IL Primary Election: Chicago turnout low on final early voting day, DuPage Co. sees record numbers
Some say Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision encouraged them to vote
CHICAGO (WLS) -- Tuesday is Election Day in Illinois.
Voters will pick the Republican, who will face Gov. JB Pritzker in the fall.
"Right now, we have over 19,000 voters for early voting alone," said DuPage County Clerk Jean Kaczmarek. "DuPage received over 35,000 mail applications. That is six times the number of applications we received in 2018."
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It's not typically an election with high voter turnout, but that is not the case out in DuPage County, where they are already seeing record numbers. To help make things easier, DuPage County has a brand new voting system.
"That voting system is a complete on-demand voting system, where ballots are printed right there at the polling place, so because we have this new voting system, voters can vote anywhere tomorrow," Kaczmarek said.
So far, voter turnout has been low in Chicago. However, the numbers are not far from the 2018 Gubernatorial Election.
"We just got past 98,000 ballots," said Max Bever of the Chicago Board of Elections. "We are still somewhere in between the Gubernatorial Election of 2018 and 2014. We're a little bit closer to 2018, so that is making us feel hopeful."
And that is the hottest race on the ballot. In the state's gubernatorial race, Pritzker is the incumbent and Darren Bailey is proving to be a strong contender, picking up the endorsement from former President Donald Trump over the weekend.
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But the question remains whether voters will turn out Tuesday.
With the Supreme Court announcement overturning Roe v. Wade last Friday, some voters said that encouraged them to make their vote count.
"I'm a white man in my 60s, so the decision probably has the least effect on me," said Terry Herdzina, an early voter. "But it upset me so bad, so I know that those people that are most affected by it, I can imagine how they feel."
