Early voting is not the magic bullet

Do you remember when we debated early voting and how it was going to increase turnout?

This election cycle gave us the first opportunity to compare two cycles and see what the trends have become. I’m sure supporters of early voting were hoping to see the slow slide in turnout come to an end this cycle, but it appears the problem wasn’t solved by adding several days of balloting.

Here was the turnout, by county, in 2010. I decided to go highest to lowest.

  1. Queen Anne’s – 67.43%
  2. Kent – 66.79%
  3. Talbot – 65.20%
  4. Harford – 63.82%
  5. Anne Arundel – 61.71%
  6. Worcester – 61.10%
  7. Carroll – 60.99%
  8. Howard – 60.88%
  9. Dorchester – 60.71%
  10. Somerset – 59.34%
  11. Baltimore Co. – 58.92%
  12. Calvert – 57.37%
  13. Caroline – 56.35%
  14. Frederick – 55.34%
  15. Wicomico – 55.34%
  16. St. Mary’s – 54.05%
  17. Garrett – 53.49%
  18. Allegany – 52.99%
  19. Charles – 52.57%
  20. Montgomery – 51.38%
  21. Cecil – 50.76%
  22. Washington – 49.20%
  23. Prince George’s – 45.17%
  24. Baltimore City – 45.02%

Statewide average was 54.02%.

I’m assuming that this year’s count has returned absentees included; if not it may bump up an extra percent. But 2014 turnout is abysmal.

  1. Kent – 58.91% (off 7.88%)
  2. Queen Anne’s – 57.01% (off 10.42%)
  3. Talbot – 56.70% (off 8.50%)
  4. Carroll – 55.44% (off 5.55%)
  5. Harford – 53.93% (off 9.89%)
  6. Calvert – 53.07% (off 4.30%)
  7. Howard – 52.16% (off 8.72%)
  8. Frederick – 51.36% (off 3.98%)
  9. Worcester – 51.13% (off 9.97%)
  10. Dorchester – 49.16% (off 11.55%)
  11. Anne Arundel – 49.15% (off 12.56%)
  12. Somerset – 49.02% (off 10.32%)
  13. Baltimore Co. – 48.87% (off 10.05%)
  14. St. Mary’s – 48.76% (off 5.29%)
  15. Caroline – 48.57% (off 7.78%)
  16. Allegany – 46.95% (off 6.04%)
  17. Garrett – 46.25% (off 7.24%)
  18. Charles – 45.66% (off 6.91%)
  19. Wicomico – 43.76% (off 11.58%)
  20. Cecil – 42.19% (off 8.57%)
  21. Washington – 41.64% (off 7.56%)
  22. Montgomery – 38.92% (off 12.46%)
  23. Prince George’s – 38.03% (off 7.14%)
  24. Baltimore City – 35.57% (off 9.45%)

So the best performer “only” dropped 3.98% thanks to a hot County Executive race while the worst fell 12.46%. Overall, the statewide turnout was an abysmal 44.72%.

And when Anthony Brown could only win four counties, including the three worst performers for overall turnout (plus Charles County, which wasn’t a hotbed either), you knew his campaign was in trouble. The far left is already blaming him for running a bad campaign, but Larry Hogan found a better message and I’ll bet when the party breakdown comes out the GOP turnout numbers will only be off 5 points or less from 2010. Part of that, as it turns out, was their utilization of early voting – but the top counties for early voting were generally the top ones for overall turnout anyway.

But back to the main subject. It’s now been demonstrated through three election cycles that all early voting is doing is spreading out fewer and fewer voters over more days. And while we haven’t seen the fraud I thought would happen so far, all bets are off once same-day registration becomes possible next time. Even so, I don’t think early voting is helping turnout, so if turnout in 2016 turns out lower once again it may be time to scrap the idea in time for 2018. Just don’t fund early voting for that election and pass the legislation necessary to place a repeal of Article I, Section 3(b) on the 2018 ballot.

Ironically, my fiance and I voted early this year. I didn’t like to have to do it, but I found it was easier than getting an absentee ballot. But as we walked right in and noticed there were a half-dozen people and ten or so voting machines sitting idle, I wondered what this convenience was costing me as a taxpayer. There were 4,945 early voters in my county at a polling place which was open for a total of 80 extra hours – by my public school math, that’s a little over 1 voter per minute. Is that really worth the cost? (Even worse, Somerset County had just 1,263 early voters so they only had perhaps 15 per hour.)

Perhaps what’s really needed are better candidates, but there’s not always much we can do about that.