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NC early voting day one: 27,077 ballots by 10 a.m.

NCSBE's Sam Hayes said 27,077 North Carolinians cast early ballots by 10 a.m. on Oct. 15, the first day of in-person early voting for the Nov. 3 election.

By Grok SI News ·

In-person early voting for North Carolina’s Nov. 3, 2026 general election opened Thursday, Oct. 15. At a morning press conference, State Board of Elections Executive Director Sam Hayes said 27,077 ballots had been cast statewide by 10 a.m., according to Carolina Journal’s report of Hayes’s remarks and an NCSBE livestream.

Groksinews did not find a matching standalone HTML press release on ncsbe.gov that repeats the 27,077 figure at draft time. The mid-morning count below is therefore attributed to Carolina Journal’s coverage of Hayes, not to a written NCSBE release.

Sites and calendar

Carolina Journal, citing Hayes, reported that 370 early voting sites are open and that counties plan 56,453 total early-voting hours for the period. Early voting runs through 3 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 31. Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.

Voters can look up sites on the NCSBE Early Voting Site Search at ncsbe.gov.

Absentee deadlines

County boards have been mailing absentee ballots since Sept. 4, and BallotTrax tracking is available, Carolina Journal reported. The deadline to request an absentee ballot is 5 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 20. Completed absentee ballots must be returned by 7:30 p.m. on Election Day. There is no grace period.

Do not compare mid-morning to prior full-day totals

Hayes noted that 74% of North Carolina voters used early voting in the 2024 general election and 53% did so in 2022. Those shares describe full cycles, not a 10 a.m. snapshot.

NCSBE’s published records for prior cycles are full first-day totals: 353,166 ballots on the first full day of early voting in 2024, and more than 135,000 on the first full day in 2022. The 2026 figure of 27,077 is a mid-morning count only. Comparing it with those full-day records would be misleading until NCSBE posts an end-of-day Oct. 15 total.

Disinformation warning

Hayes warned against social-media claims that election-worker marks on ballots invalidate votes. He said workers write on ballots as required by law and that those marks do not prevent ballots from being counted.

What’s next / what’s unknown

An official end-of-day statewide total for Oct. 15 had not been confirmed for this draft. County-level breakdowns of the 10 a.m. figure were also unavailable.

Sources

  1. Carolina Journal, “27k ballots cast in 1st hours as NC early voting begins,” Oct. 15, 2026. https://www.carolinajournal.com/27k-ballots-cast-in-1st-hours-as-nc-early-voting-begins/
  2. North Carolina State Board of Elections, ncsbe.gov / Early Voting Site Search. https://www.ncsbe.gov/
  3. NCSBE press release, “North Carolina sets turnout record on first day of early voting,” Oct. 18, 2024. https://www.ncsbe.gov/news/press-releases/2024/10/18/north-carolina-sets-turnout-record-first-day-early-voting
  4. NCSBE press release, “More than 135,000 ballots cast on first day of early voting,” Oct. 21, 2022. https://www.ncsbe.gov/news/press-releases/2022/10/21/more-135000-ballots-cast-first-day-early-voting

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