More than 830,000 Floridians have voted, GOP up 5 but Dems ready to even score with early voting

After taking Sunday off (there's no mail delivered then, so no new mail-in ballots to count), here's the latest daily update in the absentee-ballot voting war. It's like the others: Bigger than the day before; and Republicans leading in ballots already cast, but not like they used to. Republicans are ahead by 5.4 percentage points (note: it looks like 6% in the numbers below due to rounding). But that's down compared to this point in 2008, when their cast ballots were about 17 points higher than Democratic absentee ballots cast, according to Democrats.**

Still, it's a GOP lead. Expect that to change when in-person early voting, which Democrats dominate, begins Saturday Oct. 27.

Voted ballots:

Party	Voted	%
REP	371,356	45%
DEM	326,624	39%
IND	131,274	16%
TOTAL	829,254

Outstanding requests:

Party	Requested	%
REP	661,749	40%
DEM	669,334	40%
IND	333,398	20%
TOTAL	1,664,481

 

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	86,799	35,794	34,455	1,339
DAD	73,314	32,886	27,788	5,098
HIL	58,960	23,498	25,280	(1,782)
BRO	41,117	12,205	22,513	(10,308)
ORA	40,625	15,783	18,362	(2,579)
SAR	38,120	17,095	14,927	2,168
BRE	33,162	16,291	11,960	4,331
POL	28,695	12,124	12,434	(310)
LEE	27,668	14,389	8,155	6,234
VOL	26,045	11,888	9,686	2,202
PAS	25,413	10,876	9,951	925
CLL	23,555	14,339	5,147	9,192
DUV	22,822	11,539	8,405	3,134
MRN	20,133	9,541	7,849	1,692
SEM	18,751	9,718	6,010	3,708

 **One of the reasons Democrats are doing better with absentee ballots is that they have to because the GOP-controlled Legislature cut back on in-person early voting hours relative to 2008, when Democrats swamped the polls during a cumulative 120 hours of early voting over 14 days. Now, the days are limited to eight and the hours to 96 (note: the hours were always capped at 96 total, but then Gov. Charlie Crist issued an executive order that kept the early voting polls open longer).

We last explored this in an article when the vote hit the half-million mark

Comments

[ravi]

2.5 million votes. excellent. The trend with 25% of the vote in is self evident. Early voting overall favored obama over mccain by 8 points in 2008. Not happening this year. The sun is startin to shine.

[Dan Marino]

Ha! Didn't read the article at all, did ya Ravi?

[SGM]

How the independents will break will be very interesting to watch. I am an independent in Broward, and I did vote straight DEM.

[ravi]

You don't understand turnout percentages, comparisons to 08, absentee vs. early, etc. Dan. You should research before commenting. Also indies in most polls swing R/R and away O/B - that's been confirmed in numerous polls.

[Dan Marino]

You're the one getting all the facts wrong, Ravi. No in-person early voting has even started, yet you are trying to compare these mail-only ballot numbers to the final early vote in 2008. As the article states, McCain was up 17% at this point in 2008. Obama STILL won. Now R/R is up only 6%. The trend is clear.

I'm sorry that reality hasn't provided you tea nuts much to work with, but it is what it is.

[ravi]

I'm actually disappointed in your lack of intelligence but that doesn't surprise me as a leftwing ideologue. Come back to me in a week or so when in person ends and let's compare those figures to 2008. 2.4 million obvoously is not registering in ur little head nor is 8.4 million

[LesG]

Ravi is pathetic if he can't get the point of the Herald article. Since the FL GOP-controlled state govt. reduced the amt of time voters in the state could vote early, the Democrats switched their efforts this yr. from simply encouraging supporters to vote early in-person to EITHER voting early, OR voting by absentee ballot, OR voting on election day Nov. 6. THAT is why the GOP margin in absentee ballots sent in so far this yr is so much lower than it was in 2008. Many more Democrats are voting by absentee ballots. Duhhh, Ravi!!