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    • More than 2.4 million voters voted early in Michigan. Here’s who’s voting
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    More than 2.4 million voters voted early in Michigan. Here’s who’s voting

    Caradoc Wyn Posted on

    More than 102,000 voters cast their ballots in the city of Detroit via absentee ballots and early in-person voting – a tally that led the Detroit city clerk to predict that about 290,000 Detroit voters, between 53% and 55% of registered voters, cast theirs Would Vote appears in the Motor City through November 5th.

    The tally in the state’s largest city is part of the 2.4 million ballots (as of Thursday) that have been converted to ballot drop boxes across the state through absentee voting and early, in-person voting.

    In Detroit alone, of the 113,223 mail-in ballots requested, about 81,122 were returned and 21,852 people voted at early, in-person voting sites, an option made available as part of a 2022 ballot initiative. Statewide, about 1.78 million of the 2.4 million total early votes were cast by absentee ballot, and another approximately 627,000 votes were cast at early, in-person voting centers across the state.

    The state’s overall absentee response rate is around 74% as of Thursday, with counties across the state averaging response rates between 71% and 85% less than a week before Election Day. Statewide, an average of 100,000 voters per day vote at early, in-person voting sites.

    It is difficult to establish a baseline against which the numbers can be compared. In November 2020, about 3.2 million of the state’s 5.6 million votes were cast by absentee ballot. But this was the first presidential election to allow no-excuse absentee voting, and it took place during a pandemic when voters wanted to avoid large crowds in lines. Additionally, voters in Michigan will be able to vote nine days early and in-person for the first time this year in a presidential election.

    “We’re now probably setting a baseline for how this world works,” Democratic political consultant Mark Grebner said of the state’s rollout of no-reason absentee voting and early, in-person voting. Other states with similar systems saw a “kind of crescendo” in early voting over the weekend before the election, meaning the return of absentee voting and early in-person voting could increase in the next few days.

    There are several other conclusions that can be drawn from the publicly available data about who has voted so far, Grebner said. The primary voters are predominantly Democrats, “but not overwhelmingly,” he said, and the turnout to this point could be a sign of historic turnout in Michigan.

    “Maybe we’ll see 3 million early votes. … But we will see a total of 5.7 million votes, which is more than ever before,” Grebner predicted. Around 5.6 million people voted in the 2020 presidential race in Michigan.

    Nearly every community in the state will use pre-processing and pre-scoring in the days leading up to November 5 to ensure that most mail-in ballots are tabulated – but not yet reported – before Election Day. This should help make the process of counting votes on Election Day more efficient by narrowing the number of ballots still to be counted to in-person and mail-in ballots received on election days, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said.

    “This helps greatly improve the efficiency of the process,” Benson told The Detroit News on Thursday. “Because so much of what sometimes extends the amount of time it takes for these unofficial results to be announced is when everyone is waiting to return their ballots at the last minute.”

    Detroit Clerk Predicts 53% Voter Turnout

    In Detroit, City Secretary Janice Winfrey expressed confidence Thursday that the city could surpass the 50 percent turnout threshold by the end of Election Day, predicting it would be closer to 53 percent to 55 percent, or about 290,000 of the city’s 525,000 registered voters . She assumed that around 150,000 people would actually vote on election day.

    Most polls show Democratic nominee Kamala Harris and Republican nominee Donald Trump deadlocked in the swing state, but high turnout in the Democratic stronghold of Detroit could be crucial to Harris securing the state.

    In 2016, when Democrat Hillary Clinton lost to Trump, voter turnout in Detroit fell to about 49%; Clinton received about 47,000 fewer votes in Detroit than the 2012 Democratic nominee, Barack Obama.

    In 2020, Detroit had a voter turnout of about 51%, with Democrat Joe Biden winning 240,936, or about 94%, of the 256,514 presidential votes cast in the city. Trump received 5%, an improvement from 3% four years ago.

    Early in-person voting began Oct. 19 in Detroit and increased from 1,120 ballots cast on Sunday to 2,722 on Monday, more than doubling, according to the Michigan Secretary of State’s tracking dashboard. On Tuesday the daily number rose to 3,160.

    Winfrey said she attributes the increase in voter activity in the city to people “starting to use their voice in the city of Detroit.”

    “We are starting to appreciate the fact that we can use our voice and voice and have access to the ballot and the ballot box,” she said.

    John Sellek, CEO of Michigan-based consulting firm Harbor Strategic Public Affairs, who has previously worked for Republicans, said higher turnout in Detroit would likely be bad for Trump, “even if he has gained traction with male voters there.”

    “However, a significant increase in turnout up to 53-55% could be an indication of greater energy for Harris, giving her an advantage in an overall close national election,” Sellek said.

    Nationwide trends

    Michigan narrowly matched the early voter turnout pace of the 2020 election on Tuesday, according to a news release from the secretary of state.

    This year saw record overall turnout statewide – nearly 5.6 million votes – and a historic number of absentee votes due to the COVID-19 pandemic. About 3.2 million Michiganders voted by mail this year, with 2.8 million of those ballots returned before Election Day, according to secretary of state data obtained from the University of Florida Election Lab.

    A weekend before this year’s Election Day, Michigan could still surpass that number thanks to the state’s new mandatory early in-person voting window and massive efforts by presidential candidates to prevent the vote.

    Michigan’s population centers are leading the way in terms of total votes cast so far. The Detroit metropolitan area’s major counties – Wayne, Oakland and Macomb – make up the top three. Kent County, home to Grand Rapids, is in fourth place. Washtenaw County in Ann Arbor ranks fifth.

    Response rates for mail-in ballots in Michigan’s more sparsely populated northern counties – both in the Upper Peninsula and lower Michigan – were largely higher than response rates in Michigan’s urban centers.

    Alcona, Lake and Oakland counties had the lowest return rates so far, but with five days left to return ballots, officials weren’t worried about the statistics yet. Alcona County had a return of 71.3%, Lake 72.1% and Oakland 73.2% (Washtenaw County’s rate was 73.3% and Wayne County’s 73.6%).

    Oakland County Clerk Lisa Brown said there have been regular but quick lines at early voting sites in Oakland County and mail-in ballots are arriving steadily. She noted that about 2,600 people entered their mail-in ballots Tuesday morning using tabulators at early voting sites, a new option for those worried about getting their ballots in the mail on time.

    “I really encouraged people to do that so they don’t have to mail it in and if they make a mistake they can correct it,” Brown said.

    According to the Secretary of State’s Office, mail-in ballots entered via tabulators at early, in-person voting locations are marked as early, in-person vote counts on the Secretary of State’s online dashboard and then removed from the total number of mail-in ballots requested.

    Women in Michigan are leading the way in early voting, according to state election data collected by the University of Florida’s Election Lab. On Thursday, female voters made up about 55% of ballots cast, compared to about 44% for men. According to the Department of State, women make up 51.4% of active registered voters in Michigan.

    That could be a good sign for Harris, as she enjoys greater support from women, according to the latest Detroit News/WDIV poll. According to the poll results, she won among female voters by 24 points, 58% to 34%. Among male voters, Trump was ahead by 21 percentage points (55-34%).

    The secretary of state has not yet released a partisan breakdown of votes cast, but experts and partisan observers have conducted their own analysis, finding reasons for optimism among both Republicans and Democrats.

    Trump supporters have pointed out that the number of people voting early in Michigan and other key states is down compared to 2020. Harris supporters see turnout among women and black voters as positive signs for Democrats.

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    Staff writer Craig Mauger contributed.

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