U.S. Elections 2008

News & Polls

04 November 2008
2008 U.S. Voter Turnout on Course to Set Record

By Stephen Kaufman
Staff Writer

Washington — When 120 million Americans voted in the 2004 presidential election it set a record as the largest voter turnout in U.S. history. By early accounts, the turnout in 2008 will be ever larger.

Reports of large voter turnout are particularly significant in a country where, in recent decades, barely half of eligible voters cast ballots. The high numbers estimated for 2008 speak not only to voter engagement and concern, but also to a willingness to set aside weeks of polling data and exercise their right to vote, even for long-shot candidates.

Many states reported record numbers of newly registered voters for the election. According to the tracking organization Catalist, 13 of the battleground states had registered 3.4 million new voters as of October 14, compared with 1.8 million in 2004. It is unclear how many millions cast their first vote in the 2008 election, but the number includes young people who reached their 18th birthday and newly naturalized U.S. citizens.

Official counts on voter participation probably will not be available for days, but some anecdotal evidence of high voter turnout across the United States already was appearing:

• The Virginia State Board of Elections estimated that as of 1 p.m. on November 4, some 50 percent of the state’s eligible voters already had cast their ballots.

• As of 2 p.m. EST, counties in western Pennsylvania were predicting that more than 70 percent of eligible voters in the region would cast ballots.

• In Minnesota, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie said in midafternoon of Election Day that he expected that total voter turnout could surpass 3 million (of 3.7 million eligible voters in Minnesota).

• Turnout was so high in the Nebraska 1st Congressional District that some polling places had run out of “I Voted” stickers by early afternoon.

• In New Mexico, some counties were reporting that more than half their eligible voters took advantage of early voting and already had cast their ballots before the polls opened on Tuesday.

• The Texas secretary of state predicted 9 million Texans would vote November 4, breaking the record of 7.4 million who voted in 2004 presidential election.

• In Oregon, where all ballots are mailed, state officials were not offering official predictions of voter participation. However, based on the record-setting volume of pizza delivery orders for election night, voter interest in the election results is high in this Northwestern state.

As the evening wears on and more anecdotes trickle in from western U.S. states, more evidence is expected to point to the 2008 election as having the highest U.S. voter turnout ever, and this level of participation could underline what already was going to be an historic election.

For an in-depth look at a select set of congressional districts across the United States, see State and Local Campaigns.

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