Saturday, October 25, 2014

2nd Day of 2014 NC In-Person Early Voting Catches Up to 2010 Numbers

In the push of early voting by the campaigns, the reduction of the number of days (but not the number of hours) from 2010 to this year seems to be mitigated by the mobilization and energy of North Carolina voters.

Among those who cast ballots in the first two days of 2014's N.C. in-person early voting, a total of 234,032 ballots have been submitted, which equates to 74 percent of the total on this date received in 2010 (reminder: 2010 was already on the 8th day of voting at this point and had 314,581 in-person early votes cast).

Total accepted ballots cast via early methods (and this includes mail-in absentee and in-person voting) is 261,636, with 48 percent coming from registered Democrats, 32 percent from registered Republicans, and 20 percent from registered unaffiliated and Libertarian voters.

Among the 234K in-person early votes cast so far:


  • 50 percent of the in-person ballots cast so far are from registered Democrats
  • 30 percent of the in-person ballots cast so far are from registered Republicans
  • 20 percent of the in-person ballots cast so far are from registered unaffiliated & Libertarian voters
  • 51 percent of the in-person ballots cast so far are from women
  • white voters make up 71 percent of the in-person ballots cast so far
  • black voters are 25 percent of the in-person ballots cast so far

Among the ballots only cast on the second day of early voting (Friday, October 24):


  • 48 percent of the in-person ballots cast were from registered Democrats
  • 31 percent of the in-person ballots cast were from registered Republicans
  • 21 percent of the in-person ballots cast were from registered unaffiliated & Libertarian voters
  • 52 percent of the in-person ballots cast were from women
  • white voters made up 73 percent of the in-person ballots cast
  • black voters made up 24 percent of the in-person ballots cast

In comparing this year's in-person early votes cast against the numbers in 2010:


Among party registration:
  • registered Democrats are 81 percent of their total same-day ballot numbers from 2010
  • registered Republicans are 60 percent of their total same-day ballot numbers from 2010
  • registered unaffiliated and Libertarian voters are 79 percent of their total same-day ballot numbers from 2010
In two days of in-person early voting in 2014, North Carolinians have cast an almost equivalent number of ballots as the first seven days in 2010.

If we take the assumption that casting in-person early ballots is a reflection of the energy and mobilization effort by the campaigns for their ground game operations, then the Democratic ground game seems to be mobilizing and energizing their voters to participate, even though the number of early voting days was reduced. It most likely is due to the mentality by Democrats of "Republicans can't reduce our impact by reducing the number of days, we'll show them." Conversely, we'll probably start to hear from Republicans that "see, Democrats still show up even though we reduced the number of days, but not hours, of early voting."

Finally, in comparing how this year's in-person early voters so far cast their ballots in 2010:


What is interesting is that both registered Unaffiliated and Democrats are getting a greater percentage of their registered voters out who didn't vote in 2010. This will be an interesting number to watch over the remainder of 2014's in-person early voting period.