The latest early voting figures in Florida hold a lot of positive signs for Barack Obama. Figures through Tuesday, just released by the St. Petersburg Times, show Democrats holding a solid lead over Republicans in early votes casts (both absentee ballots and early voting sites combined), 45%-39%, and two recent polls show Obama with an even bigger lead in terms of actual voting.
As of yesterday, 2,657,903 Floridians have cast their votes, which represents a stunning 35% of votes cast in Florida in 2004 for the presidential election. That's pretty amazing to me.
In terms of absentee voting, Repugs lead Dems 50%-35% (with 15% independents). But Democrats are crushing Repugs at the early voting sites, 54%-30% (16% independents). And we still have 5 days left.
Here's the breakdown (estimated):
Democrats:
Absentee: 432,754
Early Voting: 772,760
Total: 1,205,514 (45% of total)
Republicans:
Absentee: 607,565
Early Voting: 431,579
Total: 1,039,144 (39% of total)
The Times reports that Democrats current have 166,311 more absentee or early votes than Republicans (note: this figure is a bit off from the totals above, since I had to work backwards from the Times figures in some cases. The Times gave the total votes and percentages for absentees and early votes, so the breakdowns by party above are approximate.)
Even better news: A Quinnipiac poll released today shows Obama up 60%-40% among early voters in Florida. That's nearly identical to a Suffolk University poll from a few days ago, which showed Obama up 60%-40% among early voters in the state. Both polls include folks who voted via absentee or at early voting sites.
If we continue to get out the vote, we can win Florida. Help with GOTV in your area if you can, in Florida or wherever you live. I signed up this morning to volunteer through next Tues. If you can spare a few hours on election day or any other day (particularly if there's early voting in your state), please help. Go to Obama's website and they make it easy to sign up to volunteer (of course).