A possible disaster looms for Democrats in Florida, according to the early voting numbers. It was assumed early on that the high reported Republican early turnout numbers (once as high as 53 percent) would come down from the stratosphere as soon as more of the in-person voting was counted in addition to the early absentee ballots.
But that hasn’t happened yet, and there isn’t much time left. Registered GOP voters have dominated the early turnout and will probably improve on their 2006 and 2008 performance by five to ten points. Democrats, meanwhile, are underperforming in the early vote, as the chart below demonstrates.
Early voting ends tonight in most of Florida, although it continues through tomorrow in some counties. At this point, with 1.8 million votes cast — probably more than one-third of the total vote in this election — Republican early turnout is above 50 percent.
| Party | 2010 | 2008 | 2006 |
| Dem | 35.6% | 45.6% |
43.6% |
| Ind | 14.0% | 17.1% | 15.4% |
| Rep | 50.5% | 37.3% | 41.0% |
