The mobilization of American voters in the midterm elections is already making an impact with fewer than two weeks to go until Election Day on November 3. Early voting, which has begun in more than 30 states, is setting records in some of them. More than 16 million voters have already cast their ballots, most of them by mail.
Monday was the first day of early voting in Texas, one of the key states in the Senate race between Republican Ken Paxton and Democrat James Talarico. In Harris County, the state’s largest, 104,000 votes were cast, a record for the midterms. Dallas County also surpassed its all-time record.
Early voting generally favors the party that shows the most enthusiasm, and in these midterms, that party is the Democrats. According to data from the University of Florida, of the votes already cast, 47.4% are from Democratic voters and 29.2% from Republican voters.
Donald Trump’s low approval ratings — weighed down by an endless war in Iran, high fuel prices, the rising cost of living, and an aggressive immigration policy — augur losses for Republican candidates. The GOP is fighting to maintain control of both chambers of Congress, and polls predict they will lose their majority.
Early voting is also showing high turnout in the states of Georgia and North Carolina. In the former nearly 30% of the total votes cast in 2022 have already been cast; in the latter the figure is close to 25%. In Georgia more than 190,000 votes were cast on the first day of early voting, breaking the record set four years ago.
Of the more than 16 million votes already cast, just over 10 million were sent by mail. During the campaign Trump repeatedly and unsuccessfully sought to impose strict limits on this form of voting, which tends to benefit Democrats. Latinos are among the groups most likely to vote by mail because it is harder for them to get time off work to go to the polls.
Polls show many Latinos who backed Trump in the 2024 presidential election — and whose votes were crucial to his return to the White House — plan this time to support Democratic candidates. In Florida, a state with 6.7 million Hispanics among its 23.3 million residents, early voting has begun in only a few counties — it will be mandatory statewide starting October 24 — but nearly 20% of the total number of voters for 2022 had already cast their ballots.
More states will join early voting in the coming days. Maryland will begin this Thursday and New York on October 24. Across the country, 47 states and Washington, D.C., allow voters to cast ballots before Election Day without providing a reason. The only jurisdictions that still require a documented reason for doing so are Alabama, Mississippi, and New Hampshire. In some states early voting ends on October 29, while in others it continues through November 3.
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