The polls are open, and voters have until 6 p.m. local time to cast their ballot in the 2024 general election.
The Associated Press reports that about 77 million Americans cast early ballots in this year’s election, with several states seeing record numbers. Hardin County Clerk Brian D. Smith described the early voting turnout in Hardin County as “staggering.”
“We voted over the course of three days early voting,” Smith said. “We voted just short of 14,000 people. That’s on top of the almost 1,700 voters who took advantage of in-person absentee voting, so this was record numbers. My staff and I have really worked hard to educate the voters about the upcoming election, about their options in voting, and it has certainly seemed to pay off.”
Hardin County has prepared for an anticipated record turnout by expanding the number of voting locations and increasing the number of voting machines at the busiest locations. Smith says he thinks his office’s prep work will pay off.
“We’ve worked very hard for the past seven or eight months to prepare for this,” Smith said. “It’s like preparing for the Super Bowl. Our locations are secure. Our locations are set up. Our poll workers have been trained. Equipment and resources are deployed. We think things will run very smoothly.”
If you need help figuring out election information, resources are available.
“The best place to look up information is govote.ky.gov,” Smith said. “You can see your sample ballot. You can find all the locations. We’ll be updating our Hardin County Clerk’s Facebook page throughout the day with information that may be helpful to voters in terms of wait time and where to go.”
Kentucky voters have a full ballot today with a presidential election, state and federal representative races, city council and school board elections, and two constitutional amendment questions.
