NBC: 8 Million Have Voted Early, Beating 2016

More than 8 million people across the country already have voted in the midterm elections, hundreds of thousands more than in 2016, NBC News reports.

The number of early or absentee ballots already counted has reached 8,156,995, over 200,000 more than the number cast by this point in 2016, according to data from TargetSmart. Republican-affiliated voters account for about 44 percent of early voters, while Democrat-affiliate voters amount to 40 percent of early voters.

According to University of Florida political science professor Michael McDonald, as many as 11 million have voted early this year.

“If these patterns persist, we could see a turnout rate at least equaling the turnout rate in 1966, which was 48 percent, and if we beat that then you have to go all the way back to 1914, when the turnout rate was 51 percent,” he told The New York Times. “We could be looking at a turnout rate that virtually no one has ever experienced.”

TargetSmart chief executive Tom Bonier added that generally, “Republicans tend to run up the score early with the absentee vote, Democrats come back strong with a pretty massive surge in in-person early voting, then on Election Day the vote tends to be closer to parity with a slight Republican lead. Republicans tend to have to play catch up on Election Day.”

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