by Hugh Jackson and April Corbin Girnus, Nevada Current

A little more than three-fourths of Nevada registered voters cast ballots in the last two presidential election cycles – 77% in 2016 and 78% in 2020.

A similar turnout this year would mean about two-thirds of Nevadans who will vote have already done so, while at least a half million more will vote either in person on Election Day Tuesday or by mailing ballots between now and then.

A smidgen over half – 50.4% – of Nevada eligible voters had cast their ballots as of the end of the day Friday, the last day of early in person voting.

Cumulative mail and early in person turnout through the early voting period this year was a little less prevalent than four years ago, when 56% of the electorate had cast ballots by the end of early voting, according to Nevada Secretary of State turnout reports.

Of the more than 542,000 early in person voters, 45.5% were Republicans, and 27.7% were Democrats.

Another 26.8% of votes were cast by others, including nonpartisans – a group that would constitute the state’s largest political party if they were a party – along with the much smaller number of Nevadans who belong to third parties. 

Of 483,171 mail ballots received as of Friday, 40.2% were sent by Democrats, 30.3% by Republicans, and 29.4% by others.

Of the slightly more than one million total votes – mail and early in person – reported cast during the early voting period, Republicans accounted for 38.4% to Democrats 33.6% and 28% for the nonpartisans/other parties.

The Secretary of State’s office will continue releasing mail ballot totals each day until Election Day.

In this year’s June primary, the single day that most mail ballots were received was the day after Election Day, because so many people deposit their mail ballot in the mail or in a drop box on Election Day.

So far, so good

“The process has been smooth,” Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar said during a press briefing Friday, and his office is “expecting the same through Election Day.”

He said there have been no instances requiring use of a new law enacted during the 2023 legislative session to protect election workers from intimidation and election interference.

Mail ballots are already being counted, and county election officials can begin counting early in person votes on the morning of Election Day.

That means when polls close Tuesday, possibly all early voting ballots and mail ballots received before Election Day will have been counted, and the first announcement of results could include a substantially larger batch of votes than has been the case in the past.

In 2020, the Nevada presidential race was not called by media decision desks until the Saturday after Election Day, because of the close margins separating Donald Trump and Joe Biden and the significant numbers of mail ballots that had not been counted by the end of Election Day. 

The new procedures have officials optimistic that Nevada’s results won’t take that long this year. One of those officials is Lorena Portillo, the registrar of voters in Clark County, which is the home of 72% of Nevada’s registered voters.

During the briefing with the press Friday, Aguilar and his staff noted that voting machines aren’t connected to the Internet, so ballots must be physically driven to the county election office. The was emphasized to address security concerns, but also to point out the delay in counting Election Day votes, when ballots are driven from distant rural polling places to county seats.

Despite new procedures designed to speed the reporting of results, that doesn’t guarantee winners of close races will be known on election night, a point underscored by the volume of mail votes received on Election Day itself but not counted until later during the primary.

Aguilar encouraged voters to update their contact info at vote.nv.gov so that counties will be able to contact them directly if their signature isn’t accepted or there are other problems. 

Aguilar also joked that his goal is for Nevada’s election to go so smoothly that nobody outside of Nevada knows who he is.