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Elliott
YESTERDAY I POSTED an update on early voting in Texas after the state published its final tallies of in-person turnout through the end of the EV window (Friday).
The upshot from that post can essentially be summarized in the chart below, which shows the share of Democratic and Republican voters in Harris County (Houston) who (a) voted early in 2024 and (b) have voted early or by mail this year. Each row shows the turnout rate for prior Democratic and Republican early voters by their level of past engagement, such as (in the first row) Houstonians who voted in the 2020, 2022 and 2024 general elections and the 2022 and 2024 primaries.
There is a larger “engagement gap” between Democrats and Republicans among the lowest-engagement group of voters. Among Houstonians who regularly turn out for elections, Democrats (91% turnout) are out-voting Republicans (86%) by a modest but still sizable 5 points. But among irregular voters (bottom row: those who skipped the 2022 midterm but voted early in 2024), Republicans (57%) have fallen 13 points behind Democrats (70%).
New voters skew even more Democratic. Among those who voted in the primary this March, Democrats outnumber Republicans more than 5 to 1. In 2022, they were split about evenly.
These results look a lot like the polls. For months, Republicans have been telling pollsters they’re less likely to vote this year than Democrats — by about 10 percentage points across firms. But that gap is concentrated among the least reliable Trump voters.
In two recent surveys — one from Wave Polling and Research, the polling firm I run, and the other from our Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll — 94% of regular voters who backed Kamala Harris in 2024 said they’d definitely vote for Congress, compared to 88% of regular Trump voters, a modest 6-point gap.
But among irregular voters, the people who turned out in 2024 but are less likely to vote in a typical midterm, the gap nearly triples: 81% of irregular Harris voters say they’ll definitely vote, vs just 64% of irregular Trump voters. Irregular Trump voters are the least sure of any 2024 voters that they’ll turn out.
As of today, Nov. 1, we have final early-voting numbers from North Carolina to add to the pile of data showing Republicans lagging this year. If these patterns hold, Democrats may even have a better turnout environment than 2018.
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