As early vote-day dawns, 1.2m Floridians have voted by absentee ballot. GOP 5-point lead won't last long

The first day of in-person early voting, which Democrats typically dominate, began this morning with long lines and lots of enthusiasm (story here). The weather was also perfect in South Florida, a boon to President Obama, who needs a large turnout in the liberal stronghold to counteract GOP gains in absentee ballots, which have been mailed in (background on what it all means is here).

Right now, the GOP leads by about 5 percentage points. Around this time in 2008, Republicans led by more than 15 points. But then early in-person voting happened, and Democrats ran up a huge pre-Election Day lead.

But as of this morning, the GOP was still out front in voted ballots:

Party	Voted	%
REP	545,282	44%
DEM	482,742	39%
IND	200,493	16%
Total	1,228,517	Rich Text

Here are the outstanding requests (Note: If Democrats could get all their requesters to vote their absentee ballots, they'd be down by about 1.3 points):

Party	Requests	%
REP	548,317	38%
DEM	576,660	40%
IND	303,242	21%
Total	1,428,219

And here are the top 15 AB hotspots. Pinellas County, less than half the size of the largest county, Miami-Dade, is nevertheless No. 1 (Note: R/D=Republican-Democrat):

County	Total	REP	DEM	R/D
PIN	133,171	55,187	52,237	2,950
DAD	109,638	48,477	41,797	6,680
HIL	85,096	33,303	36,639	(3,336)
ORA	65,446	25,436	28,971	(3,535)
BRO	61,336	17,757	33,768	(16,011)
BRE	51,693	25,508	18,541	6,967
SAR	49,975	22,462	19,066	3,396
LEE	48,202	24,645	14,464	10,181
POL	40,851	17,566	17,326	240
VOL	38,271	16,819	14,732	2,087
PAS	36,265	15,406	14,117	1,289
PAL	34,385	10,598	17,883	(7,285)
CLL	32,233	19,493	7,066	12,427
DUV	30,495	15,358	11,221	4,137
MAN	27,670	13,585	9,533	4,052

Comments

[Sapphire_407]

Romney is ahead by at least 20+ with independents so I don't know how Obama can possibly win. In 2008 he won FL by just 2% so I suspect he will get trampled badly in November

[LesG]

re: Saphire Like so many Romney supporters -- you aren't looking at the math. It begins and end in the math.

In FL, 40% of regis voters are Dems, 41% are Repubs, & only 19% are "indep." Even if Romney has a 20% edge among indeps. in FL, that means 20% of the 19% -- or roughly an edge of ONLY 3.8% of total regis voters. That is hardly a wipeout.

If the numbers of Dems actually voting exceeds their % of regis voters, something that is already happening in early voting in Nevada, Iowa, Ohio and North Carolina -- then that 3.8% Romney margin is wiped out.
It all depends on turnout. And so far, in early voting in most battleground states (about 1/4 to 1/3 of ALL regis voters have ALREADY voted in those states as of Fri), Dem turnout is much larger than Repubs, and is larger than their % portion of regis voters. I suspect after in-person voting this weekend and next wk in FL, you will be adding FL to that list.

Stay tuned.