In California, it took election workers to tally all the votes from last year's general election.
Because of varying election laws, some states take significantly longer than others to count ballots.
But now, legislators in and several other states — including , , and — have signaled interest in tackling vote-counting rules in an effort to speed up the process.
It's a mix of states, led by Democrats or Republicans or with divided government, and one key question is whether lawmakers can quicken results without sacrificing access to the ballot.
Some legislators and advocates say faster results would allow less time for misinformation about election administration to take hold.
But Arizona state Sen. Warren Petersen said much of the clamoring for changes in his state is coming straight from voters.
"I have never received as many calls or messages from constituents as I have regarding getting election results faster," he told NPR.
Petersen, a Republican, has introduced legislation, , aimed at speeding the count.
"I think it increases confidence in the process," he said. "I think it also eliminates the frustration of waiting for election results. When they see the rest of the nation with their results already, it's extremely frustrating to be in Arizona and getting your results so late."
Why some states take more time
Because states have different rules and procedures for how they run elections and count votes, some states always take longer than others to count all of their ballots. (And media outlets like call races before results are final.)
Sam Oliker-Friedland, executive director of the Institute for Responsive Government, said the biggest structural difference that affects how quickly a state can report results is the "proportion of ballots that are cast by mail versus in-person at a polling place." Unlike most in-person voting, mail-in ballots have to be removed from envelopes and have voter signatures or other identification information verified, before getting tabulated. And Oliker-Friedland said where and when those votes are tabulated — either at a polling place or a central location — could also affect how fast the process goes.
"The more mail ballots, the longer results are going to take," he said. "There's also a trend that the further west we get in the United States, the higher volume of mail that states generally have."
Pamela Smith — president and CEO of Verified Voting, a nonpartisan group focused on technology in elections — said many states that take more time often do so to give voters more opportunities to cast a ballot.
For example, these states often have longer cure periods, which allow eligible voters who made a mistake to and get their vote counted.
"I think what's important to think about is the balance between how fast we get results reported out and how well voters are supported for their participation," Smith said. "So, for example, if you reduce the time for voters to cure a signature problem on a ballot so that it can be counted or determined to be not countable, are you disenfranchising them in the name of 'we have to know immediately'?"
California Democratic Assemblymember Marc Berman said his state is an example of a state that often takes weeks to count votes for good reasons. Registered active voters are automatically mailed a ballot and can return it up to seven days after the election, as long as it is postmarked by Election Day.
"The reason for that is we don't want delays in the Postal Service to disenfranchise voters," he said. "But that means that our county elections officials can be getting a decent number of ballots, you know, two, three, four days after Election Day that they're going to have to process and count."
California then has a lengthy cure period, after a mail ballot has been returned.
Balancing voter access
Berman said he is "still figuring out the specifics of what the legislation will be," but said he wants to be sure to strike "a balance between accessibility" and a faster process.
"I personally will never consider a proposal that's going to water down the voting rights of Californians in exchange for things happening faster," he said. "That's not a tradeoff that I'm willing to make. It's not a tradeoff I think we need to make."
In Arizona, Petersen said he is looking to Florida as a model for how to count votes faster. The Sunshine State in recent election cycles has been lauded for reporting results .
Petersen said he met with Florida's secretary of state and staff to figure out what the state is doing differently that could potentially speed things up.
For one, Petersen said, he is proposing that Arizona, like Florida, create a cutoff on the Friday before Election Day for dropping off mail-in ballots at a polling site. The law — if passed and signed by the Democratic governor — would allow a voter to go into an election office, show ID and drop off a ballot there, but they wouldn't be able to drop it off at a polling site on Election Day, as they are currently allowed.
That's even though Petersen said "over a million voters" in Arizona drop off their mail ballots at polling sites between that Friday and Election Day. In an effort to lessen the impact on voter access, Petersen said his bill would create two more in-person early voting days.
SB 1011 would also enable faster processing of ballots that are cast early in-person by eliminating the envelope that ballots are put into. Petersen said taking each ballot out of an envelope before counting them was adding "up to two days" to the process.
Verified Voting's Smith said ballot processing is an area of election administration that can pick up speed and yet shouldn't affect access for voters.
Oliker-Friedland said he also thinks changes to could be helpful in speeding up election results, but ultimately, he thinks the goal can be addressed without changing policy.
"One of the best ways to actually intervene on something like this is not necessarily passing a new bill," he said. "It's giving more resources to the local election officials across the country that are in charge of counting ballots because those three things — people, space and equipment — all costs money that in many cases election officials don't have."
Are fast results important?
In general, Smith warns, this rising preoccupation with the speed of election results is not necessary as long as results come for when lawmakers need to be sworn in.
"I don't think it's the most important thing. I really don't," she said. "I think that what's most important is transparency and ensuring that voters have all the options, you know, that they have all the opportunities that they need in order to get the job done. And I would urge caution in changing policies to make sure that they don't reduce that access for voters."
Ultimately, Smith said, it would be useful to educate the public on why counting ballots takes time.
"I think there needs to be a shift in the mindset," she said. "Continue to say that we won't know the election results on election night. And that's OK."
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