ATLANTA — The number of Georgians voting early was expected to surpass 2 million, according to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.

He attributed record turnout to Georgia’s new election law.

As of Nov. 3, nearly 1.99 million voters had cast ballots in person during the early voting period which began Oct. 17.

Georgia has had record turnout since the first day of early voting this year, jumping to nearly twice the number on the first day of early voting in the 2018 midterm election.

Through the same early voting period during the 2020 general election which saw the presidential race, more than 2.32 million early in-person ballots had been cast.

Turnout through same day in 2018 saw only an estimated 1.5 million early in-person ballots were cast.

“SB 202 expanded the number of early voting days in Georgia and Georgia voters are taking advantage of that by early voting at a record pace,” Raffensperger said. “There are so many options on the table that are making a difference for Georgia voters. We’ll hit 2 million this week because of that.”

One of the most well received tenets of the controversial SB 202 is the expansion of early voting access.

The new law added an additional mandatory Saturday voting day and allows counties to have optional Sunday voting hours.

On the first mandatory Saturday of early voting Oct. 22, nearly 80,000 Georgians cast a ballot. Throughout the following weekend, when some counties had optional Sunday voting, 115,819 cast a ballot in person.

The 2022 mid-term election may be a test to see if provisions in SB 202 involving absentee-by-mail voting have restricted access or suppresses voters, as accused by opponents of the new law.  

Through the morning of Nov. 3, nearly 194,000 of 285,000 ballots (or 68% of issued absentee ballots) had been returned to county election offices, which is expected to reduce the Election Day burden on county election offices, Raffensperger said.  

Only 1,533 ballots have been rejected statewide and those voters should expect to receive cure notices explaining how they can cure any discrepancy.

In the November 2018 mid-term election, more than 284,000 ballots were accepted.  

Just before the passage of the Republican-led SB 202, in the 2020 general election, 1.3 million absentee ballots were mailed in or dropped off.

However, that surge is likely attributed to the the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic when voters opted to forgo in-person voting due to the spread of the virus.

After that surge in absentee-by-mail voting especially by minorities, state lawmakers — through SB 202 — now require voters to include a copy of their driver’s license or other state identification when applying for an absentee ballot.

The new law also limits the number of secured absentee ballot drop boxes to no more than one per 100,000 voters. And instead of making them available outside of certain facilities, they can now only be kept inside early voting locations with limited hours.

“The question is what impact the radically reduced (relative to 2020) absentee ballot period will do given the partisan and racial breakdown of those. Will those voters still come out, early, or on (Election Day)?” said Paul Glaze of New Georgia Project.  

Georgia has an estimated 7.84 million registered voters. Nov. 4 marked the last day for in-person early voting. Election Day is Nov. 8.

Several important races are on the ballot including governor, attorney general, secretary of state and several congressional seat. 

Voters can view voting locations and sample ballots at on Georgia My Voter Page at mvp.sos.ga.gov.