Collin County prepares for election day | Dallas News Live

Collin County is a county that votes early in a big way. So joining me, Caleb Breaux, Collin County Election Administrator. Caleb, first, just tell me, how's turnout been in the two weeks of early voting? Yeah, so, Stephen, before our visit this morning, I took a snapshot of our data, and we are mirroring almost exactly what we did for in-person early voting in 2018. When we look at where we were through early voting through Thursday, the second Thursday of early voting in 2018, we were at about 41.2% turnout, and we're at a 41.3% turnout so far through the same time. So we are very, very much on track to pull off what we did in back in 2018. So with turnout being a big focus for a lot of people, I know you are just making sure that the election goes off smooth. Is this turnout what you guys expected for this midterm that's been widely publicized As in campaign ads every ten seconds. Yeah, I know there was some excitement when you and I spoke on the first day of early voting. It looked like it was maybe trending a bit higher. Things have kind of settled down and leveled off a bit. So, So still, yeah, I think for a midterm election, I definitely think that the turnout is about what we anticipated, maybe just slightly under. I think when you and I first spoke, we were looking at 65% to 70%. It's looking like it's going to trend closer to that 60% turnout. So, yeah, kind of some ups and downs, I guess, trying to figure out what people are going to do as they head to the polls. Yeah, a big surge on day one and a couple of days after that. But you're saying in Collin County seems like things have kind of leveled out. Now, Collin County voters like to vote early. So what are you expecting to see on Election Day? Yeah, I think just kind of looking at the trend going back to 2018, we saw about a 20% turnout on Election Day, and I think we're headed in that direction. I saw the weather forecast before our call, expecting a little bit of rain, so I think in the day-to-day, we're going to see quite a bit of a surge here in Collin County. As we're talking right now, we've had over 17,000 voters check in at polling locations this morning up until this afternoon, so I think that leaves— It leads us to Election Day, and we're probably looking at a 20% turnout for in-person voting on Election Day. Rain in the forecast right now, rain in the forecast, like you mentioned, on Election Day. So, you know, go while there's no rain falling out the sky. That's right. Yeah, go early. Go early. Things are a little different in Collin County compared to, like, Dallas County. You guys are voting on paper now on the last day of early voting. Have you guys run into any major issues? Now, I got to tell you, this has been our biggest test. Our biggest stress test, I think, is what someone referred to it. It's been our biggest stress test for this method of marking a ballot. And I got to tell you, I'm very proud of our workers. We've had this method of marking a ballot for a year now. People have adapted to it and handling it really well in our polling places. We have developed some efficiencies in printing those ballots. So where we thought we were going to experience some bottlenecks in the ballot printing, We're not experiencing, we're finding more that we're bottlenecking more as voters are having the opportunity to adjudicate their ballot at the scanner. So we're definitely, every election, finding more and more efficient ways to get ballots printed and in the voters' hands so they can mark it. Caleb, when we have been talking about this early voting turnout, and I know every race is different, so I'll preface that with this question. When the early vote total drops, depending on how turnout is on Election Day, will that kind of set the scene for how, at least for Tarrant, Collin County is concerned, what those results may look like unless a race is super close? Yeah, I would say, Stephen, I think you're kind of hitting the nail on the head there. Typically, you don't see much change once our results, our early voting and ballot by mail results are released at 7 p.m. on election night. It's Because so many people in Collin County do vote early. It's hard to see those results flip like you may see in some other states. So I think that will probably be a pretty good indicator of what you would expect Election Day to mirror. Well, we are just a couple of days from Election Day. Collin County Election Administrator Caleb Rowe, thank you for your time. Hey, always a pleasure, Stephen.