With nine days before Election Day, more people already have cast ballots in this year’s presidential election than voted early or absentee in the 2016 race as the start of in-person early voting in big states led to a surge in turnout in recent days. The opening of early voting locations in Florida, Texas and elsewhere has piled millions of new votes on top of the mail ballots arriving at election offices as voters try to avoid crowded places on Nov. 3 during the coronavirus pandemic. The result is a total of 58.6 million ballots cast so far, more than the 58 million that The Associated Press logged as being cast through the mail or at in-person early voting sites in 2016. Democrats have continued to dominate the initial balloting, but Republicans are narrowing the gap. GOP voters have begun to show up as early in-person voting, a sign that many heeded President Donald Trump’s unfounded warnings about mail-voting fraud. On Oct. 15, Democrats registrants cast 51% of all ballots reported, compared with 25% from Republicans. On Sunday, Democrats had a slightly smaller lead, 51% to 31%. The early vote totals, reported by state and local election officials and tracked by the AP, are an imperfect indicator of which party may be leading. The data only shows party registration, not which candidate voters support. Most GOP voters are expected to vote on Election Day. Analysts said the still sizable Democratic turnout puts extra pressure on the Republican Party to push its voters out in the final week and, especially, on Nov. 3. That’s especially clear in closely contested states such as Florida, Nevada and North Carolina. “This is a glass half-full, glass half-empty situation,” said John Couvillon, a Republican pollster who tracks early voting closely. “They’re showing up more,” he added, but “Republicans need to rapidly narrow that gap.” In Florida, for example, Democrats have outvoted Republicans by a 596,000 margin by mail, while Republicans only have a 230,000 edge in person. In Nevada, where Democrats usually dominate in-person early voting but the state decided to send a mail ballot to every voter this year, the GOP has a 42,600 voter edge in-person while Democrats have an 97,500 advantage in mail ballots. “At some point, Republicans have to vote,” said Michael McDonald, a University of Florida political scientist who tracks early voting on ElectProject.org. “You can’t force everyone through a vote center on Election Day. Are you going to expect all those Republicans to stand in line for eight hours?”
Campaigns typically push their voters to cast ballots early so they can focus scarce resources chasing more marginal voters as the days tick down to Election Day. That usually saves them money on mailers and digital ads — something the cash-strapped Trump campaign would likely want — and minimizes the impact of late surprises that could change the race. Trump’s campaign has been pushing its voters to cast ballots early, but with limited success, delighting Democrats. “We see the Trump campaign, the RNC (Republican National Committee) and their state parties urging Trump’s supporters to vote by mail while the president’s Twitter account says it’s a fraud,” But Bonier warned that he does not expect a one-sided election. “There are signs of Republicans being engaged,” he said. “We do expect them to come out in very high numbers on Election Day.” That split in voting behavior — Democrats voting early, Republicans on Election Day — has led some Democrats to worry about Trump declaring victory because early votes are counted last in Rust Belt battlegrounds. But they’re counted swiftly in swing states such as Arizona, Florida and North Carolina, which may balance out which party seems ahead on election night. Some of the record-setting turnout has led to long lines at early-vote locations and there have been occasional examples of voters receiving mail ballots that are incorrectly formatted. But on a whole, voting has gone relatively smoothly. With more than one-third of the 150 million ballots that experts predict will be cast in the election, there have been no armed confrontations at polling places or massive disenfranchisement that have worried election experts for months. One sign of enthusiasm is the large number of new or infrequent voters who have already voted — 25% of the total cast, according to an AP analysis of data from the political data firm L2. Those voters are younger than a typical voter and less likely to be white. So far similar shares of them are registering Democratic and Republican. They have helped contribute to enormous turnouts in states such as Georgia, where 26.3% of the people who’ve voted are new or infrequent voters, and Texas, which is expected to set turnout record and where 30.5% are new or infrequent voters. The strong share of new and infrequent voters in the early vote is part of what leads analysts to predict more than 150 million total votes will be cast and possibly the highest turnout in a U.S. presidential election since 1908. “There’s a huge chunk of voters who didn’t cast ballots in 2016,” Bonier said. “They’re the best sign of intensity at this point.”
the ignorance of the average Trump supporter...too stupid and lazy to do any research they believe Trump actually wasn’t handed a good economy by Obama, an economy that Obama had to save from Bush’s incompetence
Jesus christ hes talking to himself in front of his "fans" to convince himself he has a chance. Look at the 25sec mark. Funny how he never says I love you back lmaoooooooo his cult followers. He could be telling his followers he's a murder and they'd still nod at him. The guy has officially gone mental.
Derelict in his duty and impotent in his response to the most important health crisis in modern time... trump whiles about how the media reports on it, despite growing numbers of cases and over 225,000 American deaths, many of which could have been prevented had some competent person been in charge... and more pathetically ridiculous... he is claiming reporters are committing a "campaign violation".
