WILMINGTON — Early voting for the 2019 local elections is over in New Hanover County and while municipal elections are non-partisan, voter data shows registered Democrats have out-voted Republicans by more than 1,100 votes so far.
According to the New Hanover County Board of Elections, 4,191 early voting ballots have been cast.
Of those ballots, 2,048 of them were cast by registered democrats followed by 1,226 unaffiliated voters and 897 republicans.
In New Hanover County, there are 164,237 registered voters. Of that, the majority are considered unaffiliated with 61,494 voters. The second most popular party is the Republican Party with 51,606 and Democrats take third place with 49,817 voters.
But as it is often seen across the country, more urban areas tend to have a higher concentration of Democrats which could be part of the reason why early voting shows such a discrepancy between the two main parties.
The lack of Republican votes prompted the New Hanover County Republican Party to issue a call for its voters to head to the polls tomorrow and vote for the city’s conservative candidates.
The ‘urgent message’ read “Dems are outvoting us 2-1 in early voting. Your vote is critical. To avoid a run-off, only vote for Neil Anderson and Harry Smith for Wilmington City Council.”
However, there are no run-offs in non-partisan elections.
Chairman of the New Hanover County Republican Party Will Knecht acknowledged the mistake and said it was written in error and was corrected within a few hours of its initial posting. But it was shared on social media which could lead to some confusion for voters since once shared, the post can not be corrected.
There will be 30 precincts in New Hanover County open for voting on Nov. 5, a list of polling locations can be found online. Polls are open from 6:30 a.m. until 7:30 p.m.
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