Early voting: Record levels in 2016 may give Clinton edge

Bill Clinton, who carried Nevada in 1992 and 1996, campaigned for his wife on both ends of the state and Obama rallied support for her in Las Vegas three weeks before the election. The turnout among Hispanic voters did not surge, even though exit polls implied that it had.

But early voting data suggests that Donald Trump, who launched his campaign calling Mexicans rapists, has awoken a sleeping electoral giant, one that might already have cost him the election. We are also seeing it with early turnout to the polls.

It is too soon to say whether it will put her over the top. Most states, the Times pointed out, don’t ask people about race and Hispanic origin on voter registration forms.

But the surge is real, and it is big. The latest Quinnipiac University poll, which was released this morning, has Clinton with 46 percent of the vote among likely voters and Trump with 45 percent. “Some blacks feel that both parties are bad”, he added, predicting that many in his community would wait for Election Day to vote.

Hillary Clinton’s path to the White House is about getting out the Hispanic, African American, Democrats, college-educated white women, and millennials. Early votes from Hispanics came in record-breaking numbers that day.

As the campaigning into U.S. presidential election draws to the last stage, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump today scrambled to make their final pitch to voters in the closely-contested race dogged by controversies like the Democratic nominee’s email scandal and sexual assault allegations against her Republican rival.

Latino-targeted radio and television ads ran in Wisconsin, where “statewide elections are close enough that the growing Latinx vote can make a difference”, said Voces de la Frontera Action in a statement, using a gender-neutral term for Hispanics that is coming into vogue with younger adults.

The attention to this year’s election appears to have sparked a record turnout.

Donald Trump called the system “rigged” at “certain key Democratic polling locations” when early voting polls in Nevada stayed open until 10pm, past the 7pm deadline. Those figures do not indicate which candidate voters picked, only the party with which the voters are registered.

The two parties in Florida almost tied in early-voting participation, with early-voting levels way up.

Michael McDonald, a University of Florida professor and an AP consultant said, “Interest in early voting has been unprecedented in many states”.

The good news for Clinton is that record early voting in Nevada means she has a “firewall” of around 73,000 ballots there, according to Slate. Actually, we’re really proud that African-Americans are supporting Secretary Clinton at the same rate as President Obama. Right now it is a bit of a mismatch: Republicans held 36 of the nation’s 99 statehouse chambers in 2010, and that number has climbed to 68.

But part of it is simply a drop in turnout overall.

Nationwide, about 12 percent of voters are Hispanic, or about 27.3 million people, according to Pew Research Center projections. But that has not translated into power at the polls, despite concerted efforts by Democrats and Latino political organizations to turn out Latino voters. But there are plenty of surveys where this does not seem to show up. Democrats say the law hurts minorities’ ability to vote, many of whom, including Latinos and African-Americans, traditionally vote Democratic.

And Sunday, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, the GOP vice presidential nominee, rallied hundreds of supporters in Hickory.

According to the analysis from Genic.ai, Trump was more popular than President Barack Obama was during the 2008 campaign – meaning his “engagement” numbers on social media platforms are higher than Obama’s was during the peak of Obama’s first campaign.

The early and absentee voters in Arizona, Colorado, Florida and Nevada also cited immigration as a major reason for their votes. “We saw just eye popping turnout in Florida over the last two days, particularly in our strongholds of southern Florida, North Carolina and elsewhere so we’re very encouraged, very positive”. The early signs were not encouraging for Democrats in early voting; election night should answer that question.

Clinton fared slightly better than her party as a whole, with 60 percent of Latinos saying she truly cares about the community, and 57 percent saying the same about the party.

Who picked a Clinton win?