ATLANTA — Georgia surpassed 1 million votes cast in the early voting period on Tuesday, state officials said. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced the crossing of the threshold in a press conference.
"To put that into perspective, at this point in the last midterm in 2018 we stood at about 590,000 votes," Raffensperger said. "That is nearly a 70% increase, comparing apples to apples."
Peach State voters have been heading to the polls in record numbers during early voting, at a rate on par with the 2020 presidential election.
Raffensperger also reported that long lines have been rare and few voting issues have been reported. Early voters gave an array of reasons for heading to the polls ahead of Election Day. Some said they intend to keep doing so in the future.
“I did it because I’m going to be out of town and I want to make sure my vote counts and my voice is heard and the line was not long," said Jessica Taylor.
Another voter, Andrew Winchell, said avoiding long lines is what brought him out early, "you can stand in line for four hours (on Election Day) and I was able to stand in line for 30 minutes and cast my vote the same.”
Gabriel Sterling, the chief operating officer of the Secretary of State's Office, has been posting regular updates on Twitter about the early voting figures. On Monday night, he said there had been 132,000 voters through just that day, Oct. 24, which was a 33% increase over the second Monday of early voting in 2018.
The total figure of votes going into Tuesday morning stood at 986,587 according to Sterling. Of those, roughly 892,000 were in-person votes at early voting polling sites with another roughly 94,000 absentee-by-mail ballots cast.
“The counties have worked tirelessly alongside our office to encourage Georgians to cast their vote early,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said in a statement last week. “County election directors are getting the job done and Georgians know it.”
The early voting period runs now through Nov. 4. Times and locations vary by county, however - you can check your specific county information here.
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