Despite concerns over alleged attempts at voter suppression, Georgia residents are already showing record-breaking turnout in this year’s midterm elections.
After one week of early voting, in-person voting is pacing ahead of the 2020 election, according to the Savannah Morning News.
“There are real contests going on, there’s a tremendous amount of advertising that’s taking place, and under those conditions, a voter will potentially feel like it’s really important that he or she goes and registers their own preferences, where as in a low visibility kind of contest, a lot of voters wouldn’t be aware it’s taking place,” said Charles Bullock, a University of Georgia political science professor.
Georgia broke records the first week of early voting when 131,318 people voted in-person, 70,849 more than in 2018, and close to the 136,739 who cast ballots in 2020.
As of Sunday Oct. 23, roughly 740,ooo voters had cast an in-person ballot, with 79,682 voting in a single day on Saturday Oct. 22.
Saturday’s turnout marked a 159 percent increase from day-six voting in 2018, and shattered the turnout record of day-six early voting in the 2020 presidential election by 20 percent, the Georgia Secretary of State’s office said.
“Early Voting is strong because Georgia’s Voter Registration system is strong,” said Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. “Every eligible Georgian who wants to be registered to vote is registered to vote. Georgians have taken advantage of Automatic Voter Registration at the DDS, online, and kept up with their status on My Voter Page.”
“Nearly 50% of early voters were white, while Hispanic and Asian voters each made up about 1% of turnout,” according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC). “Black voters accounted for about 39% of Georgia’s early voters, higher than their 29% share of the state’s registered voters, according to an analysis of election data by the AJC.”
Georgia has more than seven-and-a-half million registered voters, with roughly 6.9 million considered “active” by the Secretary of State’s office.
