La. shatters record for early voting

• By MARSHA SHULER
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: Oct 29, 2008 - Page: 1A - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Spurred by presidential politics, Louisiana shattered early-voting records with more than a quarter of a million people casting ballots by Tuesday’s deadline.

East Baton Rouge Parish led the way when 31,832 of its 276,015 registered voters — 12 percent — opted to take the early route and avoid anticipated long lines on Election Day on Tuesday.

Statewide, the seven-day total already doubled or nearly doubled counts in the 2004 presidential race and the 2007 governor’s race. That record tally doesn’t include all of the Orleans Parish early votes, which had not been counted late Tuesday, according to state elections statistics.

“It’s much greater than we or anybody had anticipated,” said Secretary of State Jay Dardenne on Tuesday. “It’s great to see so many people participating in the process.”

Dardenne said he thinks the advance turnout is a harbinger of what’s to come for the presidential contest between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama that tops the ballot.

“This I think is going to be the largest voter turnout in Louisiana history,” Dardenne said. “That’s one of the reasons we are telling people to bring two things to the polls: their voter identification and their patience.”

Some 264,361 of Louisiana’s 2.9 million registered voters — nearly 9 percent — made their election choices during seven days of early voting based on a Tuesday evening report that did not include some last minute Orleans voters.

Secretary of State press secretary Jacques Berry said about 400 people were in line when the 6 p.m. deadline for early voting struck and they were being allowed to vote. Those totals will be included in an updated report today, he said.

Already the early voting count nearly doubled the 140,933 ballots cast over a similar seven-day period in advance of the 2007 governor’s race won by Republican Bobby Jindal.

In the 2004 presidential race, 128,460 people voted early or absentee over a five-day period.

Orleans Parish voters waited up to five hours in line, while a wait of an hour or two was typical in other larger parishes, such as East Baton Rouge, election officials reported.

“They are just coming in left and right,” said East Baton Rouge Parish Registrar of Voters Elaine Lamb about mid-afternoon Tuesday.

She said all four early voting locations in the parish had long lines but they were moving at a steady pace.