The polls closed in California on Tuesday at 8 p.m. local time. As of Saturday, nobody knows which two candidates will be competing in November for governor or Los Angeles mayor. Indeed, mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day may stumble in for seven days until June 9—and still be counted. Thus, weeks could pass before these major political contests are settled. Counties have until July 3 to report their official results to the secretary of state. It was not always this way. By 5 a.m. on March 6, 2013, 100% of precincts had totaled the previous day’s ballots. Nine hours after voting ended, Angelenos knew the final two mayoral rivals. (Gil Garcetti prevailed.) As of Friday, only 71% of ballots had been tabulated in Los Angeles and just 68% statewide. Escargot can count votes more swiftly than Californians. Pundit Nate Silver calls this “failed state shit.” He observed this week via X: “The fact that California elections often can’t be resolved for weeks is kind of insane and not common in other electoral systems around the world.” Silver and Eli McKown-Dawson elaborated, “Colombia held a presidential election on Sunday [May 30], and 99.98% of the result was in on Monday morning. Japan also counts most of its votes overnight. And in the UK (not exactly a poster child for state capacity), you can generally expect to have calls for all 650 parliamentary seats the morning after the election.” California Counts President Donald Trump is not amused. “The Dumocrats are at it again!” Trump roared Thursday via Truth Social. “They are trying to STEAL THE GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA PRIMARY, AND THE MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES, PRIMARY, AWAY FROM TWO GREAT REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES. Here we go with the very late and massive numbers of MAIL IN BALLOTS.” Trump continued: “There’s BIG cheating by the Dumocrats in California. Votes are all tied up. May not be in for weeks. Under investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles. Why the vote counting DELAY???” Trump echoes conservative complaints that GOP candidates in tight races too often triumph only on Election Night. Thanks to magic ballots, these Republicans wane, and the Democrats wax and then win. Magic ballots rarely favor Republicans. California Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) Confidence Corrodes Californians are experiencing either corruption or the appearance of corruption. Neither “I am being robbed” nor “I think I am being robbed” yields deep sleep. If Democrats are using this slovenly process to slouch toward a stuffed-ballot-box defeat of Steve Hilton, Spencer Pratt, or both, the perpetrators must be handcuffed at once. But even if California’s count is purer than St. Francis of Assisi and merely looks crooked, millions of Americans will conclude that someone is cheating, and the entire system is rigged. Such suspicions corrode confidence in elections and the republic that they serve. Winners easily respect their leaders and institutions, but even citizens who lose elections can accept opponents who succeed, fair and square. But when voters feel cheated at the polls, then the whole structure starts to reek. “That’s not my mayor” and “That’s not my governor” become battle cries as America slides toward Civil War 2.0. SAVE America Act California’s pathetic performance offers yet another reason for the U.S. Senate to pry its collective butt out of the proverbial Barcalounger and pass the SAVE America Act already. Catapulting mass mail-in ballots atop the ash heap of history and limiting them to the sick, the infirm, and those absent on Election Day (as the SAVE America Act requires) would go far toward ending this nightmare. And, to be accepted, all ballots must arrive before polls close (as the U.S. Supreme Court soon might decide.) With these two reforms, California (and other states) could manage a much shorter stack of mail-in ballots. They could be counted every Election Day, with normal ballots. Winners and losers would emerge before the cocks crow at dawn. To the Republican-led Senate: Scrap mass mail-in ballots. Pass the SAVE America Act. Make Election Night Great Again!

