Brown on Business

November 2-8, 2020

Record early voting totals show American resilience amid pandemic

By Wesley Brown
wesley@dailydata.com

Regardless of the outcome of Tuesday’s presidential election, the COVID-19 pandemic will be the biggest referendum at the polls even though it is not officially on the ballot. However, the ongoing health crisis that is still seeking a cure has not prevented what is expected record voter turnout in Arkansas and across the nation, both by mail and in-person.

Data compiled by the United States Elections Project, housed at the University of Florida’s (UAF) Department of Politic Science in Gainesville, Fla., showed that 136.7 million Americans participated in the 2016 election in the president race that pitted Republican Donald Trump against Democrat Hillary Clinton. At the time, the estimated voting population was more than 245.5 million, which put the turnout at 55.67%. 

Similar data compiled by the Arkansas Secretary of State’s Office shows that 1,130,635 cast a vote for the nation’s highest political prize in 2016 with 60.6% voting for Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, while Democratic runner-up Clinton and running mate Tim Kaine garnered 33.7% of the presidential votes. Turnout in that election was highest since 2014.

Based on recent primary elections and the 2018 midterm elections, UAF political science professor Michael McDonald in early 2020 projected 65%-66% of eligible voters will turn out for the Nov. 3 election, the highest since 1908 when turnout was 65.7%. With just a over week left in 2020 contest pitting the Trump-Pence ticket against Democrat challenger Joe Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris, a California native, McDonald calls the early mail and in-person voting tallies “stunning.” 

As of Oct. 25, just over a week before Election Day on Nov. 3, McDonald’s estimates that almost 60 million people have already voted, representing a huge swath of the U.S. electorate. That vote tally is more than the 47.2 million pre-election votes in the 2016 general election. It is also more than the 58 million in-person and mail ballots cast in 2016, which includes mail ballots that were dropped off on Election Day or post marked by Election Day and received by election offices afterwards.

“Nationally, the 2020 early vote is greater than 43% of all votes cast in the 2016 election,” McDonald wrote on his weekly blog report. “The pace of some states’ early voting is such that with almost certainty states will begin surpassing their total 2016 total vote this week.” 

In his weekly pre-election analysis, McDonald noted U.S. voters be sent an unprecedented number of at least 87 million mail ballots prior to Nov. 3, mainly due to concerns of spreading the virus at the polls. However, they are returning them sooner than in past elections with nearly 40 million mail ballots already sent back, a return rate of nearly 46%.

“This is good news! There were many concerns about election officials’ ability to conduct an election during a pandemic. Not only are people voting, but they are voting over a longer period, thereby spreading out the workload of election officials,” wrote the UAF political scientist. “Yes, there have been problems, and in many places, lines are intolerably long. But people are voting and there are more opportunities for them to do so by Election Day. Americans’ resilience and support for their democracy is very heartening in these trying times.”

With recent Census Bureau estimates putting the U.S. population at more than 330 million, recent surveys estimate that 70% of the overall U.S. population or about 235 American citizens will be eligible to vote in the general election in 2020. 

Heading into the last week of early voting, McDonald noted that Democrats enjoy a huge advantage in mail ballot requests, and mail ballot return rates. These national numbers for the states with party registration are reflected in every party registration state, adding “they are not just an artifact of heavily Democratic large states like California conducting all-mail ballot election.”

For example, in states that are reporting party registration data, Democrats have returned 39.8% or 10,989,124 of their requested 23,562,336 mail-in ballots. By contrast, Republican voters have returned only 26.2% or 5,146,880 of its mail-ballots out 13,428,915 they have requested.

“Because registered Democrats are voting in such large numbers by mail, even though their ballot return rate is higher than Republicans, they have more than 4 million mail ballots outstanding,” said McDonald. “This is just the states with party registration; we might surmise the total differential number of Democrats with outstanding mail ballots is higher.”

According to the University of Florida voting project, Republicans need to vote in-person to make up ground on the Democratic mail voters, either early or on Election Day.  As of Oct. 25, McDonald said there are still more than 31.6 million outstanding mail-in ballots in reporting states that have not been returned. Of that total, 12,573,202 are registered Democrats and 8,282,026 are GOP voters. Another 10,511,250 are independent voters and the remaining 236,564 are affiliated with minor parties.

“There is still some play left in the in-person early vote, but time is starting to run short such that Republicans will need to rely heavily on Election Day vote, which has traditionally been a strong day of voting for Republicans in recent elections,” said McDonald.

In Arkansas, early voting began on Oct. 19 and ended on Halloween Day on Oct. 31. And Although mail-in votes in Arkansas cannot be counted until Nov. 3, the total number of absentee votes already cast were running close to early vote totals. On Oct. 21, Arkansas Secretary of State John Thurston released early voting data showing that 120,222 absentee votes have been cast, compared to 135,906 early votes.

But just two days later, Thurston’s office report that early vote total had more than doubled to 277,118. Compared to the same period of the 2016 election, the 2020 early vote total is a robust 30.5% improvement from 192,594 four years ago, according to the state Secretary of State Office data.

What remains to be seen in Arkansas and across the rest of the U.S. is whether the 2020 general election will get through Nov. 3 without any of the democracy-threatening snafus predicted by doomsayers on both sides of the aisle. With only a few days to vote, there have been a few malfunctions related to early and mail-in voting nationwide, but no major technology glitches, foreign hacking threats, or other poll-watching and security shenanigans to halt local get-out-to-vote efforts.

More importantly, despite the early warnings of coronavirus hotspots at the polls and possible block-long lines due to social distancing and PPE concerns, determined Arkansans and Americans have not allowed COVID-19 to prevent them from exercising their right to vote. Compared to the rest of 2020, that is one big of good news that bodes well for coming out of this pandemic OK.

Let’s hope!