More than 700,000 Floridians have voted, GOP holds 45-39% lead over Dems

The daily update in the absentee-ballot voting war is like the others: Bigger than the day before; and Republicans leading, but not like they used to. Still, it's a lead. Expect that to change when in-person early voting, which Democrats dominate, begins Saturday Oct. 27:

Voted ballots:

Party	Voted	%
REP	315,987	45%
DEM	277,253	39%
IND	110,188	16%
Total	703,428

 

Outstanding requests:

Party	Requested	%
REP	688,438	40%
DEM	689,990	40%
IND	337,446	20%
Total	1,715,874

Top 15 AB-voting hotspots, which account for 68 percent of the ballots cast (R/D=Republican-Democrat):

County	Total	REP	DEM	R/D
PIN	73,232	30,142	29,256	886
DAD	59,846	26,876	22,771	4,105
HIL	51,474	20,627	22,099	(1,472)
ORA	40,127	15,625	18,096	(2,471)
SAR	34,455	15,402	13,606	1,796
BRO	28,628	8,464	15,759	(7,295)
BRE	26,366	12,972	9,481	3,491
POL	24,133	10,199	10,476	(277)
VOL	21,772	10,151	7,916	2,235
PAS	21,619	9,244	8,487	757
DUV	21,099	10,570	7,843	2,727
LEE	20,386	10,718	5,986	4,732
CLL	19,852	12,034	4,441	7,593
MRN	17,660	8,331	6,952	1,379
SEM	16,086	8,299	5,196	3,103

Comments

[Linda]

These numbers.. they are from a poll? They are not counting the votes yet right? I don't trust polls. I hope Romney wins but you can't trust polls.

[Ben]

Linda, it's not a poll. These are the actual number of voters registered with each party (or with no party/as independents) who have already voted via absentee ballot. Party registration of course does not guarantee that all registered Democrats voted for Obama or that all registered Republicans voted for Romney. For what it's worth, absentee ballots historically are much more Republican than the general electorate, so these numbers look like a very close race so far. It's easy to overstate the significance of this data, though.