More than 1M already voted in Va.

Long lines have led to increased voting site staff

More than a million Virginians have already voted in person — and another 678,000 by mail — far outpacing the number of absentee voters in the 2016 presidential election.

“None of us have ever seen this record-breaking turnout,” Virginia Beach Registrar Donna Patterson said over the phone Thursday. “It’s really exciting.”

Amid the coronavirus pandemic, officials have been encouraging people to vote by mail or early to avoid crowds at the polls on Nov. 3. And surveys have shown a huge level of interest in the presidential race.

In Virginia Beach, about 1,000 people per day have voted in person at the city’s Municipal Center alone. People have lined up in such great numbers — even as the city added satellite voting sites — that Patterson’s office boosted staff levels to keep up with the pace.

On Friday afternoon, the city’s tracker (vbgov.com/voter) showed a wait time of three hours in Kempsville, an hour and 25 minutes at the Municipal Center and between 30 and 60 minutes at the others: Seatack, Bayside and Great Neck.

In Portsmouth, the number of returned mail-in ballots alone is already vastly higher than the city’s total absentee count from 2016. More than 14,000 people in the city have voted either in person or by mail this year — more than three times the total absentee vote count in 2016, about 4,200. A total of about 43,500 people voted that year. In Newport News, about 17,600 have voted early.

“Our lines have been steady,” Portsmouth Registrar Deloris Overton Short wrote in an email. “But no one waits any more than 25 minutes.”

Across the state, only about half a million people voted absentee either in person or by mail in 2016. Overall, about 4 million voted that year.

Virginians tripled that year’s early voting numbers by Friday — more than a full week before the Nov. 3 general election.

This season has been extraordinarily busy for election officials, as laws were tweaked from week to week, requiring updated processes or overhauls to ballots themselves. But the biggest change in Virginia came from lawmakers prior to the pandemic.

At its January session, the newly Democratic-controlled General Assembly made a change allowing absentee ballots to be counted until the Friday past Election Day, so long as they’re postmarked by that Tuesday. Voters also have until noon Friday to correct any mistakes on their ballot that would render it invalid.

The new rules expand access for voters, but mean all votes can’t be counted until Nov. 6. So far, many are opting to get their ballots in far before that deadline.

As of Friday afternoon, more than 29% of the state’s nearly 5.9 million registered voters had already cast ballots, state Department of Election statistics show.

Friday at 5 p.m. is the deadline to request a mail-in ballot in Virginia. The last day to vote early in person is Oct. 31. Visit elections.virginia.gov for more information.