THERE WERE 2.5 million Massachusetts residents who cast ballots in the November 8 midterm election, and despite the availability of vote-by-mail, more than half of them returned to the tried-and-true method of in-person voting on Election Day.
With 2,508,298 ballots cast, voter turnout was the second highest it has been for a midterm election, after 2018. But that also reflects a dismal voter turnout rate of 51.4 percent, the second lowest turnout rate in a modern election, second only to 2014. In part, the low turnoiut rate can be traced to automatic voter registration and a growing population, resulting in 4.88 million registered voters, the highest level ever.
Turnout was far higher than the 2.2 million that Secretary of the Commonwealth Bill Galvin had predicted before Election Daily. “I’m delighted to have been wrong,” Galvin said in a statement.
Galvin said a major reason for his low prediction was that he analyzed voter interest in mail-in and early voting and did not expect the large number of voters who came out in person on Election Day. Since the COVID pandemic first hit in mid-March 2020, voters have had the option to vote by mail, and more than half of ballots have been cast in every election since then either early or by mail. This election is the first time since the March 3, 2020 presidential primary that more than half of ballots were cast in person.
Galvin’s office said 1,382,454 voters cast ballots at polling places on Election Day, representing 55.1 percent of ballots cast. There were another 37,669 ballots, 37.4 percent, cast by mail. Only 188,175 voters, or 7.5 percent, voted early in person.
In only five communities did more than half of voters cast ballots by mail: Gosnold, Acton, Bourne, Orleans, and Amherst. Mail-in voting was particularly popular in wealthier towns, like Lexington and Wellesley, and in Cape Cod communities like Brewster and Eastham.
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About Shira Schoenberg
Shira Schoenberg is a reporter at CommonWealth magazine. Shira previously worked for more than seven years at the Springfield Republican/MassLive.com where she covered state politics and elections, covering topics as diverse as the launch of the legal marijuana industry, problems with the state's foster care system and the elections of U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Gov. Charlie Baker. Shira won the Massachusetts Bar Association's 2018 award for Excellence in Legal Journalism and has had several stories win awards from the New England Newspaper and Press Association. Shira covered the 2012 New Hampshire presidential primary for the Boston Globe. Before that, she worked for the Concord (N.H.) Monitor, where she wrote about state government, City Hall and Barack Obama's 2008 New Hampshire primary campaign. Shira holds a master's degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.
About Shira Schoenberg
Shira Schoenberg is a reporter at CommonWealth magazine. Shira previously worked for more than seven years at the Springfield Republican/MassLive.com where she covered state politics and elections, covering topics as diverse as the launch of the legal marijuana industry, problems with the state's foster care system and the elections of U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Gov. Charlie Baker. Shira won the Massachusetts Bar Association's 2018 award for Excellence in Legal Journalism and has had several stories win awards from the New England Newspaper and Press Association. Shira covered the 2012 New Hampshire presidential primary for the Boston Globe. Before that, she worked for the Concord (N.H.) Monitor, where she wrote about state government, City Hall and Barack Obama's 2008 New Hampshire primary campaign. Shira holds a master's degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.
There were nine small Western Massachusetts towns where more than three-quarters of ballots were cast on Election Day – places like Monroe, Mount Washington, and Montgomery.
In both Boston and Worcester, around 60 percent of ballots were cast on Election Day compared to around 36 percent by mail. In Springfield, similarly, 63 percent of ballots were cast on Election Day and 35 percent by mail.
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