[Election 2024] SoDu Snapshot: Early Voting Participation Tops 2016 and Growing

Here’s a quick snapshot of early voting in Durham with just a few days left:

• 112,712 ballots cast in Durham as of Tuesday, Oct. 29. That’s nearly 45% of Durham County’s 251,290 eligible voters.
• Of those, more than 71% of the voters are 41 and older.
• 63,503 Democrats have cast their ballots, along with 37,224 unaffiliated, and 10,754 Republicans.
• Nearly 2,000 early voters have been same-day registrants.
• 59% of early voters in Durham have been women. Across North Carolina, about 52% of early voters have been female.
• 61,219 white voters have cast ballots. Almost 32,000 Black voters have participated in Durham’s early voting process so far.
• The most ballots – 11,656 – have been cast at Eno River Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in South Durham. The fewest ballots – 2,381 – have been cast at Durham Technical Community College’s main campus near downtown.

Statewide, 3,368,358 voters – about 43% of eligible North Carolina voters – have cast ballots before Nov. 5’s general election. That already exceeds early voting participation in 2016 and is coming close to matching or exceeding early voting numbers from 2020, which saw a significant increase in voting by mail due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

It’s also worth noting that the high turnout numbers are even though absentee voting started later this year due to a court decision to require that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name from ballots.

Currently, Democrats hold a narrow lead over Republicans in voter registrations, but Republicans so far have turned out more voters throughout North Carolina – 1,148,620 compared to 1,106,300 Democrats. However, unaffiliated voters remain a massive contingent – 1,093,058 – in the early voting process.

Still need to vote? The Durham County Board of Elections provides an online tracker that offers a decent estimate of how long you can expect to stand in line to fill out both sides of your ballot.