Travis County early voters break record for Texas primaries
AUSTIN, Texas - Travis County voters showed up and showed out for early voting in the Texas primaries. Travis County Clerk Dana DeBeauvoir said more than 130,000 people hit the polls last week more than years past.
"We had a very large turnout for this year's presidential primary and of course since the Republican side is already settled," DeBeauvoir said.
The battle for the Democratic presidential nomination continues to heat up as several candidates dropped out ahead of Super Tuesday. Pete Buttigieg and Tom Steyer suspended their campaigns this weekend and early Monday Sen. Amy Klobuchar did the same.
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DeBeauvoir said those who have already voted for those candidates cannot recast their ballot and those votes will be tallied and will be worked out in delegate selections later on. This year's election has attracted thousands of younger voters.
“That is great news, for years we begged 18 to 30-year-olds to please come out and vote and this time around they are finally paying attention to elections and they are voting," said DeBeauvoir.
RELATED: Travis County sees record breaking turnout for early voting
Lines on Election Day will not look like they did for early voting. DeBeauvoir urges people to plan ahead and utilize the county's wait time map. There will be 174 polling locations across the county. Expect the longest lines to be at your local grocery stores.
"We are going to see probably more than half of our voters vote on Election Day and that kind of crush is hard for one day to absorb," DeBeauvoir said. "I encourage people who are voting on Election Day to at least go early in the day. Be kind to yourself, it's going to be a very big day."
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Voters are encouraged to vote as early as possible. Anyone who gets in line before the cut off time of 7 p.m. will be able to vote. The Travis County Clerk’s Office asks people not to wait for the last minute though, as more than 300,000 people are expected to vote on Super Tuesday.