Georgia voters have officially rewritten the record books. The state broke its midterm record for early voting in person on Thursday, and by 5 a.m. Friday, 2,402,408 Georgians had voted early in person, blowing past the previous record of 2,289,951 set during the 2022 midterms. \
The surge comes as Senator Jon Ossoff, the Democrat Republicans spent two years calling the most vulnerable incumbent in the country, heads into the final stretch with a clear polling lead over Republican challenger Mike Collins.
Early voting in person ends tonight at 7 p.m., and Georgians can still cast a ballot at any advance voting location in their home county before Election Day arrives on Tuesday, November 3. On Tuesday, voters must report to their assigned neighborhood precinct.
The Numbers Behind The Record
The record didn’t sneak up on anyone. Turnout passed the 2 million mark earlier this week, and by Thursday afternoon the state had already exceeded everything 2022 produced across its entire early voting period. State election officials also reported more than 111,000 absentee ballots accepted as of Friday morning, which puts Georgia on pace to eclipse its overall midterm early turnout record of roughly 2.5 million votes once mail ballots are counted alongside the record setting lines at polling places.
Women are powering the wave, accounting for 56% of all early ballots cast so far. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Georgians keep showing up “because they trust the system” and credited county election workers for keeping the process running smoothly.
One honest caveat on the raw numbers: Georgia now has 8.2 million registered voters, up from 7.8 million in 2022, so the eligible pool is about 5% larger than it was the last time the record was set. Even accounting for that growth, the enthusiasm is unmistakable.
The Race At The Top Of The Ballot
That enthusiasm is pouring into a Senate race Republicans once treated as their easiest pickup opportunity in America. Instead, the latest Atlanta Journal Constitution and University of Georgia survey shows Ossoff leading Collins 48% to 40% among likely voters, a lead that sits outside the poll’s 3.1% margin of error, with roughly 12% still undecided. The same polling found 55% of Georgians approve of the job Ossoff is doing, and he raised a staggering $33 million as the race entered its final weeks.
The closing weekend has drawn the biggest names in both parties, with Barack Obama and Kamala Harris stumping for Ossoff and Democratic gubernatorial nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms, while Donald Trump rallied in Georgia for Collins and Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Jackson. That governor’s race remains a dead heat in the AJC polling, which means every one of these record early votes matters all the way down the ballot.
What It Means For Tuesday
Record turnout in a midterm is a statement all by itself. It is an even louder one in a cycle where this administration has repeatedly tried to tilt the midterms through pressure campaigns, legal threats against election officials, and federal monitor deployments. Georgians answered by standing in line, in numbers no midterm in state history has ever produced.
The votes still have to be counted, and nobody should treat a polling lead as a finished result. But the picture heading into Tuesday is clear. The seat Republicans guaranteed they would flip is slipping away from them, the governor’s mansion is a coin flip, and nearly 2.5 million Georgians have already had their say before Election Day even arrives. Democracy works when people show up. In Georgia, they are showing up in record numbers.
