Fresno County sent out some wrong ballots, Clerk/Registrar of Voters James Kus said on Tuesday afternoon.

“These voters were then mailed or otherwise provided a ballot for their incorrect registration precincts, instead of the appropriate ballot based upon their registration addresses. The Department has identified a total of 11 persons who voted in the November 5, 2024, election who were affected by this error,” Kus said in a news release.

Kus said the department is investigating how the department made the mistake.

“Once the facts are determined after the investigation, the department will take all appropriate measures to protect Fresno County voters and prevent the assignment of incorrect precincts,” Kus said.

It does not appear at this point that any results will change because of the number of incorrect ballots.

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An Incorrect Ballot

Before Kus acknowledged the wrong ballots, voters contacted GV Wire to share their concerns about not receiving a correct ballot.

Rick Steitz lives in northwest Fresno near Palm and Herndon avenues. He noticed something was off when a Fresno City Council race appeared on his ballot. He lives in District 2, which wasn’t up for election on Nov. 5.

He received a ballot instead with the District 6 race between Nick Richardson and Roger Bonakdar.

As of Monday evening, Richardson led by 852 votes.

“How far does this go? I mean, I don’t have any confidence in the Fresno County Election Department anymore. They can’t even put the right dividing lines in,” said Steitz, the business agent for the City of Fresno Professional Employees Association.

Of the six district contests on Steitz’s ballot, four were correct. GV Wire investigated and discovered that his ballot would be consistent with including “East” in front of his street on the mailing address instead of “West” where he lives.

Other close races that appeared on Steitz’s ballot that should not have been there include Fresno Unified District 6 — incumbent Claudia Cazarez trails Daniel Bordona by 153 votes — and State Center Community College District 2, where incumbent Nasreen Johnson leads Pablo Villagrana by about 2,400 votes.

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Legal Consequences?

If there were more incorrect ballots, the issue could wind up in court, an election expert tells GV Wire. A candidate could challenge if the erroneous ballots are greater than the margin of victory.

“It would be up to a judge to decide whether to annul the results of the election. It’s a very unlikely outcome if the errors are administrative because the there’s no way of knowing how the voters voted. Without clear and convincing evidence that the error changed the results of the election, a judge will not annul an election,” said Matthew Alvarez, a partner with the San Francisco-based Rutan & Tucker law firm.

If the clerk can determine the actual number of incorrect ballots, he could exclude them from the final count. Alvarez said it is within the clerk’s power.

Ballots received by mail or drop boxes are separated from the envelope at the election warehouse. At that point, it is impossible to determine which ballot belonged to which voter.