It was the based of times, it was the woke of times, it was the age of candor, it was the age of cant, it was the epoch of sense, it was the epoch of pretense. And it was the season when firms started moving from high-tax, high-cost blue states to freedom-loving red states. ExxonMobil’s shareholders just sent a clear message: enough is enough. By a margin of 71%, they voted to move the firm’s legal home from New Jersey to Texas, overriding objections from proxy advisers Glass Lewis and ISS, which warned that the move might erode shareholder rights. You know what erodes shareholder rights? Climate litigation, ESG-driven activism, and state attorneys general who treat energy companies as political targets. New Jersey has been among the states pursuing aggressive environmental and climate-related litigation against energy companies. Of course, no modern business can entirely avoid these pressures. Commercial relationships span state lines, and policies enacted in blue states such as New Jersey and California can continue to affect companies’ operations even after they relocate their legal domicile or headquarters to red states such as Texas. The redomiciliation, at any rate, makes sense. Exxon has operated out of Texas since 1989. Its New Jersey incorporation was a legal relic, a 140-year-old address with no operational meaning. But relocation alone should not be mistaken for broader reform. Firms can, after all, change their state of incorporation while maintaining the same (often woke) operational structure, workplace policies, and business practices. Texas has, by comparison, established a corporate legal framework that emphasizes business operations over broader social policy objectives. Recent statutory changes have made derivative suits more difficult to bring, strengthened protections for directors, and codified aspects of the business judgment rule. The Wall Street Journal editorial board highlights that New Jersey’s corporate tax rate has ranked among the highest in the nation, reaching 11.5% for many large corporations, whereas Texas has no corporate income tax whatsoever. Industrial electricity costs are also lower in Texas than in New Jersey. The regulatory climate (like the sunshine and weather) is friendlier down south. Exxon isn’t the first to notice: SpaceX, Tesla, Coinbase, and Chevron have all made the same calculation. There is a legitimate concern worth acknowledging. Texas’s new director-friendly statutes could, in the wrong hands, entrench management against legitimate shareholder challenges. Exxon alleges that it won’t adopt “any elective provisions” under the Texas statutory scheme “that weaken shareholder rights as compared to New Jersey law.” And that’s the right call. But a pledge is not a biblical covenant. Could the company formalize those commitments in its governing documents, with any future changes requiring majority shareholder approval? Possibly. Boards that trust their own stewardship shouldn’t fear putting that in writing. Courts, however, have recognized that contractual arrangements that unduly constrain a board’s ability to exercise its fiduciary duties—absent a fiduciary-out mechanism—may be impermissible in merger negotiations. Although that reasoning presumably does not apply to charter or bylaw provisions, the comparison raises an interesting issue. Federalism works, it seems, as designed. States compete for corporate charters. That competition disciplines them toward better governance. Texas has made its case: lower costs, cleaner legal frameworks, less exposure to politicized litigation. And corporations, no surprise, are responding. The migration of capital and enterprise to the Lone Star State—and other red states—is a market verdict. The deeper question is whether corporate boards have an obligation to shareholders to reconsider domicile when a state’s tax burden, regulatory hostility, and litigation climate consistently destroy value. The answer looks like yes. Talent, network advantages, and inertia may keep some companies tethered to California or New York for now. But Austin and Nashville are no longer afterthoughts. ExxonMobil has moved toward operational reality and away from a jurisdiction that had made itself hostile to the business of business. Other boards should be asking whether their own legal addresses still make sense or are just bad habits to break. In a republic built on divided sovereignty, the freedom to exit is one of the most powerful checks on bad governance. Texas is winning. New Jersey and its blue-state counterparts are losing. It is, in the end, a tale of two states. One offers stability, clarity, and the quiet confidence of a jurisdiction that trusts enterprise to create value. The other offers the best of intentions and the worst of incentives: high taxes, regulatory hostility, and a plaintiff’s bar that never sleeps. For ExxonMobil, the choice between them was not close.

