From Gov. Brian Kemp to former President Jimmy Carter, over 240,000 Georgia voters have already cast their ballots for this month’s primary.
Turnout steadily rose by roughly 25,000 voters each day across Georgia through nearly two weeks of early voting, according to state election data published Friday.
The deadline to request an absentee ballot is Friday, and absentee ballots must be received at county election offices before polls close on election day May 21.
Voters can find their early voting locations, request absentee ballots and view sample ballots through the state’s My Voter Page at www.mvp.sos.ga.gov.
Georgia is an open primary state, meaning voters can choose whichever party’s primary they want to participate in.
So far, more voters are participating in the Republican primary than the Democratic primary. There were over 130,000 Republican voters, nearly 106,000 Democratic voters and 3,800 voters who cast nonpartisan ballots.
The primary includes races for Congress, the General Assembly, county offices and the Georgia Supreme Court.
The winners of partisan primaries will advance to the general election in November. In some cases, the primary will effectively decide the winner in races where no candidate from a different party is running.
Most early voters have cast ballots at in-person locations across the state, which are open statewide for at least 17 days leading up to election day. Early voting ends May 17.
Fewer than 20,000 people have cast absentee ballots so far, about 8% of the total. About 35,000 more voters requested absentee ballots that haven’t yet been returned.
