Election: 1-in-4 Lancaster County voters have already cast their ballot
LINCOLN, Neb. (KOLN) - With exactly two weeks until Election Day, approximately 25% of Lancaster County voters have voted early. That’s slightly above the Nebraska total, which shows about 21% of registered Nebraska voters have cast their ballot.
Election Commissioner Dave Shively said about 50,000 early ballots have been returned, either through the mail or via in-person voting. Ballots were first sent out on September 28 and in-person voting started on October 5.
Political Party | Early Request or In-Person | Percent of Total |
---|---|---|
Republican | 28,419 | 34.1% |
Democrat | 38,560 | 46.2% |
Nonpartisan | 15,691 | 18.8% |
Libertarian | 719 | 0.9% |
Total | 83,389 | 100% |
Also, according to voter data updated on September 30 on the Lancaster County Election Commissioner’s website, Lancaster County has surpassed 200,000 registered voters for the first time ever. That’s about a 2.5% increase in the last 30 days. As of August 30, there were 195,824 registered voters.
Political Party | City of Lincoln | Rural Lancaster | Total | Percent of Voters |
---|---|---|---|---|
Republican | 66,900 | 12,391 | 79,291 | 39.6% |
Democrat | 66,367 | 5,520 | 71,887 | 35.9% |
Libertarian | 3,015 | 284 | 3,299 | 1.6% |
Nonpartisan | 41,354 | 4,647 | 46,001 | 22.9% |
Total | 177,636 | 22,842 | 200,478 | 100% |
Despite Republicans outnumbering Democrats in Lancaster County by about 7,400 voters, more than 10,000 more Democrats have cast their ballot in Lancaster County than Republicans so far.
10/11 NOW also requested information from Nebraska’s Secretary of State, which shows 262,313 ballots have been cast from 1,252,089 registered Nebraska voters, or about 21% of voters.
Political Party | Registered Voters | Percent of Voters | Requested Ballots | Request Rate | Returned Ballots | Return Rate |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Republicans | 599,087 | 47.8% | 218,030 | 36.4% | 102,909 | 47.2% |
Democrats | 366,099 | 29.2% | 180,730 | 49.4% | 114,640 | 63.4% |
Libertarian | 17,194 | 1.4% | 3,989 | 23.2% | 1,724 | 43.2% |
Nonpartisan | 269,709 | 21.5% | 86,032 | 31.9% | 43,040 | 50.0% |
Total | 1,252,089 | 100% | 488,781 | 39.0% | 262,313 | 53.7% |
Based on State data, a higher percentage of Democrats are requesting early ballots and returning early ballots, however, registered Democrats are outnumbered by about 233,000 voters in Nebraska.
In Nebraska, every voter was sent an early ballot request form, but the form needs to be filled out and returned to the local county election commissioner in order to then get a ballot in the mail.
Over the last two months, the number of registered voters in Nebraska has increased by nearly 24,000 statewide, or about 2%. Republican registration is outpacing Democrat registration, as Republicans increased by 13,211 voters or about 2.3% between August and October. During that same time frame, Democrats increased by 6,016 voters, or about 1.6%.
The General Election is November 3.
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