Early Voting Turnout Surges in Montgomery County

High-profile races in Democratic primaries for president, Senate and House District 8 likely led to large increase

By Aaron Kraut

The Silver Spring Civic Building was the most popular of 10 early voting sites in Montgomery County BRENDAN DALY

More than 42,000 Montgomery County residents voted early in this month’s primary, a number that far outpaces even the combined amount of votes cast during early voting in the 2012 and 2014 primaries.

Of the 257,996 people who voted in Maryland over the eight days of early voting from April 14-21, 42,504 of the votes were cast at one of 10 locations in the county, according to the State Board of Elections.

That was the highest number of early voters of any jurisdiction in the state. Baltimore County reported 39,434 early voters, Prince George’s County saw 38,357 and Baltimore City had 29,767.

The amount of early voters equaled 6.63 percent of the overall number of registered voters in the county. It was a significant increase from the 18,871 county residents who voted early over eight days in June 2014 for that year’s gubernatorial primary. In March 2012, 10,037 county residents voted early in a presidential primary in which incumbent Democratic President Barack Obama was seeking re-election.

This year’s high-profile and hotly contested primaries for president, the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Barbara Mikulski and the District 8 House of Representatives seat being vacated by Chris Van Hollen likely played a significant role in the increased early voting turnout.

Van Hollen, who lives in Kensington, is running against Rep. Donna Edwards, a resident of Prince George’s County, for Mikulski’s seat and nine people are running for Van Hollen’s seat in what has become one of the most expensive House races in the country.

State Sen. Jamie Raskin of Takoma Park, former Marriott International executive and Chevy Chase resident Kathleen Matthews and Total Wine & More co-owner David Trone of Potomac are considered the front-runners.

Polls show Hillary Clinton with a commanding lead against Sen. Bernie Sanders in Maryland in the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination and front-runner Donald Trump with a sizeable lead for the Republican presidential nomination.

Of the 42,504 early voters in the county, 35,079 were Democrats and 6,319 were Republicans, good for turnout percentages of 9.5 percent and 5.2 percent, respectively.

Locations for this year’s early voting period included a 10th site at the Potomac Community Recreation Center, which in its first year of early voting saw 4,915 ballots cast—good for second most in the county behind the 7,439 votes at the Silver Spring Civic Building.

The new Potomac location was the result of a controversial effort last fall by the Republican-led county Board of Elections to change two early voting sites to less-populated areas, including Potomac. County Democratic leaders claimed the move was meant to make it harder to vote for down-county Democrats, though the Republicans on the board said they merely wanted to provide other communities with easier access to early voting locations.

The Marilyn J. Praisner Community Recreation Center in Burtonsville and Jane Lawton Community Recreation Center in Chevy Chase, which Republicans on the board initially recommended getting rid of, remained as early voting sites and were the third and fourth most popular sites this year, with 4,579 votes and 4,552 votes, respectively.

The Damascus Community Recreation Center was the least popular of the county’s 10 early voting sites, with 1,428 votes over the eight days.

This year was also the first that unregistered voters could register during early voting. Statewide, 3,974 people used same-day registration or made an address change to their voter registration records. Montgomery County was home to 845 of those same-day registration sign-ups or changes, second to Baltimore City, which had 1,004.

The regular primary election day is Tuesday.