How early voting has fared so far in California

SACRAMENTO — With two weeks left until Election Day, we are getting our first look at who is voting early in California and what it could mean when the results come in. 

At the Sacramento County Registrar of Voters office, their ballot drop box has been busy. Regina Wilkins made sure to vote early. 

“I’m concerned about our constitution,” Wilkins said. 

So did Mike Campbell. 

“We’ve got problems going on,” Campbell said. 

Paul Mitchell with Political Data Inc. tracks ballots during election cycles to see who is voting and when. He said, just two weeks out, “This is kind of nearing the peak of election insanity.” 

Through publicly available data, Mitchell crunches the numbers. 

“We can see how many people are turning in their ballots to get a sense for maybe enthusiasm, and also we can see the age breakdown, the ethnic breakdown, the partisan breakdown,” Mitchell said. 

His breakdown shows that around 11% of California voters have returned their ballots compared to 21% four years ago at this same time. He cautioned that was during the pandemic. 

“So voters were voting so much quicker in 2020,” he noted. “The voting patterns were so much different.” 

This year, the numbers show people aged 65-plus are voting early most often. The youngest voters are voting early the least. Here’s how it breaks down two weeks out from Election Day:

• 23% of voters aged 65 and up have returned their ballots.
• 12% of voters aged 50-64 have returned their ballots.
• 6% of voters aged 35-49 have returned their ballots.
• 4% of voters aged 18-34 have returned their ballots.

In a breakdown by ethnicity, the percentages show very few Latino voters have voted early. Here’s how the numbers break down by ethnicity:

• 14% of White/other voters have returned their ballots.
• 11% of Asian voters have returned their ballots.
• 9% of Black voters have returned their ballots.
• 6% of Latino voters have returned their ballots.

By party, Independents are the least likely right now to have cast their ballots early, with only 8% voting early so far. Around 14% of Republicans have returned their ballots while around 12% of Democrats have returned theirs.

“It’s Independents who aren’t really using vote-by-mail,” Mitchell said, “and one reason that independents aren’t using vote-by-mail early is that they’re a lot younger. Younger voters aren’t using vote-by-mail early. Half of the ballots that have come in so far are from seniors.” 

This snapshot of early voting in California can allow campaigns to target where to spend their time and money as Election Day nears. 

Thursday, more voting centers will open to make voting early even more accessible.