Fewer Democrats Plan to Vote by Mail as Midterms Approach

A new NBC News poll finds Democratic voters shifting toward early in-person voting ahead of the 2026 midterms, while Republican voting-method preferences have remained largely unchanged.

By yourNEWS Media Newsroom.

Fewer Democratic voters say they intend to cast mail ballots in the 2026 midterm elections than did at a comparable point in the 2024 campaign, with a growing share instead planning to vote early and in person, according to an NBC News poll released Sunday.

The survey found that 23% of registered Democrats plan to vote by mail this fall, an 11-percentage-point decline from the 34% who gave that answer in mid-September 2024. At the same time, 36% said they expect to vote in person at an early-voting location, up from 30% two years ago. Another 36% said they intend to vote at their polling place on Election Day, essentially unchanged from 35% in 2024.

The remaining 5% of Democratic respondents said they were uncertain how they would vote or were unlikely to participate.

The findings, detailed in NBC News’ reporting on changing voting preferences, come as voting procedures have received renewed attention ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms.

President Donald Trump has pushed for tighter restrictions on mail voting. On Sept. 14, the Supreme Court declined to allow new U.S. Postal Service mail-ballot requirements to take effect for the midterm elections, leaving a lower-court injunction against the rules in place while litigation continues.

The NBC News poll was conducted Sept. 11-15, meaning its field period overlapped with the Supreme Court’s action. Democrats have made greater use of mail voting since the 2020 election, which was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the new survey indicates that more Democratic voters are now planning to cast their ballots in person.

A smaller movement away from mail voting also appeared among independent voters.

Twenty-five percent of independents said they plan to vote by mail in this year’s election, compared with 28% in 2024. The share planning to vote early and in person rose to 28%, from 22% two years ago.

Another 37% of independents said they intend to vote at their polling places on Election Day, down from 41% in 2024, while 15% said they were either uncertain about how they would vote or unlikely to cast a ballot.

Republican voters showed substantially less change in their planned method of voting.

GOP voters have “remained consistent,” NBC News reported. The survey found that 16% of Republicans intend to vote by mail, 26% plan to cast their ballots early in person and 53% plan to vote on Election Day, with all three figures virtually unchanged from the comparable 2024 survey.

The differences in voting methods between the parties could also affect when election results are reported because Democratic and Republican voters remain concentrated in different forms of voting.

Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates, which conducted the NBC News survey with Republican polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, described the partisan divide among early and Election Day voters.

“Among early voters, Democrats have a 23-point advantage on the congressional ballot, but among Election Day voters, Republicans have a 14-point advantage So, if a blue wave comes in, it will hit land at different times, and even on different days or weeks.”

The figures describe the preferences of voters who say they intend to use particular voting methods and do not establish how many ultimately will cast ballots through each method. The partisan differences nevertheless illustrate how the timing and method of voting continue to vary considerably between Democratic and Republican voters heading into the midterms.

NBC News surveyed 1,000 registered voters from Sept. 11 through Sept. 15 using a combination of telephone interviews and an online survey distributed by text message. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.