Across Vermont, more votes were cast this election than ever before. But how people voted varied, and generally tracked with political leanings.
Vermont towns that supported President Donald Trump were less likely to vote by mail than those who supported Vice President Joe Biden. This includes a number of towns in the Northeast Kingdom that border the Canadian border as well as the areas on the New Hampshire state line.
The decision by Trump voters in Vermont to go to the polls on the day of the election follows a similar national trend of Republicans voting in-person and creating a “red mirage” of Trump support in key battleground states.
The president had spent weeks in the runup to the election claiming that voting by mail led to voter fraud and that the U.S. Postal Service could not be trusted to deliver ballots.
While Vermont saw record voter turnout on Tuesday, early data suggests the state’s mail-in voting expansion was utilized widely, with towns seeing an average of 75% of registered voters choosing to mail ballots.
Across the state the record turnout smashed the 12-year-old high water mark from 2008’s general election in which former President Barack Obama won his first term to the White House.
While the vote count remains unofficial, the Vermont Secretary of State’s Office reports that more than 365,000 Vermonters cast ballots in the Nov. 3 presidential contest, a substantially higher number than the previous record of 326,822 set in the 2008 general election.
As of Wednesday afternoon, the total turnout stood just north of 365,000 votes according to the secretary of state’s unofficial results. However with town clerks still reporting vote totals, that number is expected to grow in the coming hours.
The high turnout was primarily a result of Secretary of State Jim Condos’ emergency Covid-19 election procedure which made sure that every active voter was mailed a ballot for the general election — greatly expanding Vermont’s absentee voting system in an attempt to maintain public safety at polling locations.
“I want to thank Vermont voters for embracing the safe voting options available to them, and for participating in this election in what unofficially appears to be a record breaking turnout,” Condos said in a statement on Wednesday.
Towns throughout the state, from the southern border to the northeast corner of Vermont, saw voter turnout of more than 70%.
Canaan, a town nestled between the Canadian border and New Hampshire, narrowly supported President Donald Trump over former Vice President Joe Biden. Seventy-one percent of voters came out in that small town to vote.
In the south of the state, 81% of voters in Whitingham cast ballots, with the majority choosing Biden over Trump.