Old North News

Former President Donald Trump (R) launched a “Swamp the Vote” campaign in June, asking voters to vote early, absentee, by mail, or in person on Election Day.

“Republicans must win and we must use every available appropriate tool to beat the Democrats,” said Trump said in a video announcing the “Swamp the Vote” effort. “Whether you vote early, absentee, by mail or in person, we must swamp the radical Democrats with massive turnout.”

Trump is facing Vice President Kamala Harris (D) in the upcoming election. President Joe Biden was previously running for re-election alongside Harris before dropping out of the race and endorsing her as his replacement. Trump ran against Biden in the 2020 election in which neither candidate received more than 50% of the vote in North Carolina, with Biden receiving 48.6% of the vote and Trump receiving 49.9% of the vote. 

That close margin makes North Carolina a battleground state in 2024. Harris leads Trump by one point among battleground state voters, according to a recent poll released by American Greatness.

In the 2020 election in North Carolina, 3,460,562 voters, or 62.4% of the final vote population, voted at in-person early voting. Additionally, 974,351 voters, or 17.6% of the total votes, were sent in as mail in ballots. 

Only 16.2% of votes, amounting to 896,818 voters, voted at the polls in person on election day, according to data from the North Carolina Election Assistance Commission. 

Data from the 2020 presidential election reported that while 81.6% of registered Republicans voted, a higher turnout than the 75.1% of registered Democrats that voted, Democrats had overall higher numbers with 1,971,589 voters compared to the 1,822,837 Republican voters. 

Any voter in North Carolina is able to vote by mail, early in-person, or at the polls. The deadline for registering to vote in the November election is October 11. 

The deadline to request an absentee ballot for the election is October 29. Absentee ballots must be returned by 7:30 p.m. on election day. 

Early in person voting runs from October 17 through November 2. 

Voter can get information about registering online at ncsbe.gov/registering.