MICHIGAN, USA —
When Ladon Flowers showed up at the polls in Muskegon County at 9:30 a.m., he didn’t think there would be a line out the door.
“I thought I was coming early, and when I got here, it was all the way down [the sidewalk],” he said. “And I'm like, I guess I'm not the first one here this morning.”
The county told 13 ON YOUR SIDE were 35 people lined up before they even opened the doors.
Flowers was able to come back with his daughter later in the day.
Over a thousand people came out to vote early in Muskegon County on the first day, which is almost quadruple the amount from August, the county said.
Other counties in West Michigan had record turnout as well.
Kent County said 12,081 voters turned out on the first day, which almost tripled in one day the total number of voters who cast their ballots during the nine-day early voting period in the August primary.
Norton Shores resident Steven McDiarmid, who voted at the Muskegon County early voting location, said the large turnout is likely due to the choice in voting.
“It gives everybody the more opportunity to be able to do it in their time frame, so they won't happen to forget [or] get disqualified for being somewhere else. So it gets it done easy, quickly.”
He came out to the polls Saturday because it was convenient for him. He has family in the area he visited as well and said he “killed two birds with one stone.”
He said voting, no matter how, is also important.
“Get out and vote. Your vote counts. Your vote is needed, especially the way the condition of everything is,” he said. “We want to know what everybody is going to do for the future of this country. So, we need to get out there and support our candidate, support the progress, and go with the program and not just sit back and complain.”
Muskegon Township resident Dave Muskovin echoes McDiarmid’s thoughts.
“Do your homework,” Muskovin said. “You can go online and get the ballot information ahead of time, and do your homework and pick a quality candidate or candidates or vote for your millage if you have to. That's going to do right for your community and the United States.”
He brought his sixth-grade son to the polls and got to teach him about voting and the responsibilities he believes come with making decisions for the country.
Kent County did not experience any major issues but said there was a paper jam at a City of Grand Rapids early voting site. A tabulator needed to be serviced, so for a brief time voters inserted their ballots into a secure auxiliary bin.
The county said it is not out of the ordinary, and the bin is there to allow ballots to be cast in a secure matter. Only election workers have access to the bins, and once the tabulator is up and running ballots are placed by two election workers, one Democrat and one Republican.
Throughout Kent County, out of the 152,000 absentee ballots issued, around 64% have been returned. Combined with Saturday’s numbers, the county is just over 20% voter turnout.
