Delaware’s absentee and early voting numbers topped 28,000 as of Thursday at noon.
More than half of participation- 18,971 ballots - are from early voting so far. Nearly 40 percent were absentee ballots.
Delaware’s primary early voting wraps on Sunday. Delaware’s primary election date is next Tuesday on September 15.
Voters need to be registered with a political party to participate in Delaware’s primary.
One group, Open Primaries, wants to change that. Legislation was introduced this session to allow unaffiliated voters to cast a ballot in primary elections, but did not make it to the governor's desk.
Delaware has approximately 64,474 unaffiliated voters. Jeremy Gruber Grewber, Senior Vice President of Open Primaries, said it's the First State's second largest voting block.
"There is no context where that isn't a crisis," he said. "That's particularly because Delaware is in such poor company."
He said Delaware is one of 14 states that hold closed primaries. And 36 states have open primaries.
"(Open primary states) are all kinds of states," he said. "These are blue states like California and Massachusetts, red states like Texas and Tennessee, and purple states like Arizona and North Carolina."
If you’re unaffiliated currently, it doesn’t mean you can’t vote in this year’s primary. Delaware residents automatically registered to vote at the DMV and listed as “no party - AVR” can still choose a party and vote. They can do so online or declaring a party at a polling place.
In early voting as of Thursday, Sussex County is seeing the largest turnout with 13,280 total votes between absentee and in-person ballots. New Castle County is the second highest county for turnout with nearly 11 thousand votes total. Most of its votes are in-person ballots, with about 6,259. But it had the most absentee ballots cast, at 4,576.
Kent County had tallied 4,239 total early ballots. Most of these came from early in-person voting also.
Delaware’s early voting turnout for primaries is already higher this year than in 2024, when the total was more than 12,000.
