Early voting continues for the November 8 general election.

Just under 4.5% of registered voters have cast ballots in person or by mail through yesterday (Mon.), the first day of early voting by personal appearance.

A total of 789K voters have already cast ballots statewide based on preliminary, unofficial counts provided by counties to the Secretary of State. Several counties have not reported, and others have not reported mail ballots, so we expect the number to be revised upward, but probably not by a large amount.

The first-day total for 2020 was 1.13M. Comparable figures are not available for 2018 because only the 30 counties with the most RVs were required to provide daily updates that year.As it currently stands, the Day 1 total number of voters for those 30 counties is down 13% from the first day of early voting in 2018 and 32% from 2020. In the five counties with the most RVs – Harris, Dallas, Tarrant, Bexar and Travis – the total number of voters is down 17% from 2018 and 38% from 2020. Harris Co. itself is down 40% – almost entirely due to a 52% decrease in the number of in-person voters.

Roughly five out of every six early voters have recent primary voting history, according to a preliminary analysis of voter history by Republican strategist and data nerd Derek Ryan:

• 46% voted in at least one of the last four Republican primaries, but no Democratic ones
• 31% voted in at least one of the last four Democratic primaries, but no Republican ones; and
• 5% voted in at least one of each party’s last four primaries.

About 14% voted in at least one of the last four general elections but no primaries, and just 3% have no recent voting history. These latter two blocs of voters tend to become more prominent as we get closer to Election Day.

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