By james art More than 1 million Massachusetts voters have already cast ballots in the 2024 election.
So far, nearly 860,000 residents have voted by mail and nearly 328,000 have voted in person during early voting hours, according to data from the Secretary of State’s office Monday evening. Altogether, this represents 24% of the state’s electorate.
Early voting for this year’s election runs through Friday, November 1.
In 2020 — the first year of the pandemic — about 1.5 million ballots were mailed and 844,000 residents voted during early voting. Postal voting probably won’t reach the same level; just 1.3 million residents applied to vote by mail this election cycle. The deadline to request a vote is Tuesday.
More than 62% of those who received mailed ballots have already returned them. Election officials are recommending that those who still need to return their ballots do so by using their community’s official drop box or take the ballot to their local election office instead of dropping it in the mailbox.
In addition to determining the next president, the 2024 election also includes a challenge to two-term incumbent Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a number of ballot questions, and other state and local offices.
The deadline to register to vote in Massachusetts this year has passed. The number of registered voters in the state has grown by about 242,000 since the last presidential election to more than 5 million people.
In 2020, there were about 4.8 million registered voters (with a 76% turnout), and in 2016 there were 4.5 million registered voters (with about a 74% turnout), according to state data.