Early voting in the US presidential election in the critical battleground state of Georgia got underway with record turnout on Tuesday. Gabriel Sterling, Georgia’s top election official, revealed that at least 328,000 ballots had already been cast in the state, more than double what was recorded on the first day of early voting in 2020.
States are allowed to open early voting as early as six weeks before Election Day, scheduled for November 5 this year, thus allowing voters to avoid the crowds.
The timing differs from state to state, with voting in Illinois already kicking off on September 26. However, most states begin early voting in mid to late October. This week, polls open in Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Rhode Island, Tennessee, North Carolina, Louisiana, Washington, Massachusetts, and Nevada.
Georgia is a highly contested state that is expected to play an important role in the outcome of the election. Six others are considered battleground states: Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Commenting on voter turnout in Georgia in an X post on Wednesday, Sterling called it “spectacular” and “record breaking.” Republican candidate and former US President Donald Trump, who lost Georgia to the current president, Joe Biden, in 2020, expressed enthusiasm for the early vote in the state at a campaign event in Atlanta, saying, “the votes are coming in at a nice level for us.”
Nationwide, however, turnout has been much more subdued. Analysts at Election Lab estimate that only 5.5 million Americans have so far cast their ballots, down from the 27 million recorded at this point in the 2020 election.
Recent polling has shown Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris running neck-and-neck with just under three weeks to go until Election Day.