This should surprise no one. https://www.mprnews.org/story/2020/...NCCHv8fnbKKpdFTTxtze6OntZG2mXopNmN_rM4zdmNmTQ Robocalls, rumors and emails: Last-minute election disinformation floods voters Pam Fessler October 24, 2020 9:10 a.m. Dirty tricks and disinformation have been used to intimidate and mislead voters for as long as there have been elections. But they have been especially pervasive this year as millions of Americans cast ballots in a chaotic and contentious election. This has led to stepped-up efforts by election officials and voter advocates to counter the disinformation so voters are not discouraged from turning out. "2020 has been a year like no other because not only have we seen a higher volume of online mis- and disinformation, we have also changed a lot of processes about our society, including the way we administer elections," said Jesse Littlewood, who leads the Stopping Cyber Suppression program for Common Cause. His nonpartisan group has already identified close to 5,000 incidents this year. Voting shift drives disinformation Littlewood noted that the shift to more mail-in voting because of the pandemic has opened the way for a whole new wave of disinformation. One of the most high-profile cases involved robocalls that went to tens of thousands of minority voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois and New York. The calls falsely claimed that voting by mail could be dangerous. "Mail-in voting sounds great," a woman's voice warned. "But did you know that if you vote by mail your personal information will be part of a public database that will be used by police departments to track down old warrants and be used by credit companies to collect outstanding debts?" The woman went on to say — falsely — that the government could use the information to track people down for mandatory vaccines. "Don't be finessed into giving your private information to the man. Stay safe and beware of vote-by-mail," she concluded. Two right-wing operatives, Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman, have since been charged with using the calls to intimidate voters, which is a felony. Federal authorities also announced this week that Iran was behind threatening emails sent to thousands of Democrats in Florida and Alaska and made to appear as though they came from the far-right extremist group, the Proud Boys. The emails warned voters that the group had gained access to their personal information and that "you will vote for Trump on Election Day or we will come after you." Social media as disinformation vector Usually, it's difficult to identify the source of election disinformation, although it appears to come from a variety of people and groups with different agendas. Some are trying to discourage voters of the opposite party from voting. Others, such as Russia and Iran, want to disrupt U.S. elections and undermine confidence in the system. Whatever the source, social media allow the disinformation to spread rapidly, and fringe news organizations sometimes pick up the false information and spread it even further. President Donald Trump has also amplified election disinformation in his effort to make the case that mail-in voting cannot be trusted. For example, he has repeatedly claimed that ballots were abandoned in a ditch in Wisconsin, although that is not true. Fake voting guides, scams, bar codes Efforts to mislead voters can take many forms. Voters at early polling sites in Palm Beach County, Fla., recently received fake Democratic voting guides listing far-right Republican congressional candidate Laura Loomer instead of the Democratic candidate. Online disinformation has been especially widespread. Facebook posts have warned voters that their ballots will be invalidated if a poll worker puts a mark on it, such as their initials, even though that's a requirement in many states. The fake claim led numerous election officials to issue statements such as this one from the North Carolina State Board of Elections: "In North Carolina, this is false." (The state's release put "false" in bold.) Other misleading messages include tweets that Democrats will vote on Nov. 3 (the correct date) and Republicans will vote on Nov. 4 because of COVID-19 restrictions, and that someone can go online and change people's votes. Neither claim is true. One false rumor circulated in Texas that bar codes on mail-in ballot envelopes can reveal personal information, including whether the voter is a Republican or a Democrat. After receiving several ballots with blacked-out bar codes, Tarrant County Elections Administrator Heider Garcia took to Twitter and posted a video warning voters that this could lead to their ballots being rejected. "So please, I'm begging you. Do not tamper with the bar code on your carrier envelope," he pleaded. There have also been reports of numerous scams involving election information. Oklahoma officials said one voter received a text message that her polling place had changed, and the attached phone number turned out to be for an escort service. Scammers have also used fake voter registration sites and ballot tracking services to trick voters into sharing their personal information. Election officials and federal authorities have been worried for months about the impact such disinformation can have on elections and voter confidence. They've been working with social media companies to identify and take down any misleading information as soon as it's identified. They have also launched a nationwide campaign encouraging voters to get their information from trusted sources, such as secretaries of state or local election offices. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security recently set up a site to knock down malicious election rumors, especially those originating from foreign adversaries. Agency Director Christopher Krebs told reporters that making sure Americans have the facts is "one of the best tactics and techniques we have right now to counteract these disinformation operations and influence ops." Still, he and others expect that efforts to mislead voters will only increase in the days ahead. In a joint statement Thursday, federal and state authorities said American voters "must remain diligent. ... Be prepared for attempts to confuse or misinform; be prepared before casting your ballot; and be prepared for foreign efforts aimed at sowing division and undermining the legitimacy of the election. An informed public is the best defense we have to #Protect2020." Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. Your support matters.
