CORPUS CHRISTI, TEXAS — It’s an exciting time in politics. We are now entering the second week of early voting and voters are heading out to polling sites across the coastal bend. One of the busiest polling locations in town is at New Life Church on Airline and McArdle.
Election officials here are seeing an average of 500 voters a day and there are no signs that things will slow down here anytime soon.
“For Nueces County we had 211,453 registered voters,” said Kevin Kieschnick who is the Nueces County Tax Assessor/Collector & Voter Registrar.
More than 211,000 people are registered to vote in Nueces County this year. Kevin Kieshcnick says that’s a huge increase compared to the number of registered voters in 2016. During that Presidential election, Nueces County had about 204,000 registered voters. Thats 7,000 more voters in the county.
The number of voters this year may have been an indication of how busy this election would be. Kieschnick says the reason for the increase is not only the interest in the presidential race but the number of candidates in the local races. Int he first 5 days of early voting, more than 52,000 voters have cast their ballots.
“A lot of people showed out for the Obama election and we need to do so for every election. It's very important that we turn out on every election,” said Chris Johnson who was voting at the polls.
We also caught up with Ashley Benitez who voted for the first time on Sunday. “I’ve been registered to vote since I was 18 and I am 31 now. But this election is pretty intense and our country needs another direction,” said Benitez.
Benitez wants to encourage those who haven’t decided to vote to cast their ballot. “It’s very important to exercise your right to vote whether you think it matters or not, it will make a difference,” said Benitez. Early voting ends October 30.
