The 2026 primaries are resurfacing controversies about mail-in ballots that were at the heart of election disputes in 2020.

California’s June 2 primary – in which candidates from every party ran together and the top two advanced to the general election – raised eyebrows because of its so-called “red mirage.” A mirage is a misleading early count that can temporarily show a candidate ahead in a race, sometimes by a significant margin.

For example, early Election Day returns showed Republican Steve Hilton leading for California governor and Republican Spencer Pratt among the top two candidates for Los Angeles mayor. However, 4 out of 5 California voters return their ballots by mail, so as additional mail ballots were counted, leads changed. Hilton narrowly held on to second place, but Pratt fell into third place and off the November ballot entirely.

Rumors swirled that a late “ballot dump” in Los Angeles had seen Pratt receiving zero votes out of 24,000. These reports were debunked by PolitiFact, but they were reminiscent of claims six years ago.

In the 2020 presidential election, when Donald Trump led early in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and other crucial states, only to have that lead evaporate under the weight of mail ballots, he claimed a rigged election. This year, those claims returned, as Trump declared on Truth Social, his social media platform, on June 8: “Not possible for Spencer Pratt to have lost the L.A. runoffs after the big lead he had. 3rd World Nation. Rigged Elections!”

I am the associate director of the Institute of American Civics, and my teaching and research focuses on American political institutions, elections and public policy. I’ve been writing about American elections since 1992, and over the past three decades, I’ve followed with interest the growth of mail voting.

The controversy over mail ballot elections has become a microcosm of our polarized politics, with one narrative assuming mass fraud lies behind every electoral mirage, and another denying that there can be legitimate concerns about mail ballot elections. Both narratives warrant scrutiny.

Today, eight states use all mail ballot elections: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont and Washington. In those states, registered........

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