On June 6, 1876, as the United States approached its centennial anniversary, President Ulysses S. Grant addressedthe youth of America. “My advice … no matter their denomination,” is to hold fast to faith, to not merely know one’s religious precepts, but to live them. By Grant’s counsel, in this would be the flourishing of the American nation. He concluded with a proverb—“Righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people”—a verse also inscribed in Robert Muir’s painting “Peace and War” in the West Point chapel, which Grant no doubt contemplated as a student. These words were more than a ceremonial message from a sitting president and former Civil War general. They were a warning, a lesson, and a charge to the next generation: What we inherit can be lost—unless we have the character to keep it. Grant’s letter was first published in Sunday School Times, but due to its relevance and impact for all Americans, it also appeared in The New York Timesa few days later—and again nine years later on the front page. At the heart of the eighteenth president’s 1876 lesson is this: a nation’s strength is not ultimately measured by its wealth, weapons, or political victories, but by the values its citizens are willing to preserve, even when doing so becomes unpopular. Values are the measure of a nation’s enduring worth. That is why President Grant’s message matters today—especially as religious liberty becomes increasingly contested in public life. When Grant wrote to America’s youth, he was speaking to citizens who would shape the next century. The Civil War had ended, but the nation still bore deep scars. Americans were trying to rebuild not only cities and economies, but unity itself—the very idea of America. The question was whether the country would be held together by more than lines on a map, but whether it could be held together by principle. Grant’s letter recognized that the survival of American freedom would depend on whether young Americans embraced responsibility and character, not just rights. That same reality confronts us today, and Grant’s challenge still rings true for all citizens as the U.S. nears its 250th Anniversary in July 2026. The freedoms secured by the Constitution—including the free exercise of religion—do not survive by accident. They survive only when citizens mutually recognize that liberty is not guaranteed, but that it must be understood, cherished, and protected. This is how we maintain the America we know and love. However, the first freedom mentioned in the First Amendment—religious liberty—is often treated today as a niche political cause, relevant only to certain voters or certain faith traditions. But this is wrong. Religious liberty is a foundational American promise: No government has the authority to dictate what a person must believe, how he or she must worship, or what convictions he or she must abandon in order to participate in public life. Quite the contrary. Each citizen has the individual right to embrace the faith—or no faith at all—by his or her own choosing, without fear of being silenced or punished. At least, that is what the Founders intended. Sadly, true freedom of religion (an important foundation of principle that Grant spoke of) has not been the reality for many American citizens shunned, bullied, and punished for their faith by government officials or employers who seem to have forgotten what freedom really means. The First Amendment did not invent religious liberty. Rather, it recognizes a foundational truth that the Founders already knew: Conscience is not the property of the state, and it must be tenaciously protected. Otherwise, America is doomed to repeat the folly of other nations in history. Freedom of religion matters. Principle matters. It has mattered for 250 years, and it will matter for another 250 years if we want to see an America that we recognize and are proud of for generations to come. The Founders’ recognition of religious liberty was a declaration that the state is limited, that the government, military, schools, or city councils cannot reach into the human soul and command a specific allegiance. That limit is one of the greatest protections a people can ever possess. The wisdom of the Founding Fathers was anchored in a sober view of human nature and a profound trust that true liberty requires something beyond mankind’s own power. Their understanding of rights was inseparable from the conviction that rights come from God, not government, meaning the government’s role is not to grant liberty, but to protect it. So, as America nears its 250th anniversary this July, Grant’s challenge of faith and freedom still remains just as strong as it did at the centennial: What we inherit can be lost, unless we have the character to keep it. May we have the character to stand on principle and protect the First Freedom, freedom of religion, for that will determine where America stands at the next centennial.   We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of the Daily Signal.

