When early voting polls in Maryland closed on June 21st, approximately 221,000 ballots had been cast. That is a 56% increase from the 2014 primary early voting numbers.

This primary season, 7 percent of eligible voters in Maryland voted early. 2010 was the first time early voting was allowed in Maryland during a primary and only 2.4 percent of eligible voters took advantage of it.

Of the 2,143,288 eligible Democratic voters, 170,356 opted to vote ahead of election day (7.9 percent) while only 47,736 of the 1,003,153 Republican voters casted their ballot early (4.8 percent) .

Mileah Kromer, Director of the Sarah T. Hughes Field Politics Center at Goucher College, told wtop “We won’t know until Election Day whether this is an increase in new voters or a redistribution of voters — folks who would have voted on Election Day, but then decided to take up the convenience of early voting.” She also cautioned against crediting this surge to increased voter enthusiasm until the polls close tomorrow.