Again, a cautionary tale: this may be an early trend that reverts back to the norm of what we saw in 2012's general election when it comes to accepted mail-in ballots, but this first week seems to indicate a potential strong interest in this year's general election.
First, here's the breakdown of requested ballots and their status (the first line are ballots that have not be returned) through Friday, Sept. 16:
Over 50,000 ballots have been requested, with nearly 1,500 returned and accepted as votes (there are nearly 150 ballots returned that were deficient in some way).
Next, I tracked the cumulative accepted mail-in ballots by party registration over the past week:
Next is the comparison to the same day as in 2012 and where things stand in 2016. While registered Democrats in 2012 took an early lead, by a week and a half into the returned 2012 mail-in and accepted ballots period, registered Republicans took the lead and maintained it for the rest of the period leading up to the November election.
Right now, total returned and accepted ballots are running at 300 percent of the same day in 2012, with the following breakdowns by party registration:
- Registered Democrats: 316 percent ahead of where they were the same day in 2012
- Registered unaffiliated voters: 461 percent ahead of where they were the same day in 2012
- Registered Republicans: 234 percent ahead of where they were the same day in 2012
Finally, of the nearly 48,500 ballots requested that are still outstanding, the percentage breakdown by party registration is:
