Early Voting in Georgia: Who Does it Really Help? | Georgia Public Broadcasting

It’s arguably a small point here, but one of the most cogent observations I’ve seen about this year’s campaign season comes from GPB’s News Director of TV, Radio & Digital Rickey Bevington via Bill Nigut.

For so many decades, the picture of a candidate voting ON election Day has become an iconic image, meant as a final gesture to help encourage voters to head to the polls. Yet here was Nunn, voting fully two weeks before the May 20 primary election. What’s going on here?”

The Nunn camp clearly believes that early voting has the potential to boost her numbers in a Democratic primary.

Bill asked a similar question of Tharon Johnson on last week’s “On the Story.” Hopefully we’ll be able to see that segment online soon.

Tomorrow night, I’ll be on with Bill and his co-host Bobbie Battista, and some of the sharpest minds in Georgia politics. How I lucked into a seat at that table is beyond me. I hope you’ll tune in at 7 PM on Channel 8 here in Atlanta, or your local Georgia Public Broadcasting station.

GPB News Director Rickey Bevington and others on the news team made note in our daily story meeting the other day that they’d seen pictures of U.S. Senate candidate Michelle Nunn at a polling place casting an early ballot the other day. They caught something important that I missed: For so many decades, the picture of a candidate voting ON election Day has become an iconic image, meant as a final gesture to help encourage voters to head to the polls.

Yet here was Nunn, voting fully two weeks before the May 20 primary election. What’s going on here? The answer is that early voting has provided a crucial opportunity for candidates to turn out larger numbers of voters than they might attract on election day itself. The Nunn camp clearly believes that early voting has the potential to boost her numbers in a Democratic primary.

via Early Voting in Georgia: Who Does it Really Help?.