What we know about Georgia's 4 million votes already cast ahead of Election Day
Millions of Americans are heading to the polls Tuesday to cast their Election Day ballots, and in battleground Georgia, more than half the state’s active voters have already done so.
The Peach State’s early voting period between Oct. 15 and Nov. 1 saw more than 4 million people vote either early in-person or absentee. That’s 55.5% of their active voting populace, according to Georgia’s Election Data Hub.
Both the Trump and Harris campaigns are pouring enormous resources into the state won by President Biden in 2020 by less than 1%.
Here is what we know about who has voted in Georgia already:
Female early voters in Georgia have outpaced male voters by double digits – something Vice President Kamala Harris’ allies see as a positive sign for Democrats, given their emphasis on abortion rights in the elections since Roe v. Wade was overturned during the Trump administration.
Former President Trump has also made recent appeals to women voters, promising in several events over the last few days to "protect women" and warning they are "under attack" by illegal immigrants under the current Democratic administration.
In Georgia, 56% of early voters were women, while 43.8% were men.
The gap between female and male voters in Georgia widened considerably when focused on Black voters.
Women made up 62.1% of Black voters who voted early in-person or absentee, while Black men trailed behind with 37.8%.
Black voters, women in particular, are still expected to favor Harris and the Democratic Party in broad numbers.
The Trump campaign, however, has worked to make inroads with Black men in key swing states like Georgia and North Carolina, with promises of economic prosperity under Republicans.
GEORGIA DEMS CHAIR REVEALS MESSAGE TO UNDECIDED GOP VOTERS AS HARRIS WORKS TO BUILD BROAD BASE
A 58% majority of Georgia’s early voters were White, according to Georgia Votes, a data aggregation site partnered with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
That was followed by Black voters with 26.4% of the early vote.
Hispanic and Asian voters combined made up roughly 6% of early voters.
Black or African American Georgians make up roughly a third of the state’s population, according to the most recent census data.
Of the state’s active White voters, 63% have already voted, compared to 49.7% of active Black voters, the Georgia elections site says.
Counties considered more rural in Georgia have seen more of their active voters cast pre-Election Day ballots than more Democratic-leaning areas around Atlanta.
The 20 counties ranked highest in terms of percentage of total active voter turnout so far were all won by Trump in 2020, despite Biden winning the state overall.
The bluer counties in the Atlanta metropolitan area are still significantly larger than those rural counties where turnout is high – but in a race that came down to less than 12,000 votes in 2020, every ballot cast is critical.
GEORGIA GOP CHAIR SHARES 2-PRONGED ELECTION STRATEGY AS TRUMP WORKS TO WIN BACK PEACH STATE
In terms of sheer numbers, the most early and absentee voters have been in Atlanta and its densely packed surrounding suburbs.
The top three counties in terms of turnout are Towns, Oconee and Dawson – all were won by Trump in 2020, but together the number of active voters who have cast ballots there already is just over 47,000.
By contrast, the counties of Henry, Cobb and Fulton – the third being home to the city of Atlanta itself – have seen less of their total active voting populations turn out before Election Day, but more than 861,000 ballots cast so far.
One of the biggest questions of the Election Day post-mortem will be how more than 830,000 early voters who did not vote at all in 2020 cast their ballots this time around.
That group makes up roughly 21% of Georgia’s early voters, per Georgia Votes.
Roughly half of those voters are White and about a quarter are Black.
Georgia Lt. Gov. Burt Jones told Fox News Digital last week that he believes those voters are largely Trump supporters who voted in 2016 but did not do so in 2020.
It’s worth noting, however, that the majority of early voters in Georgia also voted early in 2020.