What to expect on Election Day in central Virginia
HANOVER COUNTY, Va. (WRIC) — The Hanover County Registrar's office gave 8News a look at how they tally votes as the countdown to Election Day continues. According to Terry Smithson, the Director of Elections in Hanover County, a total of 34,123 county residents have voted so far, 26,652 of whom voted early in-person and 7,471 voted by mail. “We're at 35% voter turnout already," said Smithson about the county as a whole. "In some of our polling precincts, they're already at 50% voter turnout.” Smithson said Virginia uses pre-processing to verify that all information on a ballot is filled out correctly before its time to count them all on Tuesday night. “Instead of having just thousands of ballots and having to go through them, we make sure that the person has filled them out correctly and that they're viable,” Smithson said. Smithson said she expects around 2,000 Hanover County voters on Saturday, the last day to vote early, and a heavy turnout on Election Day. Randolph-Macon College political science professor Rich Meagher said that mail-in, absentee and in-person election day voting has primarily favored Democrats for years -- in many cases over the objection of Republicans. “Because of Donald Trump's claims about what happened in the 2020 election, I think Republicans have been less likely to look favorably on mail-in ballots, absentee ballots and early voting,” Meagher said. Meagher said there has been a recent effort for Republicans to catch up to Democrats with regards to early voting. He also says it's important wait until all votes across Virginia have been counted before making conclusions about the election results in the Commonwealth. "We always call it 'waiting for Fairfax,'" Meagher said in reference to the large northern Virginia county. “Fairfax County must report and there's so many people up there that a huge chunk of votes come in later. It doesn't mean that those votes are illegitimate, or it somehow changed the election, it just means we're adding to the count and we're getting to the right result." Meagher said elections are often not decided on Election Night, so it could be a while to get results from all different voting methods.
VENN
HANOVER COUNTY, Va. (WRIC) — The Hanover County Registrar's office gave 8News a look at how they tally votes as the countdown to Election Day continues.
According to Terry Smithson, the Director of Elections in Hanover County, a total of 34,123 county residents have voted so far, 26,652 of whom voted early in-person and 7,471 voted by mail.
“We're at 35% voter turnout already," said Smithson about the county as a whole. "In some of our polling precincts, they're already at 50% voter turnout.”
Smithson said Virginia uses pre-processing to verify that all information on a ballot is filled out correctly before its time to count them all on Tuesday night.
“Instead of having just thousands of ballots and having to go through them, we make sure that the person has filled them out correctly and that they're viable,” Smithson said.
Smithson said she expects around 2,000 Hanover County voters on Saturday, the last day to vote early, and a heavy turnout on Election Day.
Randolph-Macon College political science professor Rich Meagher said that mail-in, absentee and in-person election day voting has primarily favored Democrats for years -- in many cases over the objection of Republicans.
“Because of Donald Trump's claims about what happened in the 2020 election, I think Republicans have been less likely to look favorably on mail-in ballots, absentee ballots and early voting,” Meagher said.
Meagher said there has been a recent effort for Republicans to catch up to Democrats with regards to early voting. He also says it's important wait until all votes across Virginia have been counted before making conclusions about the election results in the Commonwealth.
"We always call it 'waiting for Fairfax,'" Meagher said in reference to the large northern Virginia county. “Fairfax County must report and there's so many people up there that a huge chunk of votes come in later. It doesn't mean that those votes are illegitimate, or it somehow changed the election, it just means we're adding to the count and we're getting to the right result."
Meagher said elections are often not decided on Election Night, so it could be a while to get results from all different voting methods.
