Among these mail-in ballots:
- requests from registered Republicans are 44 percent
- from registered Democrats are 32 percent
- from unaffiliated voters are 24 percent
- women are 56 percent
- white voters are 85 percent
- black voters are 10 percent
Among the 22,293 returned and accepted mail-in ballots:
- registered Republicans are 42 percent
- registered Democrats are 36 percent
- registered unaffiliated voters are 23 percent
- women are 55 percent
- white voters are 85 percent
- black voters are 11 percent
So far, 29 percent of the requested ballots have been returned and accepted.
In terms of the percentage increase over the last mid-term election regarding mail-in ballots:
Registered Republicans are slightly below their 2010 numbers (down 3 percent), while registered unaffiliated voters are up 31 percent and Democrats are up 17 percent over their 2010 numbers.
In looking at the 2010 numbers, I also wanted to see what this year's performances in mail-in balloting by the different party registrations to a presidential year, 2012. First, I looked at the actual numbers in a comparison to both 2010 and 2012 for each party registration pool.
Registered Republicans are performing in between their 2010 and 2012 mail-in performance, so above their 2010 mid-term performance but below their 2012 presidential year performance; for both registered Democrats and unaffiliated voters, however, their numbers are more like a presidential year performance than a mid-term election.
Another way to look at this trend is by comparing the portion of registered voters in each party pool by their mail-in percentage.
Again, Republicans are acting in between their 2010 mid-term and 2012 presidential year performance, but both Democrats and unaffiliated voters are mirroring their 2012 trend line as opposed to their 2010 mid-term trend line.
Might this mean that while Republicans are performing as expected, and in fact a bit better than their mid-term year performance trend, both Democrats and unaffiliated voters are acting as if it's a presidential election year instead of a mid-term election year?
Perhaps these trend lines are indicative of the energy on the ground in North Carolina and why the U.S. Senate race is such a competitive contest.
