Since the start of early voting on Oct. 13 the number of voters continued to grow. In the first 12 days over 71 thousand people voted in person, and roughly 13,700 voted by mail for a total of about 85 thousand votes. There are 211,415 total registered voters in Nueces County, so it equated to roughly 40.3% of total votes thus far. By comparison in 2008, there were only 67 thousand at around 12 days in, about 62 thousand in 2012 and the 2016 election also brought in 71 thousand votes.

The 2016 and 2020 numbers are similar, yet a direct comparison isn’t plausible because starting this year, due to the pandemic, 16 days of early voting are allowed compared to the usual 12 days. With the extra four days, numbers were sure to keep steadily rising, as about 2.88% of voters continued to turnout daily. For this reason, early voting numbers from 2016 and 2020 are going to differ significantly. There is no telling if the extra four days will become standard in future election years.

According to Nueces County’s voting data, the busiest early voting locations are the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center and Veterans Memorial High School. The locations with the least number of voters since early voting started are Banquete ISD and Hattie Martin – Robstown ISD.

Nueces County Clerk Kara Sands has stated that the elections department hired extra poll workers to keep up with the sanitary conditions expected during the COVID-19 pandemic. Each booth is sanitized after each voter, all workers are wearing face masks and cotton swabs are being provided so voters don’t have to directly touch the voting screens. In addition, each location has the voting booths spaced six feet apart.