Biden vs. Trump showdown drove Pa. voter turnout to historic high

Voter turnout in this month’s presidential election appears to have shattered modern records, Pennsylvania election officials announced Tuesday afternoon.

More than 6.9 million Pennsylvanians cast a ballot, either in person or by mail, according to a news release from the Pennsylvania Department of State. That bested the total from the 2016 election, when Donald Trump carried the state in his race against Hillary Clinton. More than 6.1 million people cast a ballot in that race.

The 6.9 million voters in this month’s election account for 70.93% of voter-aged residents of Pennsylvania, according to the release. That topped a figure last seen in 1960, when 70.3% of the population cast ballots in the race between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon. By comparison, 61% of the voting-age population participated in the 2016 election.

The turnout came after 9 million people registered to vote in the Keystone State, the most in Pennsylvania history.

“I am thrilled with the voter engagement and record turnout in this year’s election, which truly reflects the vitality of our democracy,” Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar said in a news release. “It is also a powerful credit to Pennsylvania’s dedicated election officials and poll workers, who worked incredibly hard to run a free, fair and secure election with no significant issues while contending with a pandemic, new mail-in ballot procedures and what is apparently the highest voter turnout in commonwealth history.”

Pennsylvania’s tally of the election is nearly complete, with about 18,000 out of 100,000 provisional ballots remaining. Provisional ballots take longer to count because county election officials must determine if each ballot should be fully counted, partially counted or rejected depending on the circumstances. Due to the surge of voters who requested mail-in ballots and problems at the U.S. Postal Service in delivering those ballots, an unusually high number of provisional ballots were cast.

Trump has acknowledged that Joe Biden appears to have won the race but continues to insist that widespread fraud took place. His campaign has presented no evidence to back this claim, and members of the Trump campaign’s legal team have said no such evidence exists.

The most recent tally in Pennsylvania has Biden leading Trump by approximately 73,000 votes.

Trump would need to find some way to flip the results in Pennsylvania and at least one other state to get a second term.