Heavy turnouts have been reported across North Texas as early voting begins for the Nov. 8 general election. In some areas, early voters shattered first-day records set in 2012.
"It's a lot of interest, more than we've ever had before," said Dallas County Elections Administrator Toni Pippins-Poole.
Some, 58,213 people in Dallas County had voted on Monday by 7 p.m., when the polls were set to close. A few polling locations stayed open past 7 p.m. to allow people already in line the chance to vote.
The previous record in Dallas County was set in 2008, when 34,415 people cast ballots on the first day of early voting.
Election administrators in Tarrant County reported a first-day turnout of about 43,000 voters.
And Collin County smashed its previous record for the first day of early voting, as 30,288 people cast ballots Monday, nearly twice the previous record of just over 16,000 in 2012.
A long line spilled out the door nearly all day at the Lancaster Veterans Memorial Library.
"People have been pretty patient because they want to get it over with," said Carlon Terry, a campaign volunteer handing out pamphlets outside.
Many voters couldn't wait to vote and put the election behind them.
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"I've been watching the debates and all that stuff, and I just wanted to be done with it, just wanted to get it over with and out of the way," says Hope Wilcox, of Dallas. "The election series has been crazy and I'm just kind of ready for it to be over."
"We want to get it over with, make sure that we're done with it," added Stayce Armant, of Lancaster.
"Champing at the bit," Jeff Hemstreet, a Lancaster voter, described the feeling of casting a vote. "I think a lot of people are really excited about this, this year, this election."
Some voters said they came on the first day to cast an historic vote.
"We came on this day to vote because we've been waiting our entire lives to vote for a woman for president," said Karen McCrocklin, of Dallas.
Numbers were up as well in Denton County, where more than 15,000 people voted, up by about 3,000 votes from 2012.
Texas set a record for statewide registered voters at more than 15 million, nearly 78 percent of the state's estimated voting age population. More than 13. 6 million Texans registered to vote in 2012.
More Polling Locations Added in Dallas This Year
Dallas County officials expected a large turnout, prompting elections officials to open 41 polling locations.
"Normally we have 25 early voting locations, and we've seen historically people are in line and they are in line for maybe more than an hour, so we are trying to reduce that impact on our locations," Pippins-Poole explained. "Early voting now is almost over 50 percent of the people who are actually going to vote. So, we are looking at our polling locations…more than 470,000 of our registered voters will vote early."
Dallas County election workers will open nine more locations in the last week of early voting on college campuses.
"We normally don't vote on college campuses, but we want to try to reduce the impact on some of our other locations," Pippins-Poole said.
This comes as Texas Secretary of State Carlos Cascos announces a record number of registered voters at more than 15 million.
"If you want to vote, you must be registered, so it's good to see that so many Texans are preparing for this November's election," Cascos said in a media release.
With so many voters expected at the polls, Dallas County launched a new web-based tool to track wait times.
We have compiled a list of voting locations and sample ballots from counties around the area including Dallas, Tarrant, Collin and Denton.