It would be better for boys if society stopped expecting them to act like girls. A Texas mom recently shared a video of her son at his kindergarten graduation. The clip shows him squirming in his chair, playing with his hands and stretching over his seat. She captioned the video, “You’re six and the ceremony enters minute 37.” The footage went viral because the boy is cute and the situation is so relatable for parents. But for boys, moments like this are no laughing matter. Think about most modern early elementary classrooms. Many teachers want students to spend hours a day sitting, listening, reading or writing by themselves. This is certainly well-intentioned. Self-control is important and helps students with formal education. For many young boys, however, it’s a form of cruel and unusual punishment. Little boys are bundles of energy. Their natural state is restlessness. Left alone, they bounce off walls, dig in the dirt and tussle with each other. This level of activity produces frequent bursts of noise. While some girls fit this description, it’s endemic among boys. One reason is that young girls mature faster than boys. At an earlier age, their bodies are ready to sit and be still. As boys age, their restlessness declines. This sets up young boys for failure in most classrooms. Sitting still is a prerequisite for success and some boys can’t do that for minutes, let alone hours, at a time. School doesn’t need to be torturous for boys. One relatively easy improvement would be for schools to have more recess. This playtime provides a healthy outlet for all this energy. It’s much easier for boys and girls to sit and learn after running around and playing ball or tag. Growing up, I had three daily recesses and lunch, along with physical education classes. Today, many schools offer a single 15-20-minute recess that is sometimes smooshed together with lunch. Yes, more recess would mean less time in the classroom. If boys were robots to program, this idea wouldn’t make sense. But since they are human bundles of energy, it’s an obvious first step. Because they mature more slowly, many boys should start school a year later. In some places, they already are. In 2022, The Atlantic reported that starting boys a year later “is an open secret in elite circles.” Further, “a delayed school entry is now close to the norm for boys who would otherwise be on the young side.” Nevada has done the opposite. In 2023, the Legislature and Gov. Joe Lombardo lowered. Clark County School District Superintendent Jhone Ebert and many politicians want to expand pre-K. A 2022 Vanderbilt University study looked at third through sixth graders who used Tennessee’s Pre-K program. “A negative effect was also found for disciplinary infractions, attendance and receipt of special education services,” the researchers wrote. Go figure that sticking 3-and 4-year-old boys in a structured classroom environment doesn’t end well. Apparently, many supposed education experts haven’t spent much time around young boys. More substantial changes are needed. The rise of fatherless households has been a disaster for boys. Society must tell men how vital it is that they get married and raise their children. Boys need male role models. Elementary schools aren’t providing many. Men account for only 11% of elementary school teachers. More male teachers would help, although that’s easier said than done. Boys also need times when they are only around boys and men. But the Boy Scouts now accepts girls. That’s a major loss for boys, even as groups like Trail Life are working to provide them with new options. It’s time to help boys, not just be amused at their aggressive fidgeting. COPYRIGHT 2026 CREATORS.COM We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of the Daily Signal.

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—With the midterms less than five months away, Americans for Prosperity Action is engaged in another ad campaign in support of Sen. Jon Husted, R-Ohio, ahead of his special election. Husted, who was appointed to office by Gov. Mike DeWine in January 2025 to replace Vice President JD Vance, is facing former Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown, who lost a race in 2024 to now-Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno. The latest ads focus on Brown’s establishment candidate status and record in Ohio, as well as a “new normal” of higher prices that Brown would have to offer. Husted, of course, is depicted as offering a different path forward. The ads began on June 2 and will last through June 30. AFP Action spent $1.75 million on the ad buy, with $750,000 for digital/streaming and $1 million for cable and broadcast TV. The group expects to reach about 1.75 million individuals. As the ads suggest, AFP Action is focused on affordability. Donovan O’Neil, a senior advisor for AFP Action, told the Daily Signal that this is the group’s “top-tier issue.” “What everything comes back to … is affordability and making sure families—working families, in particular, in a blue-collar state like Ohio—have somebody fighting for them in Washington,” O’Neil said. O’Neil said Brown has been in Washington for decades and “consistently voted for policies that made gas prices, among many other things, more expensive.” He added that the ads “help drive that message and complement the work our teams have been doing.” O’Neil also said voters in Ohio are frustrated and need to see a contrast between the two candidates to help inform their vote in November. “They want to know that the person they’re voting for has affordability at the top of mind,” O’Neil explained, and that there’s a reason why “they retired him two years ago.” During his earlier work in the Ohio Statehouse as speaker, Husted focused on education and cutting taxes. As Ohio’s secretary of state, and also as lieutenant governor, he worked to ease regulations on businesses. O’Neil says AFP supports Husted especially for his role in the Working Families Tax Cuts and permitting reform. “Sen. Husted’s been at the forefront of the issues that he knows Washington hasn’t been able to solve yet, and he’s committed to staying focused on those solutions,” he offered. The Cook Political Report regards the race between Husted and Brown as a “toss-up.” The winner of the special election will be up for reelection again in 2028.