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Voters made decisions on Election Day in Cherokee County, bringing the turnout to 72.32 percent.
It was the highest turnout Leighsa Jones, the county’s director of elections, has seen since she started working at the elections office in 1995.
“It was not surprising based on the activity beforehand,” Jones said.
Of the 16,402 ballots cast by the end of the night Tuesday, 11,459 voted before Election Day. Mailed absentee ballots were still arriving at the elections office, and could be included in the final count as long as they were postmarked by Nov. 3 and received by Nov. 12. There were also 48 provisional ballots cast on Election Day that were not included in the unofficial results and will be reviewed for the final tally.
In 2016, 7,754 of the 14,280 ballots were cast early, either at the one-stop location or by mail. The lower number of voters on Election Day this year helped make the process go smoothly at all precincts, Jones said.
“We didn’t have any problems at all,” she said. “Election Day was pretty quiet and smooth.”
Cherokee County Republican Party Chairman Bennie Jo McKinnon complimented the elections office. She said the county is very fortunate to have experienced, well-trained staff.
“Our girls down here … everything runs smoothly,” McKinnon said. “There’s no issues.”
Hiwassee Dam’s precinct was the busiest, she said, and Andrews South was also very busy, but those precincts usually are. The Murphy South precinct had more people who voted early than other.
One thing Jones noticed this year that she hadn’t noticed in previous years was that more Democrats requested to vote by mail. While information on who voted on Election Day will not be available until after the canvass to certify the election on Nov. 13, unofficial results show 1,022 people voted for Joe Biden absentee by mail, while 636 voted for him in-person on Election Day in Cherokee County.
There were still just over 700 absentee ballots that had not been returned before Election Day and could arrive by Nov. 12. Voters still had the option to vote in-person instead after requesting an absentee ballot.
Democratic Party Chairman Lawrence McNabb believes that when the final tally is made, it will show Democrats had a strong showing.
“Obviously, we always want it to be better,” he said.
McKinnon believes that after the votes are certified on Nov. 14 and voter information is updated, Republicans will reach 62-65 percent turnout in the county, based on the early vote turnout of 56 percent. She thanked everyone for participating.
“We had a huge turnout in Cherokee County,” McKinnon said. “We had great participation and a lot of excitement.”
She thought it would be fantastic if the county had a turnout like this year’s in every election, and hated that political controversy is what apparently brought people out to vote.