More than 353,000 votes were cast in North Carolina on Thursday, a state record for the first day of early voting, in a battleground state still reeling from the damage from Hurricane Helen and with 16 presidential electoral votes at stake. showed great enthusiasm. However, early insights into the importance of such high turnout were unclear.
Christopher A. Cooper, a political science professor at Western Carolina University in Cullowee, North Carolina, and Michael Bitzer, a North Carolina political expert at Catawba College in Salisbury, North Carolina, cautioned against reading too much into the data in a blog post.
They said using early voting data as a way to determine who wins or loses an election is “like bringing a fishing rod to a home run derby: it’s the wrong tool.”
Still, Cooper told X that the damage caused by Hurricane Helen in western North Carolina could have a major impact on turnout. For example, in Buncombe County, which includes the liberal metropolis of Asheville, more than 33,000 votes were cast on the first day of early voting in 2020, but as of Thursday, only about 8,200 votes had been cast in the county. It was.
The state Board of Elections has approved several emergency measures after approximately 10 early voting locations in western North Carolina suffered significant damage or access issues. On Thursday, lines of voters stretched out the door at the public library in Black Mountain, North Carolina, a purple town in left-leaning Buncombe County, where about 8,500 residents were still recovering from the aftermath of Helen.
More than 400 early voting locations opened as scheduled Thursday, including 76 in the 25 western counties hardest hit by Helen, the state Board of Elections said. Only four could not be opened.
“I know that thousands of North Carolinians lost so much in this storm. Their lives will never be the same after this tragedy,” the State Board of Elections said. Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell said at a news conference Thursday. “But one thing Helen did not take away from the people of western North Carolina is the right to vote in this important election.”
The previous record for the first day of early voting was in 2020, when more than 348,000 votes were cast. Former President Donald J. Trump won North Carolina by 1.3 percentage points in 2020, and his campaign sees it as a must-win state this year.
Early voting in North Carolina ends at 3 p.m. on November 2. Democrats are pouring resources into the state, hoping that Vice President Kamala Harris will become the first Democratic presidential candidate to win North Carolina since 2008. are.
