N.J. casts over 320,000 votes in advance of Tuesday's primary – New Jersey Globe

New Jerseyans cast 10,374 in-person early votes on Saturday, bringing the total to 41,785 statewide, with 320,823 total advance votes for the June 4 primary election, according to an analysis of numbers through last night by Ryan Dubicki, an Associated Press election researcher.

Democrats have already cast 241,205 votes, including 215,803 vote-by-mail ballots and 25,402 early votes; 79,248 advance votes have come from Republicans, including 62,871 VBMs and 16,377 early votes.

That puts advance voting turnout at 10% for Democrats and 5% for Republicans.

County clerks mailed 693,504 vote-by-mail ballots, 75% of them to Democrats; 21% of Democrats requested VBMs, while just 11% of Republicans did.  The return rate among Democrats is 41.6%; it’s 36.8% among Republicans.

There have been 24,613 advance votes in the Democratic primary for Congress in New Jersey’s 3rd district, where 46% of Democrats have returned mail-in ballots.   This is the contest for U.S. Senate candidate Andy Kim’s open House seat.

In the 8th district, where Rep. Rob Menendez (D-Jersey City) and Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla are facing off for the Democratic nomination, 13,311 advance votes have been cast: 8,656 VBMs and 4,655 in-person early votes.

The state’s largest city, Newark, has cast 2,042 advance votes in the Democratic primary, including 641 in-person early votes – about the same number as Evesham.

Union City cast 2,746 in-person early votes, the most in the state.