On or before the March 5 primary, 104 voters in Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties mailed their ballots.
Legally, those ballots should have been counted, barring a problem like a ballot envelope signature not matching what’s on file.
But they weren’t tallied because registrars of voters in these counties received the ballots after March 12 — the final day that on-time mail-in ballots could be accepted.
While Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties processed more than 3 million primary votes, ballots postmarked on time but arriving too late — however few — pose a challenge for California elections that rely heavily on ballots mailed to every registered voter.
“While this amount may not make any difference in the election results, it certainly makes a difference to the integrity of the process,” Robert Tyler of the Murrieta-based law firm Advocates For Faith & Freedom said via email.