Some American voters will be able to cast their ballots in the 2024 election at any time, as the first ballots of the cycle began to be sent out on Friday.
The crucial swing state of North Carolina began sending out its first ballots on September 6, sixty days before Election Day.
It is the first state in the country to begin sending out ballots as the campaign season enters full swing for the final stretch.
Both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris is looking to secure the key state and its sixteen electoral votes, while the Tar Heel State also has one of the most contentious gubernatorial races of 2024.
Trump won the state in 2016 and 2020. But the latest polls show a very close race, with the former president leading the vice president by just over half a point, according to the Real Clear Politics average.
North Carolina is the first state in the country to begin issuing ballots ahead of the 2024 election. The first ballots will be mailed out on September 60, sixty days before Election Day on November 5.
Harris’ campaign sees North Carolina as one of its opportunities for a state that Democrats can flip in November and has been investing time and money there.
The first ballots are cast before Harris and Trump meet face to face on the debate stage for the first time. The highly anticipated prime-time showdown is scheduled for Sept. 10 in Philadelphia. The first ballots will be cast in Pennsylvania on Sept. 16.
But Western Carolina University professor Chris Cooper doesn’t think the early start date for mail-in voting in North Carolina will have a big electoral effect for either candidate.
“Let’s say if we sent it out 45 days before the election instead of 60 days before, I don’t know if we’d see a much different result,” Cooper said. “Probably the same people would still be voting at that point.”
But he offered two pieces of evidence of why it could potentially be beneficial for Harris at the margins: Democrats have been using mail-in voting more frequently in recent years, and Harris is still enjoying a boost in enthusiasm since President Biden’s ticket changed.
‘“It’s hard to maintain enthusiasm for months at a time,” he said.
The first ballots in North Carolina are being mailed in before Kamala Harris and Donald Trump face off on the debate stage on September 10.
North Carolina begins sending mail-in ballots to all voters who request them, including military personnel and overseas voters, sixty days later.
Voters can request an absentee ballot by mail by completing the official form online, mailing it in with a paper form, or delivering it in person.
Voters in the battleground state do not need an excuse to vote by mail. While the first ballots will be mailed out on Friday, voters have until seven days before the Nov. 5 election to request a mail-in ballot.
More than a million people voted by mail in North Carolina’s 2020 election, but it was held at the height of the coronavirus pandemic. Another 3.6 million voted early in person.
In 2022, fewer than 190,000 people voted absentee by mail in the midterm elections, while more than two million chose to vote early in person.
Poll workers fill out applications for mail-in ballots in North Carolina in September 2020. The number of people voting by mail in the last presidential election spiked due to the pandemic, but declined again in 2022.
“Typically, it’s a relatively small proportion of the total votes cast, two to three percentage points,” Cooper said of mail-in voting in the state. “In 2020, it skyrocketed.” to about one in five votes cast, and then, in 2022, it dropped again.
Cooper called it “significant in a state like North Carolina” but expects it to pale in comparison to in-person voting, whether early or on Election Day.
Early in-person voting begins in North Carolina on October 17.
This year, there have been some changes to voting in person or by mail in the state. Voters who mail in their ballot must include a photocopy of a valid ID or complete a photo ID exception form to return with the absentee ballot packet mailed to them.
Harris visited North Carolina in August to deliver her first speech on the economy in Raleigh. She did so just after Trump was also in the state to deliver speeches focused on the economy.
Both candidates made several stops in the city this year. Most recently, Harris’ running mate, Tim Walz, traveled to North Carolina after campaigning in Georgia last week.
Democrats have stepped up their efforts to flip the state. The latest polls show Trump leading by less than a point. He won the state by fewer than 75,000 votes in the last presidential election.
The last Democrat to win North Carolina in a presidential election was former President Obama in 2008. Democrats see it as one of the few battlegrounds they could add to their column starting in 2020.
The state is known for its independent leanings. Although Trump won in 2016 and 2020, North Carolina also elected Democratic Governor Roy Cooper.
North Carolina voters will also vote for governor between Robinson and Stein
This year’s race for governor between Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson and Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein has been brutal. The latest Real Clear Politics average gives Stein a nearly nine-point lead.
Traditionally, Republicans were more likely to vote by mail, in part because of the number of military personnel, but that changed when Trump began questioning mail-in ballots in 2020. More Republicans listened to him, while Democrats chose to do the opposite.
Some Republicans are making efforts to ensure that their voters use all available options to cast their ballots, even if that means voting by mail.