Florida counted more than 10 million votes on election night.
California just held a statewide primary – and officials are warning final results could take weeks.
Ron DeSantis noticed, and he had some words.
DeSantis Unloads on the Golden State
After California election officials warned that final results from the June 2 primary could take weeks – with only 54% of votes counted the day after the election – DeSantis went straight to X.
"Florida processes more than 10 million votes in a matter of hours. California takes days – or sometimes even weeks – to count the votes," he posted. "It's pathetic – and it's corrosive to our civic culture."
https://twitter.com/RonDeSantis/status/2062908774906470472?s=20
When Polymarket's prediction market showed odds shifting against Republican Spencer Pratt in the Los Angeles mayor's race as new vote batches dropped, DeSantis asked the obvious question: "California keeps dumping votes. Odds are shifting because the vote dumps always seem to go one way. Count until you get the result you want?"
Pratt – a Republican whose Pacific Palisades home burned in the 2025 wildfires – had been in second place with about 30% of the vote, ahead of socialist Democrat Nithya Raman at 23%, with incumbent Mayor Karen Bass leading at 35%.
Spencer Pratt watched it happen in real time – his odds on Polymarket ticking down with each new ballot dump, the gap between him and Raman narrowing vote batch by vote batch, days after the election closed.
The Pattern California Doesn't Want to Talk About
This isn't a 2026 anomaly.
In 2022, California's final House race results weren't called for weeks, with control of the U.S. House of Representatives hanging in the balance.
https://twitter.com/RonDeSantis/status/2062333664285876653?s=20
The same year, the California legislature codified pandemic-era rules and made universal mail-in voting permanent – sending a ballot to every registered voter whether they asked for one or not.
The result is a predictable pattern every election cycle: Republican voters return ballots early or vote in person, those ballots get counted first, and then mail ballot dumps shift the count toward Democrats as counting drags on for days and weeks.
House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil put it plainly in congressional testimony: "The longer it takes to provide the results of an election, the more voters can lose trust and become frustrated with the process."
California accepts mail ballots postmarked by Election Day and received up to a week later.
Voters then have 28 days to cure any ballot discrepancies.
Florida requires mail ballots received by 7 p.m. on Election Day – and allows counties to start counting them 22 days before the election.
Florida Proved This Problem Is Solvable
Florida wasn't always good at this.
The 2000 presidential recount made Florida a national laughingstock.
Then the state legislature rebuilt the entire system – better machines, professional training, and laws that give counties a head start on counting well before Election Day.
Florida's 2024 voter turnout hit 78.9% of registered voters – a record high. California's 2024 participation was 71.4%.
Election policy expert Andy Craig called Florida's vote-processing procedures "the gold standard" for other states to follow.
https://twitter.com/draloneboy/status/2062591456901283874?s=20
Then Nate Silver – the left's favorite numbers guy – looked at what California was doing and couldn't defend it.
"The fact that California elections often can't be resolved for weeks is kind of insane and not common in other electoral systems around the world," Silver wrote. He called it an example of "learned helplessness" and said the system "should be more stigmatized."
When DeSantis and Nate Silver are saying the same thing, California Democrats can't call it sour grapes.
California's choice to make every election take weeks isn't an accident and it isn't an inability.
It's a policy decision – one that just happens to consistently benefit one party as the late ballots roll in.
DeSantis called it "corrosive to our civic culture."
He's right.
Sources:
- Ron DeSantis, X posts, June 4, 2026.
- Danielle Wallace, "California election results expected to be delayed for days, weeks in some Los Angeles-area races," Fox News, November 8, 2022.
- Chairman Bryan Steil, Opening Remarks, House Administration Committee Hearing on California's Election Counting Process, April 2025.
- Andy Craig, "Counting votes once made Florida a laughingstock. Now it's the gold standard," The Hill, November 5, 2024.
- KABC-TV, Los Angeles Mayor Primary Live Results, June 3–4, 2026.
