Millions of Americans have already voted, either in person or by sending in their ballots, and more women than men are voting early across key battleground states in a presidential election that is being marked by a gender divide, according to new statistics.
Data from the University of Florida's Election Lab shows that nearly 18 million Americans have voted early as of Tuesday, and that overall, 54% of women have cast early ballots, compared to 44% of men, reports The New York Times.
Women are casting their ballots early in at least three battleground states, with 55% of the early ballots in Georgia, 51% in North Carolina, and 56% in Michigan all coming from women.
The data didn't break down the voting by gender numbers in the four other battleground states, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Wisconsin, or Nevada, but the trend also follows the tendency of women to vote at slightly higher rates than men in presidential elections.
In the 2020 race, 68% of women who were eligible to vote cast ballots, compared to 65% of men.
The gender gap is significant in this year's race, as many polls are finding that Vice President Kamala Harris is polling far ahead of former President Donald Trump among women.
For example, late last week, a Quinnipiac University poll showed that 61% of women favored Harris, with 36% of men favoring her. But 60% of men chose Trump, compared to 35% of women.
In 2020, more than 65.6 million people voted by mail, and another 35.8 million voted early in person to avoid crowds during the pandemic.
This year, voters are casting ballots early for several reasons, including new laws that expand their options, but many just found during the last election that they liked the convenience involved.
And states are setting records for their first day of early voting, including North Carolina, which set a record of 353,000 early ballots last Thursday, even though the state is still recovering from Hurricane Helene.
Voting laws changed in some states after the controversies of the 2020 election.
Georgia approved a law in 2021 to add restrictions to mail-in voting, and in 2022, laws were passed in Michigan to allow 9 days of early voting and to establish a "permanent absentee list" that allows voters to receive a mail ballot every election without having to reapply.
It appears that more Democrats are once again embracing early voting, at least according to the few states that track early voting by political parties, the University of Florida data shows.
Republicans are getting mixed messages from Trump on voting early. This election cycle, he's encouraged his supporters to vote early, but he also still continues to call for single-day voting and speaks out about mail-in voting.
Both presidential campaigns are warning that it is too soon to draw major conclusions about the early vote turnout, reports The Wall Street Journal.
The Trump campaign has also been pushing the message about early voting through canvassers and advertising.
Early voting numbers have come from older people, with nearly half of the numbers so far coming from voters older than 65, according to the University of Florida's Election Lab, which also showed that only 5% of voters ages 18 to 25 have cast early ballots.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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