Nearly one week remains before election day in the United States this year (November 5), and the Republican voter turnout continues to surpass that of previous election cycles, with 45 states conducting early voting.
According to statistics from the University of Florida Election Lab on the evening of October 28, nearly 47.5 million Americans have already voted in the 2024 election, with 24.24 million casting their votes in person and over 23.38 million opting for mail-in ballots, representing almost one-third of the 158.4 million American voters in 2020.
With early voting in Florida, New Jersey, New York, and Michigan (Michigan being a battleground state offering in-person early voting for the first time) kicking off over the weekend, Americans in 45 states can now cast their votes in person ahead of the election day on November 5.
Starting from October 30 in Oklahoma, voters can cast their ballots four days early, while Kentucky allows three days of early in-person voting starting from October 31.
Meanwhile, Louisiana closed early voting on October 29, and Maine, Tennessee, and Maryland closed their early voting on October 31. Alabama, Mississippi, and New Hampshire do not allow in-person early voting.
Since the first batch of ballots was cast in late September, Republicans have outnumbered Democrats in voting in person ahead of election day, while Democrats have cast the most mail-in ballots, although not reaching the numbers of 2020.
In recent election cycles, Democrats have had higher early voting rates than Republicans, but according to the Election Lab report on October 28, in 30 states with partisan voter registration, data from 26 states show that only 14 states have a higher early voting rate for registered Democrats than registered Republicans.
According to a study by the M.I.T. Election Data and Science Lab, around 60% of Democrats and 32% of Republicans voted by mail in 2020.
If the current trend continues, the gap in 2024 may not be as significant, as Republicans are responding to leaders’ calls to vote early, either in person or by mail, contrary to the situation in 2020, especially in northern states.
Scholars believe this trend is particularly evident in the seven battleground states that will determine the election results of former President Donald Trump and Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
In Arizona, early voting started on October 8, and as of October 27, over 1.4 million voters had either mailed in their ballots or voted at the county election office.
In Georgia, with early voting starting on October 15, a record-high of 328,000 voters cast their ballots on the first day. By October 28, out of 7.22 million voters, over 3 million (about 42%) had voted, with nearly 2.72 million voting in person.
The North Carolina State Election Board data shows that as of October 27, over 2.82 million voters out of 7.81 million registered voters had cast their ballots. Republican voters outnumbered Democrats in early in-person voting by about 16,200 votes, with 920,386 unaffiliated voters participating as well.
In Pennsylvania, data from the Election Lab indicates that out of 1.414 million returned ballots, registered Democrats accounted for 58%, Republicans nearly 31.5%, and non-affiliated voters 10.4%. The Republican voting rate of over 30% is a significant increase from 23% in 2020.
In Michigan, during the first in-person early voting period starting from October 26, the state’s Election Dashboard reported over 1.5 million ballots returned out of 2.345 million requested. In Wisconsin, another battleground state, nearly 860,000 voters have cast their ballots in person since early voting began on October 22.
In Nevada, Republicans lead Democrats by over 32,000 votes in early in-person voting, with 39.7% to 34.7%, while an additional 164,519 unaffiliated voters have also participated in early voting. Democrats are ahead in mail-in ballots, but a significant number have been rejected.
All Nevada voters automatically receive mail-in ballots, unless they opt out. In 2020, President Biden won the state by a margin of 2.4 percentage points.