Frequently Asked Questions About the November 4, 2025, Statewide Special Election

Any registered voter in California may vote in the 2025 Statewide Special Election. If you are registered to vote in San Bernardino County, you can check your voter registration status at My Elections Gateway on the Registrar of Voters website or visit VoterStatus.sos.ca.gov.

Proposition 50 is the only contest appearing on the 2025 Statewide Special Election ballot.

Voters can review the Secretary of States’ Voter Information Guide [pdf] to learn about this contest.

You have four ways to cast a ballot this election.

  1. Vote by Mail
  2. Mail Ballot Drop-Box Location
  3. Early Vote Site
  4. Polling Place

Your assigned polling place is listed on the bottom of the first page of your abbreviated Voter Information Guide. You may also use Polling Place Look-up tool to find your polling place.

In addition to voting by mail or using a mail ballot drop-box, the Registrar of Voters office opens for early voting on Monday, October 6.

Early voting at five additional locations will be available from Thursday, October 30 through Tuesday, November 4. Visit the Early Vote page for locations and hours.

Polling places will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Election Day, Tuesday, November 4. Voters are encouraged to vote early to beat the rush at polling places on Election Day.

Pursuant to California Elections Code section 3000.5, every active registered voter in the county is mailed a ballot. Mail ballots will be delivered to the United States Postal Service beginning October 6. For this election, the County Voter Information Guides are included in each mail ballot packet.

If you do not receive a mail ballot, you can request a replacement ballot in person from the Registrar of Voters, an Early Vote site or a polling place. If you want the ballot mailed to you, use the Replacement Mail Ballot Application [pdf] or call the Registrar of Voters at 909-387-8300.

Alternatively, you may authorize another person to pick-up your mail ballot at the Registrar of Voters or an Early Vote site with an Application to Provide Vote-By-Mail Ballot to an Authorized Representative [pdf]

Note: If you request a replacement ballot, the Registrar of Voters will suspend the mail ballot you did not receive so someone else cannot use it to vote.

For your mail ballot to be counted, your ballot must be:

  • Postmarked no later than 8 p.m. on Election Day, November 4, 2025;
  • Dropped-off at any polling place by 8 p.m. on Election Day;
  • Delivered to the Registrar of Voters by 8 p.m. on Election Day; or
  • Deposited into a mail ballot drop box by 8 p.m. on Election Day.

You can track when your ballot is mailed, received, and accepted for counting through the Secretary of State’s Where’s My Ballot tracking system. You can sign up to receive notifications about the status of your mail ballot via email, text message, or by telephone. Sign up at WheresMyBallot.sos.ca.gov.

You may use one of the following two websites to look up the status of your ballot:

  • My Voter Status on the Secretary of State’s website allows you to look up the status of your ballot.
  • My Elections Gateway on the Registrar of Voters’ website allows you to look up the status of your ballot if you voted by mail.
    • If you have cast a mail ballot, the status of your ballot will remain “received” until after we certify the election results. After certification, your mail ballot status will update to “counted” or “not counted.”
    • If you voted at a polling place, your voting history will not be immediately available on My Elections Gateway. You will be able to view your voting history after the election results are certified to see that you voted in this election.

If you receive this message, you will have an opportunity to resolve the issue with your mail ballot up until two days before the Registrar of Voters certifies the results of the election.

The most common mail ballot issues are:

  • Voter did not sign the mail ballot return envelope
  • Signature on the mail ballot return envelope does not compare to the signature in the voter’s registration record
  • First-time voter did not provide sufficient identification information when registering to vote and must provide ID when voting the first time

Voters may return a Signature Verification and Unsigned Identification Envelope Statement [pdf], or a copy of their ID by dropping a copy off at the Registrar of Voters office, by mail, by fax, or by emailing a photographed or scanned copy of the statement or ID.

At polling places, voters will be able to mark their choices using a ballot marking device that will print the ballot after the voter makes their choices. Voters will cast their paper ballot by placing it in a green ballot box.

On Election Night, the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters releases unofficial results of ballots received from polling places and mail ballots received prior to Election Day.

These results are cumulative, and updates are released throughout the night. The first results will be posted by 8:30 p.m. on Election Night.

Election Night ballot counting continues until all in-person ballots cast at polling places have been counted. Though ballot counting may be completed for the night, the Registrar of Voters will continue to process and count additional ballots in the weeks following the election.

The canvass for the 2025 Statewide Special Election begins November 5, and the results will be certified by the Registrar of Voters on December 2, 2025.

The Registrar of Voters must certify election results on December 2. The California Secretary of State is required to certify election results no later than December 12.3

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