Elon Musk slams delay in California vote count, praises India's poll system

Billionaire businessman Elon Musk on Sunday took a swipe at the US' electoral process with California yet to officially announce results of the presidential polls, more than two weeks after it was held, and drew a contrast with the voting processes in India

The Tesla CEO Elon Musk praised India's election process, highlighting that the country was able to count a staggering 640 million votes in just one day.

Sharing a post on X, the social media platform that he owns, Musk wrote, "India counted 640 million votes in 1 day. California is still counting votes." He also posted a facepalm emoji with his post to express his resentment.

In contrast, Musk noted that California is still struggling to count its votes, which he termed as "tragic" in response to a meme posted by an X user.

Donald Trump won a second term as President of the United States after securing 295 electoral votes in the 2024 presidential election, defeating Democratic rival Kamala Harris, who garnered 226 votes.  Following his victory, President-elect Donald Trump has moved swiftly with finalising his foreign policy and national security team ahead of his formal inauguration in January 2025.

Notably, California has the largest number of registered voters in the United States--over 22 million registered voters.

According to the website of the California Secretary of State, on election night, county elections officials must begin reporting results to the Secretary of State no more than two hours after they begin tallying votes after the polls close. County elections officials then continue to report results periodically throughout election night until all precinct vote totals have been reported.

First election results are typically ballots received before election day, which include vote-by-mail ballots and early voting location ballots. County elections officials may begin opening and processing vote-by-mail ballot envelopes up to 29 days before election day, but those results cannot be accessed or shared with the public until all polls close on election day.

Election results posted on election night are semi-official results based on the in-person ballots cast at voting locations on Election Day, any early voted ballots cast in person prior to election day, and any vote-by-mail ballots received and processed prior to election day.

By law, California county elections officials have 30 days, also known as the canvass period, to count every valid ballot and conduct a required post-election audit. During the official canvass, elections officials are required to conduct a public 1 per cent manual tally of the ballots tabulated by the county's voting system in order to verify the accuracy of the automated count.

During the 30-day canvass period, county elections officials process and count provisional ballots, ballots from voters who registered and voted conditionally (Same Day Voter Registration), and vote-by-mail ballots postmarked by election day and received within seven days of the election.

This process includes a comparison of signatures on envelopes to the signatures on file. If a signature is missing or does not compare to the signature on file, state law requires county elections officials to reach out to voters to verify their signature to ensure that their ballot can be counted. By law, voters are allowed to verify their signature up to two days before the county certifies their results. These processes ensure that all valid votes cast by eligible voters can be counted, and hence, it takes longer for California to count ballots.