KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Knox County early voting, as it usually does, picked up in the closing days, placing the final turnout tally pretty close to early turnout in 2022.
A total of 31,294 Knox Countians took advantage of early voting over nearly two weeks. Also, 2,061 ballots were cast by absentee ballot or during nursing home visits, according to the Knox County Election Commission.
The final three days of early voting, which ended Saturday, saw an obvious uptick across the county in turnout, figures show. About 27 percent of all votes were cast at the Downtown West site.
In the August 2022 midterm election, 31,566 votes were cast in the county. In August 2020 the total was 37,982, and in 2018 it was 43,755.
Election Day itself is Thursday, Aug. 1. Some 303,000 people are eligible to vote. This month, 643 first-time voters went to the polls in the county.
Typically, election administrators anticipate about the same number of people voting on Election Day as vote during the early period, which projects out to a total turnout of 60,000 to perhaps 65,000.
Polls will be open at your precinct stations 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday. Early returns typically become available starting about 8:30 p.m.
Early voting this month produced a few noteworthy statistics.
Republican votes outnumbered Democratic votes -- which is typical in Knox County.
But Democratic voters age 18-54 outnumbered Republican voters 4,623 to 3,547, figures show. The count doesn't include absentee ballots.
The big difference for Republicans? 14,883 voters age 55 and older cast ballots compared with 7,854 Democratic voters age 55 and older, according to the Election Commission. Older voters are the most dedicated voters.
Expect those trends again Thursday.
Locally, the races drawing the most votes included West Knoxville's District 4, which has a competitive and highly watched commission race, and far west Knox County's District 5, which features an open commission seat and a school board seat.
According to the Election Commission, 5,780 voted early in the District 4 commission race. And, 4,778 people voted early in the District 5 races. Another district drawing strong voting was the District 9 race for an open commission seat at 3,805.
Votes cast for races in those three districts represented about 46 percent of all early votes cast this July.
The August ballot features general races for county offices such as Knox County Commission and Knox County Board of Education. It also features primaries for state legislative races and congressional races.
The presidential race is in November.
