Early in person voting in North Carolina wrapped up Saturday with more than 3.5 million people voting during the two-week period. Combined with absentee by-mail voting, nearly 62% of registered voters in North Carolina already have cast their ballots.
Mecklenburg County had 33 early voting sites, among them many high school gyms and four library branches. WFAE visited the library branches Saturday, where the lines were not long.
Cole Horowitz, 19, voted at the Mountain Island library branch. It was his first time.
“Everybody’s kind of like peer-pressuring each other to vote," he said. "Not wanting to vote makes you kind of — a little uncool, you know."
Horowitz said he was expecting to have to wait in the line for hours, but it went much faster.
“A lot of my neighbors and friends are actually helping out with voting, and I want to thank them for just making our experience go a little smoother,” Horowitz added.
Joe Guyer went to the North County Regional Library in Huntersville on Saturday to vote for the first time early. He came with his son who had never voted before.
“I expect a large crowd [on Election Day] – he wanted to go with me," Guyer said. "I knew it would be difficult to schedule both of us Tuesday morning. So, we took advantage of it today.”
Ebony Southerland recently moved from Indianapolis and was worried that she wouldn’t be able to vote because her registration was not complete and all her identifying documents were still linked to Indiana.
She completed the voter registration application online and brought a bill with her new North Carolina address on it with her to vote early at the Allegra Westbrooks Regional Library on Beatties Ford Road.
“I went to the closest place for me to vote,” she said.
Southerland said that her voting experience went smoothly and quickly, and the longest part of the process was reading the actual ballot.
She was wearing a Mrs. Incredible costume in the spirit of Halloween. That didn’t slow the process down. She wanted to use the costume to prove a point to voters that you don’t need to show a North Carolina ID to vote in the state. She said she was going to snap a photo of herself in it and post that message on social media.
“I’m going to make this dramatic post while wearing my ‘incredible’ outfit saying, ‘It’s incredible!’” she said.
To see how many ballots were cast at each One-Stop voting site in Mecklenburg County visit Mecklenburg County Board of Elections website and to stay up to date with ballot numbers statewide, visit North Carolina Board of Elections website.
Dante Miller joined WFAE as a Report for America Corps Member in 2020 in the unique partnership using radio and Wikipedia to fill news deserts.
Alexandra Watts joined WFAE as a Report for America Corps Member in 2020 in the unique partnership with the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library using radio and Wikipedia to fill news deserts.
Tell us about your voting experience. Did it go smoothly? Were there any problems? How were the lines? Did you feel safe? If so, why or why not?
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