High turnout of more than 2.1 million registered voters steadied as midday approached, with a high rate of as much as 20 percent in small towns on a controversial Election Day.
“Some of the smaller towns earlier this morning were reporting as much as 15 to 20 percent in the first hour or two of voting,” said Patrick Gallahue, director of communications for Secretary of State Denise W. Merrill. “That’s very high; however that’s just anecdotal right now, but potentially indicative of high turnout.”
By late morning, that rate had stayed heavy, with longer than usual lines at a handful of polling places in the bigger cities, he said.
Polls opened at 6 a.m. across the state and close at 8 p.m.
Voters are considering Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in a highly contested and vicious battle for voters’ attention and support. Voters are also considering state and Congressional legislative representatives.
Gallahue said voter registration this year peaked at around 2.14 million, but that does not include people who register on Election Day, which numbered about 11,000 in 2014. He also noted that some 5,000 or so inactive voters get reactivated, and those votes add to the ultimate total.
By late afternoon, Gallahue said that one potentially significant problem was averted earlier in the day when a batch of ballots from another district ended up at a different polling place in Hartford. The misplaced ballots were identified quickly when the machines rejected them and fixed immediately so voters could cast their votes correctly, he said.
Other normal issues have cropped up but been resolved without any lingering problems, he said.
