Republicans have led Democrats in the key state of North Carolina as of Thursday morning, data shows.
Nearly 30 million Americans have cast early votes across the United States so far, with 12 days left until the Nov. 5 presidential election, according to the latest report. compiled electoral data.
Republicans had trailed Democrats in both early in-person and mail-in ballots in the Tar Heel State. That slight Democratic lead appears to have eroded, as Republican voters have now gained a lead of about 3,000 early votes.
About 686,497 Republicans have cast early votes in the state, compared to 683,072 Democrats, data provided by the University of Florida Election Laboratory shows. Unaffiliated or minor party voters have so far returned about 638,090 votes.
Republicans have advantages in early and mail-in voting over Democrats in both Arizona, where the party has a lead of 53,000 votes, and Snowfallwhere Republicans have returned about 12,000 more votes so far, ahead of the 2024 election, data shows.
In Pennsylvaniawhich has only reported mail-in votes as of Thursday, Democrats have gained a lead of more than 350,000 votes over Republicans, according to the election website.
Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin do not report party affiliation. More than 2.1 million have voted in Georgia, 1.3 million have voted in Michigan and more than 716,000 in Wisconsin, which opened early voting earlier this week and unleashed the system. courteous due to high participation.
More generally, it appears that more Republicans are voting early in this election than in the 2020 election.
Of the more than 28 million votes cast nationwide, 16 million of them are mail-in votes and almost 12 million are early votes, data provided by the Electoral Laboratory shows.
About half of the early votes, or about 14 million, were cast in states that report party affiliation. As of Thursday, 41.9 percent of early votes have been from Democrats, 35.3 percent were cast by Republicans and 22.9 percent are independents or belong to a minor party.
Compared to the 2020 election, Republican voters in 2024 appear to be narrowing Democrats’ lead in early voting.
Only 25.2 percent of Republican voters returned their mail-in ballots with two weeks left before the 2020 election, while Democrats saw a 52.2 percent advantage, according to 2020 data. show. About 21.4 percent of mail-in voters at the time were unaffiliated.
One week before the 2020 elections, according to the report compiled by the university dataDemocrats led the way with 52.3 percent, and Republicans saw a decrease from the previous week, to 24.5 percent of the total, while unaffiliated voters saw a small increase.
As in 2020, Republicans are embracing early in-person voting more than Democrats this year. About 40.2 percent of those votes have been cast by Republicans, compared to 31.6 percent for Democrats. four years agoRepublicans and Democrats were tied, at 40.2 percent and 37.5 percent, respectively.
North Carolina in focus
Turnout since the start of early voting last week has been surprisingly strong in North Carolina, weeks after Hurricane Helene devastated the western part of the state, leaving entire cities and communities isolated.
Voters set a state record of more than 350,000 votes cast on the first day, according to the North Carolina State Board of Elections. As of Thursday, more than 2 million ballots had been returned.
Karen Brinson Bell, executive director of the State Board of Elections, has repeatedly praised the efforts of local election workers, some of whom lost their own homes. He described the damage as unprecedented and the challenges election officials faced as daunting. During the first week of early voting, the process has proven remarkably smooth and few complaints have been voiced publicly.
“The people of the mountains are strong, and the electoral people who serve them are also resilient and tough,” he said last week.
Earlier this week, former President Donald Trump visited areas of North Carolina that were devastated by Helene and said some Americans in the region “felt helpless, abandoned and abandoned by their government.”
“In North Carolina’s hour of desperation, the American people answered the call far more than their federal government,” he said.
Vice President Kamala Harris held At a rally in Greenville in mid-October, he told a crowd that he wanted to “fight for the ideals of our country and fight to make the promise of America a reality.”
“This is not 2016 or 2020. The stakes are even higher,” he said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
