SC early absentee voting hits milestone, reaches 60% of total ballots cast in 2016
With fewer than 14 hours left until polls open on Election Day, South Carolina has crushed previous absentee voting records.
Voters in some counties waited in lines that stretched around the block Monday, the final day South Carolinians could cast absentee ballots in person, and by 5 p.m. the state’s absentee voting total equaled just under 62% of all votes cast in the 2016 general election.
More than 1.3 million South Carolinians have now voted absentee — about two-and-a-half times the previous state record for total absentee voting, set in 2016 — the State Election Commission reported.
Absentee voting may account for as much as half of total turnout in this election, election officials have said.
By comparison, the absentee vote made up only 23.7% of the state’s total vote in 2016.
Democrats and Republicans both argue high turnout will be in their favor this cycle.
“I think it’s good for us,” Drew McKissick, the state’s Republican Party chairman said Monday “I mean, we’ve had a crowd of people who’ve been early voting for us in this cycle.”
McKissick also said he projects more Republicans, not Democrats, will show up to the polls on Election Day.
“In all our polls, two-thirds of Republicans have said that they wanted to vote on Election Day,” McKissick said. “You know, we’re going to own Election Day, no doubt about it.”
But Trav Robertson, the chairman of the state Democratic Party, said the crush of absentee numbers is indicative of more than that.
“You don’t have this number of people standing in lines for hours in a state like South Carolina unless they’re mad as hell or anxious or something,” Robertson said. “When people are voting like they’re voting (right now) they want normally some type of change. And I am not dismissing the energy of the Republican base. I am not dismissing the energy of the Democratic base. But normally that base is not almost 1.4 million people.”
If South Carolina matches the 76% turnout rate seen in 2008 — the state’s highest turnout in the past 25 years, when then-Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama faced Republican nominee John McCain — roughly 2.7 million South Carolinians will have cast votes through Election Day. A little more than 2.1 million South Carolinians voted in 2016, giving the state a 68% turnout.
The state’s COVID-19 outbreak and the resulting absentee voting expansion helped drive the huge spike in early voting this cycle.
Before this year, absentee voting in South Carolina had been open only to a limited number of voters who met certain requirements. But in September, lawmakers expanded absentee voting due to the outbreak, making it available to all registered voters.
The voter surge also could be a factor beyond COVID-19 after back-and-forth court confusion over the witness signature requirement.
As of Monday, at least 2,592 ballots had been returned without a witness signature and that number is expected to go up since more mail-in ballots — 427,000 as of mid-Monday — had been returned to the state. In 2016, the state rejected 1,575 ballots out of 133,000.
Republican consultant Walter Whetsell said he expects South Carolina to set turnout records this cycle due to multiple factors, but said he doesn’t believe that turnout will necessarily benefit one party over another. While absentee voting has historically helped Democrats in South Carolina, he said this year could be different because of COVID-19 and the number of seniors, likely to be more conservative, who are casting ballots.
Yet Democratic political consultant Lachlan McIntosh said he sees the early voting totals as a boon for Democrats.
His analysis assumes that absentee voting favors Democrats, based on high early turnout in blue Charleston and Richland counties, and said Democrats should be ahead heading into Election Day.
In years past, when absentee voting made up a much smaller proportion of the overall vote, Republicans have been able to overcome Democrats’ early lead. But this year, when roughly 50% of voters will have cast ballots before Election Day, Republican candidates have significantly more ground to make up, he said.
“They need a massive turnout tomorrow,” McIntosh said. “If I’m Lindsey Graham, I’m stressed right now.”
One of those early voters in Richland County, Sarah Ravenell, 35, told The State Monday she expected to stand in line for at least two hours at Richland County Elections and Voter Registration Office. She decided to vote Monday instead of Tuesday because Election Day is her birthday.
“I think it might be nasty tomorrow,” said Ravenell, who said she was prepared to stand for hours to vote because of “foolishness.”
“Que Sera Sera,” she said. “What will be will be.”
Across the country, a record-breaking 97.6 million voters have cast ballots early, according to the U.S. Elections Project, and turnout is at nearly 71% of the total votes counted in the 2016 general election.
Texas and Hawaii already have exceeded their total 2016 vote counts, and many other states are on the cusp of doing so as well.
Based on party registration statistics from the 19 states that provide them — excluding South Carolina, which does not have registration by party — 45.2% of voters who have cast ballots early are registered Democrats compared to only 30.5% who are registered Republicans, according to the U.S. Elections Project. The remaining 23.6% of early voters have no party affiliation, according to the database.
Reporter Joseph Bustos contributed to this report.
This story was originally published November 2, 2020 at 12:36 PM with the headline "SC early absentee voting hits milestone, reaches 60% of total ballots cast in 2016."
