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INSIDE L.A.’S
BALLOTPLEX
▶ In a Pomona warehouse, millions of mail-in votes make the journey through
sorting, signature validation, and “extraction”▶ By Amanda Kolson Hurley
▶ Photographs by Peter AdamsLos Angeles County, the most
populous county in the U.S., has
more registered voters—5.6 million—
than the entire populations of
Mississippi, Rhode Island, Vermont,
and Wyoming combined. Because of
the pandemic, the county sent mail-
in ballots to all registered voters for
the 2020 election, a first.
When ballots were returned, they
ended up inside a vast warehouse
on the Fairplex fairgrounds in
Pomona, Calif. Before the ballots
are sent off to be counted, more
than 200 workers, in day and night
shifts, put them through a multistep
process. Officials chose Fairplex—
which hosts the L.A. County Fair innonpandemic years—as a temporary
site to accommodate the mail-in
ballots and to give workers space for
social distancing.
As of Nov. 2, almost 2.9 million
ballots had been returned in Los
Angeles County, or 50% of those
mailed out. Among registered
Democrats, 55% had submitted
their ballots, compared with 52% of
registered Republicans and 41% of
independents and members of other
parties. Presumably, some of the
voters who hadn’t returned their mail
ballots decided to vote in person
instead.◼ ELECTION Bloomberg Businessweek November 9, 2020