Correction: due to a programming error we inadvertently published the wrong data for Republican voters. This article was updated on October 25, 2024 at 09:30E to correct the information. Thank you to Chris Hernandez for pointing out the error.
Over the last few days, El Paso News has been analyzing the early voting voters. We have found that the voting patterns from previous elections largely remain the same. As of yesterday, the fifth day of early voting, 86,864 ballots have been cast. Of those, 53% are women voters and 47% are men. The average age of the voter is 57 years old, slightly down from the previous day.
About 10% of the voters who are voting are casting their first ballot. The highest turnout zip code so far is 79936 with 11,833 voters, or 14%. Zip code 79912 follows with 10,964 ballots cast or 13%. This has been consistent through the early voting period.
Breaking down the races by office, we find that two seats, Districts 1 and 5 are seeing new voters. We also noted that a younger voter is casting ballots in one city council race. Here is what we have found for the first five days of early voting and mail in ballots.
The Mayoral Election
There are eight candidates running in the mayoral election. Only four candidates, three city representatives and a newcomer are viable enough to end the election in a runoff. The three city representatives are Cassandra Hernandez, Brian Kennedy and Isabel Salcido. Renard Johnson is the newcomer.
As of yesterday, 71,720 voters have cast ballots. Of them, 53% are women voters. The average age of the voters voting in the mayoral election is 58, a slight increase of the average age of 57 years old for all voters. Most of the voters – 84% – who are casting a ballot in this election cycle, also voted in the last mayoral election. This has been consistent through the first five days of early voting.
District 1
There are four candidates running for the District 1 seat. They are Sam Armijo, Alejandra Chávez, Tom Handy and Monica Reyes. In this race, there have been 12,489 ballots cast. Of those, 52% are women voters. The average age of the District 1 voter is 57 years old. Of the ballots cast, 30% voted in the last election held for this office. Of the city council races, District 1 has had the most ballots cast. It should be noted that voters voting in this election cycle did not vote in the last election for this office as only 30% are return voters, compared to 85% and 85% in Districts 2 and 3. Only District 5 has a lower repeat voter turnout with 17%.
This may suggest that the Chávez Campaign has mobilized voters with the significant campaign funds the campaign has spent in that race. The mobilization of voters may translate into voters specifically casting ballots for the Chávez Campaign.
District 2
For the District 2 seat there are only two candidates running ensuring that the winner will be declared on Election Day. The incumbent, Josh Acevedo is being challenged by Isabel Ceballos Otten.
In this race, there have been 7,089 ballots cast. Of those, 53% are women voters. The average age of the District 2 voter is 61 years old. Of the ballots cast, 85% voted on November 3, 2020 when Alexsandra Annello, James Campos and Judy Gutierrez ran for the seat. Gutierrez finished that race with 47% of the vote to 37% for Annello. In the runoff election on December 12, 2020, Annello defeated Gutierrez 52% to 48% of the vote.
However, in this race there was another election held in December with a runoff in January because Annello vacated her seat to run for the state legislature. The two elections were held in December 2023 and January 2024. Josh Acevedo defeated Verónica Carbajal in the January runoff election.
On December 9, 2023, Carbajal received six more votes than Josh Acevedo, forcing both into a runoff election since Ben Mendoza received 90 votes. On January 20, 2024, Acevedo defeated Carbajal by 307 votes to win the seat. As of yesterday, 892 or 13% voted in 2023 and 1,402, or 20% voted in 2024.
District 3
For the District 3 seat, there are five candidates seeking the office. They are Fabiola H. Arellano, Kenneth Bell, Deanna Maldonado-Rocha, Jose Rodriguez and Jesse Romero. Of these candidates, three – Arellano, Bell or Maldonado-Rocha are likely to end up in a runoff election.
As of yesterday, there have been 9,749 ballots cast. Of those, 54% are women voters. The average age of the District 3 voter is 61 years old. Of those voting this week, 87% voted in the previous election for this office.
District 4
In the District 4 race there are four candidates running for the seat. They are Dorothy “Sissy” Byrd, Cynthia Trejo Boyer, the incumbent Joe Molinar and Lawrence Wesley.
Including yesterday’s voters, 9,091 voters have voted in this race. Of those, 53% are women voters. Their average age is 58 years old. Those casting a ballot in this election cycle include 83% of the voters that voted in the last election for this office.
District 5
In the District 5 race there are five candidates. They are Amanda Cunningham, Tamara Davis, Ivan Niño, Felix Muñoz and Sean Orr. In this race, 7,110 ballots have been cast. Of those, 51% are women voters. The average age of the District 5 voter is 49 years old. Of the ballots cast, 17% voted in the last election held for this office. It should be noted that the 17% of returning voters voting in this election cycle and the younger age of the voters suggests that new voters are showing up at the polls for this seat. It is yet unknown whether the voter turnout favors any of the candidates.
District 7
In the last city council seat in contention, there are four candidates seeking the office. They are Chris Hernandez, Lily Limón, Fabiola Lopez and Alan Serna. For this seat there have been 9,035 ballots cast. Of those, 55% are women voters. The average age of the District 7 voter is 62 years old. Of the ballots cast, 87% voted in the last election held for this office.
El Paso News noted that the average age of the voters has steadily dropped as early voting progressed through yesterday. We also noted that in the District 1 race there appear to be new voters casting ballots suggesting that the large amount of campaign funds spent by the Chávez Campaign may have mobilized new voters to the race.
Republican Voters – Corrected
There is a common misconception among the El Paso Democratic Party circles that Texas has party affiliation. It does not. In Texas, party affiliation is implied when a voter casts a party ballot during a Primary. However, the party affiliation ends at the end of the year. Thus, a voter who cast a Republican ballot in the recent March primary is implied to be Republican until December 31, at which point party affiliation is reset to nothing until another ballot is cast in the next Primary, or an oath of affiliation is made by the voter.
Nonetheless because of the issue among Democrats that some candidates for municipal offices, which are non-partisan are alleged to be Republican, we analyzed whether voters who have voted during the early voting period have cast a Republican ballot in either the 2024 or 2022 Primary elections.
Our analysis shows that of the early voters voting last week, 18% cast a Republican ballot in 2024. We also found that 33% of the early voters had cast a Republican ballot in 2022. Those that cast Republican ballots in 2022 and 2024 represent 12% of the early voting ballots cast last week.
If last week’s trend continues, we expect over 100,000 ballots to be cast before the early voting period ends next Friday. It is likely that close to 200,000 ballots will be cast by Election Day.
The Early Voting period continues to run through Friday, November 1. Election Day is Tuesday, November 5.