Supreme Court rejects Trump bid to alter California vote count Play

The Trump administration went to the United States Supreme Court on Monday morning and requested to radically alter the vote count procedure in Los Angeles. Less than three hours after that request was filed, the Supreme Court turned it down.

The vote count all across California will start at 8 p.m. Tuesday. Malibu may see results from the city council race around 9 p.m., but those early votes may not be very accurate and should not be trusted on the first run. In years past, most votes have been counted by around 10 or 11 at night, but this year the ballot counting procedure may be significantly different. Election observers may be at the vote count down in Norwalk, and that could delay reporting.

The Supreme Court ruling in Washington was not signed. It was issued just a few hours after the White House filed its request. The governor said the highest court in the land firmly slapped down the Trump Department of Justice's baseless attack on California's electoral process.

The Trump Justice Department had argued that once California commingles the challenged ballots with lawful ones, there is no way to get the challenged ballots back. They lost. The vote count will proceed Tuesday at 8 p.m.

California goes to extraordinary lengths to count every single possible vote. The U.S. mail system has up to a week to deliver ballots with the proper postmarks. If you insist on handing in your ballot Tuesday, take it to an election center, not the U.S. mail. A seasoned reporter would guess, based on past turnout, that 80% of the ballots in Malibu have already been cast.

Four city council candidates are on the ballot this year: challenger Amir Sam Dibaei, incumbent Marianne Riggins, challenger Danny Smith, and incumbent Doug Stewart. KBUU will broadcast national election results from Democracy Now starting at 6 p.m. Tuesday. Local election results will be on malibu.fm as they come in, with full coverage Wednesday.