ATLANTA (AP) — Georgians aren’t waiting to vote as more than 10% of expected turnout could vote through Wednesday.
More than 310,000 people voted on Tuesday, the first day of in-person voting, while another 180,000 people made their choices through Wednesday afternoon. An additional 30,000 mail-in ballots have also been accepted. That’s 540,000 votes cast in Georgia, compared to the southern battleground state’s record 5 million votes in the 2020 presidential election.
Voters lined up before dawn Monday, with many saying they had long ago decided whether to choose Democrat Kamala Harris, Republican Donald Trump, Libertarian Chase Oliver or Green Party candidate Jill Stein. Two other candidates – independent Cornel West and Claudia De la Cruz of the Party for Socialism and Liberation – appear on ballots in Georgia, but their votes will not be counted after the Supreme Court ruled they were ineligible.
“I’m excited to vote against Donald Trump and for Kamala Harris,” said Anthony Engleton, a retiree who voted Tuesday in the Atlanta suburb of Sandy Springs. “The entire history, the record of Trump’s misdeeds and misdeeds shows that he is a conman who only cares about himself.”
Karen Hall, voting in the Gwinnett County suburb of Berkeley Lake, said she had long been willing to support Trump because of her concerns about immigration.
“It’s the most important election of our lifetimes,” Hall said. “Our country has gone to hell in an instant and needs to be put back on track. Donald Trump is the only one who can solve this.”
Both Democrats and Republicans are trying to get their most committed supporters to vote early in Georgia so they can focus on less reliable voters later. Trump hosted two events in Georgia on Tuesday as top Democratic surrogates urged voters in recent days.
The previous first-day record was nearly 137,000 in 2020, and this year’s increase reflects a shift in the way Georgians vote. In 2020, during the pandemic, Georgia temporarily made it easy to request a ballot online and set up many drop boxes. By this time in 2020, 1.2 million votes had already been registered.
Voters in Georgia must now physically sign an absentee ballot, counties must mail them later and the number of drop boxes is sharply limited. That all combined to reduce the number of mail-in voting requests starting in 2020, part of a hotly contested series of voting changes in the state.
Among those who have already voted in Georgia are a former president, Jimmy Carter, and a current presidential candidate, Libertarian Chase Oliver.
Oliver joined a line of voters in the Atlanta suburb of Tucker on Tuesday morning.
“It always feels weird to see your name on the screen and you select yourself. It’s a bit surreal,” Oliver said.
The libertarian bills himself as the only third-party candidate on the ballot in all 50 states, saying he is an alternative to Republicans and Democrats dissatisfied with their nominees.
Jimmy Carter cast his vote by mail on Wednesday, according to the Carter Center.
His son Chip Carter said before the family gathered Oct. 1 for his father’s 100th birthday that the former president was “plugged in” to the election.
“I asked him two months ago if he was trying to live to be 100, and he said, ‘No, I’m trying to live to vote for Kamala Harris,’” Chip Carter said. ___
Kramon reported from Berkeley Lake, Georgia.
