Saturday marked the end of a record-breaking first week of early voting in Louisiana, with over 25% of registered voters submitting their vote early.

The end of the first week of early voting saw 761,218 voters cast their ballot, either at polling stations or through absentee ballots, according to the Secretary of State’s website. This is around 225,000 votes less than the total amount of early votes cast during the 2020 election, in which 986,428 Louisianans voted early. 

So far, registered Republicans have submitted the most votes, totalling to 348,410 votes. Democrat voters accounted for 273,957 votes and “other” voters for almost 139,000 votes. This differs from 2020, in which Democrat voters submitted the most early votes by over 60,000 votes.

A record-breaking amount of votes were cast on Oct. 19, the first day of early voting. 

In total, 176,882 early voters cast their ballot on the first day of early voting, including both in-person and absentee votes, the Louisiana Illuminator reports. This was 1.3% more than the first day of early voting in the 2020 election.

On the first day of early voting, Republicans cast around 75,455 of the votes, and Democrats 74,311 votes. “Other” voters cast 27,166 votes.

Black voter turnout was down on the first day of early voting compared to 2020 according to the Illuminator, with Black voters casting only a quarter of the votes on the first day of early voting this year versus almost a third in 2020.
Early voting runs through Oct. 29, Mondays-Saturdays from 8:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Polling locations can be found at voterportal.sos.la.gov. Registered voters can cast their ballot in person on Nov. 5 if they do not vote early.