More than 2.2 million Tennesseans cast ballots during early voting over the past two weeks as turnout nearly reached 46 percent, nearly 3 percent fewer than the 2020 presidential election total.
Early voting in person totaled 2,132,610, and 82,253 were cast by mail, for a total of 2,214,870 through Oct. 31st, the final day of early voting, according to the Secretary of State’s office.
Though some involved in the presidential election are calling it the most important one in this era, early voting numbers don’t quite match that view, falling 2.89 percent. Tennessee typically sees about half of voters go to the polls early.
Early voting turnout in the 2020 presidential election between current President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, who was the incumbent at the time, hit 2,280,767, nearly 66,000 more than cast ballots so far in this year’s election between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Trump.
Both early voting totals, though, are much higher than in 2016 when 1.67 million Tennesseans cast ballots early as Trump defeated former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State’s figures show.
Enthusiasm across Tennessee through the 14 days of early voting was evident, as Tennessee saw more than 2.13 million registered voters cast their ballots in person — a new record.
– Doug Kufner, Tennessee Secretary of State’s office
Among the state’s biggest counties, Davidson, typically a stronghold for Democrats, showed a major decline in early voting from four years ago, dropping off 13.3 percent as 219,411 cast ballots early compared to 253,123 in 2020.
Davidson County Elections Administrator Jeff Roberts said the difference could be that 34,000 people voted by absentee ballots during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 compared to 13,000 this year, a difference of 21,000. All of those are counted as mail-in ballots.
Absentee balloting fell off by nearly 61 percent this fall to 82,253 from 210,428 in 2020 when many voters were afraid to go to the polls and risk catching COVID-19. The American Civil Liberties Union sued the state to give voters more exceptions to vote absentee four years ago.
Davidson County was split into three congressional districts before the 2022 vote, a move that gave Republicans an advantage in winning all three seats and forced longtime Democratic U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper to step away from Congress.
Early voting in Shelby County, another focal point for Democrats, fell off even more dramatically, dropping by 20.9 percent to 257,733 this fall from 326,007 in 2020. Shelby County’s decrease of 68,274 early voters topped the total state decline of 65,900.
Hamilton County, in contrast, saw a 13.2 percent increase with 117,254 casting ballots early compared to 103,590 four years ago.
Knox County reported a small decrease, down .61 percent to 170,736 from 171,790 in 2020.
Rutherford County also reported a 2.7 percent decrease in early voting, dipping to 117,040 from 120,281 four years ago. In addition, Williamson County dipped .57 percent, from 122,277 in 2020 to 121,585 this year.
Secretary of State spokesperson Doug Kufner said early voting ran well because of the work of county election commission staff and poll workers statewide.
“Enthusiasm across Tennessee through the 14 days of early voting was evident, as Tennessee saw more than 2.13 million registered voters cast their ballots in person — a new record. Seventy-six counties also exceeded their in-person early voting turnout from 2020. We anticipate a robust Election Day turnout, and we encourage all registered Tennesseans who have not yet voted to make their voice heard on Nov. 5,” Kufner said in a statement.
In spite of disruptions from Hurricane Helene, most of the counties that suffered from massive flooding reported early voting increases. In some instances, election officials in those counties had to change voting sites because of flood damage and road outages.
Greene County, for instance, experienced an early voting increase of 30.4 percent with 19,851 casting ballots this year, compared to 15,220 in 2020.
Carter County saw early voting increase by 21.2 percent with 14,753 participating this year compared to 12,169 four years ago.
Washington County experienced a 6.8 percent jump in early voting totals, going to 45,825 from 42,909.
Johnson County saw a small increase of 1.92 percent as early voting went up to 5,474 from 5,371 in 2020. Cocke County also saw a bit of an increase with early voting jumping 3.3 percent, to 10,670 from 10,325 in 2020.
Unicoi County saw a slight decline of 1.73 percent to 6,067 this year from 6,174 four years ago.
Tennessee Lookout is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: info@tennesseelookout.com. Follow Tennessee Lookout on Facebook and X.
