A total of 47,899 Montgomery County voters have cast ballots through Day Three of early voting in the county, an increase of 4.26% over Day Three turnout in 2016. As of Oct. 15, 34,559 county residents had voted in person while 13,340 absentee ballots were cast. The in-person turnout so far this fall is more than 7% less than in-person turnout through the third day of early voting in 2016, while the absentee ballot count is up 53.47%. The use of absentee ballots by more than one-fourth of county voters so far is the highest proportion recorded by Day Three of early voting in a presidential election. Despite the higher number of ballots cast in the county so far, overall turnout among registered voters has paced slightly lower than in the 2016 and 2012 early voting periods. Out of the 369,796 voters registered for this year's general election, 2020 turnout sat at an estimated 12.95% on Day Three of early voting. That is below the 13.44% Day Three turnout recorded in fall 2012 and the 14.73% turnout recorded on Day Three in October 2016. Updated Oct. 15 9:24 a.m.
Early voting totals in Montgomery County continued to slightly outpace 2016's general election turnout on the second day of early voting in the county. As of Oct. 14, 33,550 county residents had voted in person or via absentee ballots, a 1.01% increase over the 33,213 votes recorded by Day Two of early voting in 2016. Montgomery County voters continued to utilize absentee ballots at a higher rate than previous years as of Day Two as well. More than one-third of ballots cast as of Oct. 14 were absentee, higher than second-day totals in previous presidential election years and a decrease from the more than 50% absentee ballot use recorded as of Oct. 13. A total of 22,167 Montgomery County residents have now voted in person, and 11,383 have cast absentee ballots.
This year's extended early voting period will continue through Oct. 30, except on Oct. 18.
Posted Oct. 14 11:23 a.m.
More than 20,800 ballots were cast in Montgomery County on the first day of early voting Oct. 13, according to the unofficial daily count by the county elections administration. The total of 20,874 early ballots cast as of Tuesday is just over 2% more than the 20,432 reported on the first day of early voting in October 2016, the previous countywide record in a general election, according to historic information from the Texas Secretary of State's Office. The slight uptick in Day One voting was spurred by a nearly 32% increase in absentee ballots cast from 2016 to 2020, while in-person voting fell by more than 16% over the first day of the previous election. This marked the first time the number of absentee ballots outpaced in-person voting on the first day of a general election early voting period, with 10,383 in-person votes and 10,491 absentee ballots cast. Early voting totals, and the percentage of registered voters participating in the early voting period, have increased in recent years as the county's population grew. Just over 50% of 311,882 registered Montgomery County voters had cast ballots by the final day of early voting in 2016's general election, up from the 46.18% recorded in 2012 and the 43.36% recorded in 2008.
The total number of registered voters in the county for the 2020 general election has not yet been released, although the county reported 353,232 in the July primary runoffs earlier this year—an increase of more than 13% since fall 2016.
Early voting in the county will continue daily through Oct. 30, except Oct. 18; this year, an extra five days were added to the typical 12-day general election early voting period.
Eight polling places are open to all registered voters throughout the county, with the office of Elections Administrator Suzie Harvey open to those casting limited ballots, ballots by mail or other special forms of early voting. More early voting and Election Day voting information may be found at https://elections.mctx.org.
More election content, including voting information, candidate Q&A's and election results, may be found at www.communityimpact.com/voter-guide.
