KNOX COUNTY, Tenn. — Knox County voters are flocking to the polls and breaking records. At the end of the early voting period, election officials said more than half of all registered voters in the county had cast a ballot.
In a release, the Knox County Election Commission said 163,303 early votes were cast and it received 7,503 absentee and nursing home votes. There are around 336,000 registered voters in Knox County, the release said. The most active polling location during early voting was at Downtown West.
The number of early votes surpassed those from the previous two presidential elections. In 2020, the commission said it got around 153,000 early votes and in 2016 there were around 135,700 early votes cast.
The total number of votes cast in 2016 was around 185,000, and in 2020 election officials collected around 222,000 total votes.
The commission also said 23,414 first-time voters cast a ballot during the 2024 early voting period in Knox County. It also said around 87,100 votes were cast by people at least 55 years old, and the majority of votes so far were likely cast by women.
It recorded 82,873 female voters so far and 65,627 male voters in Knox County. However, it said 22,306 votes were cast by voters with unknown genders since federal voter registration forms do not ask for gender information.
The next chance most voters will have to cast a ballot will be on Election Day, falling on Nov. 5. Polls will be open in Knox County from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. that Tuesday. Knox County voters will need to vote at their assigned locations, which they can find online.
