Nearly half of registered voters in Travis, Williamson and Hays counties have already cast a ballot ahead of Election Day. In Travis County, the total number of voters is the highest it has seen for a midterm election since 1998, which is the earliest available data, according to the Texas secretary of state's office.
In total, more than 450,000 people have voted early in person or by mail in Travis County.
The early voting turnout in Travis County for the 2026 midterm election was higher than the turnout for the 2012 presidential election, when President Barack Obama defeated then-presidential candidate Mitt Romney, according to data from the Travis County clerk and the Texas secretary of state. The turnout is also higher than the last midterm election in 2022 by about 100,000 voters, or about the capacity of the University of Texas at Austin's football stadium.
Election officials have been preparing for the high voting turnout. KUT News has previously reported that the voting turnout in the primaries was the highest it had been since 2008.
There was a backlog in voter registrations due to the Department of Public Safety failing to send records to counties across the state.
Celia Israel, Travis County's tax assessor-collector, said the office finished inputting voter registrations last week. That means that some voters who were registered to vote but were not in the system had to submit a provisional ballot.
She said that, for Nov. 3, the system is now updated.
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