As Americans have been urged to vote early and mail-in ballots have been put under the microscope, early results in Florida reveal that Democrats have an early edge on Republicans as the November 3 election draws closer. The Florida Division of Elections reports that 49 percent of the mail-in ballots are from Democrats and more than 30 percent are from Republicans thus far.
The Division of Elections shows that 2,423,573 Florida citizens have mailed in the ballots for the forthcoming election as of Saturday, October 17. Of those ballots, 1,190,508 came from Democrats compared to only 730,123 that have come from Republicans. The remaining 502, 942 mail-in ballots came from other parties or were non-party affiliates.
These statistics show that more people have used mail-in ballots for the November 3 election that they did for the August primaries, which was 2,342,751 votes.
With Florida being a swing state, such an early saturation of Democrats voting early by mail is a good sign for Democratic Presidential candidate Joe Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris. This is the first time Democrats have led the mail-in votes against Republicans this close to an election day, as reported by Politico.
READ MORE: Mail-in ballots from Black NC voters rejected 4 times the rate of white voters
In addition to the mail-in votes, CBS News 5 reported that NewsNation/Emerson College polls show Biden leading over incumbent President Donald Trump in Florida. Biden had 50 percent support while Trump had 47 percent.
Despite having an early lead, Democrats such as political strategist Steve Schale believe it’s still too early to claim victory in Florida at this moment.
“The numbers are pretty staggering for us and the return rates and the polling look good,” Schale stated. “But there’s just a lot we don’t know.”
Florida may prove to be an important swing state for the election. Trump won Florida over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. In 2000, Florida was the deciding state for the George W. Bush vs. Al Gore election with results so close that there had to be a recount.
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