Mail ballots in North Carolina are also set to go out soon. In-person voting is set to start next week in parts of Pennsylvania and in Virginia.
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Absentee ballots are ready for distribution at Cobb County’s elections and registration office in Marietta, Ga.
The first ballots of the 2024 general election are in the mail.
Alabama began mailing out absentee ballots on Wednesday, the first state to do so. Only a small minority of people there vote by mail, because the state has strict limitations on who is allowed to do so, but the dispatch of those ballots nonetheless marks an important milestone: With each passing day from here on, more votes will be locked in and the pool of voters whose minds can be changed will shrink.
Mail ballots in more states will be going out soon, including in North Carolina, a competitive state where they were supposed to be mailed last week but were delayed because of a court order requiring officials to remove Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name. That meant millions of ballots had to be reprinted.
Next week, in-person early voting will begin in states including Pennsylvania — a key battleground where start dates vary by county — and Virginia.
All told, millions of voters are expected to cast their ballots before Election Day on Nov. 5.
In 2020, a majority of voters did so because of the Covid pandemic. The percentage may be lower this year because fewer Americans are worried about Covid and many Republican-led states have enacted new restrictions.
Maggie Astor covers politics for The New York Times, focusing on breaking news, policies, campaigns and how underrepresented or marginalized groups are affected by political systems. More about Maggie Astor
See more on: 2024 Elections: News, Polls and Analysis
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Source: nytimes.com
