Yale Daily News

At 6 p.m. on Sunday, when early voting polls were scheduled to close, a line of over 50 prospective voters still snaked around the second floor of City Hall.

Sunday, the fourteenth and final day of Connecticut’s third implementation of early voting — and its first in a general election — saw a record 1,078 ballots issued to individuals participating in early voting or same-day registration, which were based out of adjacent rooms in City Hall. Across all 14 days, 8,024 New Haveners voted early, 1,012 voted through same-day registration and 1,758 absentee ballots were received, Kevin Arnold, an election moderator, shared on Sunday night. Same-day registration will also operate in City Hall on Election Day, in the meeting room and the aldermanic chambers across the floor.

Arnold said that he found the numbers to be “tremendous.”

“I don’t think anyone was expecting this,” he told the News after polls closed.

Tuesday, Oct. 29 and Thursday, Oct. 31 — the two days in which early voting was offered for four additional hours each — and Sunday saw the highest tallies of early voters. The number of voters who cast ballots through same-day registration increased drastically as the week progressed, from 29 ballots issued on Monday, Oct. 21 to 232 ballots issued on Sunday. 

Dominic Tammaro, another election moderator, said he heard reports of early voters waiting in line for up to two hours and 15 minutes, especially in the final few days. He explained that the moderators were having only four voters enter the meeting room at a time to prevent crowding or confusion. As a result, a queue of prospective voters formed. Advancing 20 paces in the line took about 15 minutes on Sunday evening. The last individual to vote early in New Haven did so after 6:30 p.m., over half an hour after polls were scheduled to close.

Across Connecticut, several cities and counties have also seen high early voter turnout. Over 850,000 voters statewide have already cast their ballots through early voting or absentee mail-in ballots.

Christopher Prue, the president of the Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut, described the turnout as “far greater than anyone ever imagined,” which he called a “good problem to have.”

In New Haven particularly, the first two implementations of early voting — four days ahead of the April presidential primary and seven days ahead of the August primary for down-ballot races — saw low turnout. 

During the April presidential primaries, only 238 people voted early in New Haven — 231 Democrats and seven Republicans — out of 3,796 primary voters citywide. The primary took place before President Joe Biden, who was then on the ballot and the Democrats’ presumptive nominee, terminated his campaign and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to replace him at the top of the ticket. 

In New Haven’s only competitive Democratic primary in August, a race between Hamden Town Councilor Abdul Osmanu and former New Haven Alder Steve Winter ’11 for state representative, 54 out of 661 Democratic voters in New Haven voted early — around 8.2 percent.

Over 61,000 New Haveners are active registered voters as of October 2020, though the city has seen low turnout in recent years. In the 2020 presidential election, 66.28 percent of New Haven’s registered voters voted — 42,257 individuals in total. In the 2016 presidential election, 42,444 New Haveners voted.

If 42,350 voters turn out in total in 2024 — an average of the past two presidential elections — 18.9 percent of them will have voted early, and at least an additional 4.2 percent will have cast absentee ballots.

Though Connecticut inaugurated early voting for the 2024 election season, New Haveners had previously been accustomed to voting alternatives to Election Day. In the 2020 general election, 14,016 New Haveners — around a third of all voters in that election — cast absentee ballots.

New Haveners can vote in the 2024 presidential election on Tuesday from their local polling site or, for those who need to register to vote on Election Day, from the same-day registration setup in City Hall, from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.