Caffeinated Thoughts reported last week that Iowa Republicans cut the Democrats early voting advantage to 9000. The Iowa Secretary of State’s office reports as of October 21st Democrats now only lead Republicans among ballots received by 170 ballots.
170 – in order to give you some perspective on this on October 21, 2012, a presidential election year, Democrats had a 56,908 ballot. The last midterm election that was a good year for Republicans they held a 17,228 ballot advantage on October 21, 2010.
As with last time, not surprisingly, the Iowa 4th Congressional District is the Republicans strength with early voting. Last week Republicans led Democrats in ballots received by 3,333. They added 4,802 ballot to their lead and have 8,135 more ballot received than the Democrats.
In the Iowa 3rd Congressional District Republicans have erased their 2,128 ballot deficit from last week when I reported and now lead Democrats by 282 ballots. In the Iowa 1st Congressional District Republicans have cut into the Democrat buffer by 1,533 ballots and now only trail by 3,522. Republicans saw the smallest gain in the Iowa 2nd Congressional District, only closing the margin by 56 ballots. They trail Democrats by 5,045 ballots.
Early voting is typically the Democrats bread and butter. They still lead Republicans among ballots requested by 18,371 and they requested 3,514 more ballots than Republicans over the last week so they can still widen this lead. The ballots don’t count unless they are turned in. Right now Republicans are completing 65% of the ballots they have requested. Democrats have only returned 58% of theirs.