Thread by @TobyMGData

Wisconsin Absentee Report 10/29

638,838 requests
(+4,302 over yesterday)

478,537 returns (75.39%)
(+32,393 over yesterday)

511,141 in-person "early votes"
(+99,119 over yesterday)

More requests than I'd like to see at this point (these folks might not even get their ballot in

time, let alone have time to return it) but it has slowed a lot since a week and half ago.
Big day of returns, and, as hoped/expected we pass a 75% mail return rate, passing 475k mail votes cast. This is about two days ahead of 2022's return pace and has caught up (and slightly

outpaced) 2020's return rate which was at 74.43% one week out from Election Day.

The big story remains in-person absentee voting, which is showing, so far, no signs of abating from a record setting first week.
There are now 150k more early votes cast than this point in 2020.

27.83% of registered voters (as of 10/1) have cast a ballot already. We're definitely in uncharted territory here. We don't know what Election Day will look like and how much these voters are just moving from Election Day to early but everything is pointing to massive turnout

next week.
At the municipal level, Milwaukee lags by about 6%, similar to where things were before the weekend, and now has almost exactly the same number of mail and early votes- 31,886 mail and 31,878 early.

Madison continues to pull away from the statewide rate and is now

at 77.73%. Madison has solidly joined the other elite cities with high return rates- Green Bay (77.23%), Kenosha (77.37%), Appleton (77.32%), Janesville (79.55%), Oshkosh (77.33%), and Eau Claire (78.18%) are all approaching 80% and many of them should make it tomorrow.

Brookfield and New Berlin (Waukesha suburbs) continues to overperform but have fallen back behind Kenosha and Wauwatosa, a blue Milwaukee suburb.
The City of Waukesha, which had trailed badly, is now starting to catch up to its suburbs, just behind the two already mentioned and

passing Menomonee Falls and Muskego.
There are now 262,540 ballots in Central Count municipalities, 91k of which are in Milwaukee, Green Bay and Kenosha. Another 14k are in previously mentioned Wauwatosa, which could make for more drama on Election Night.

At the County level,

Milwaukee is just 3.6% behind the statewide rate at 71.80% and the suburbs minus the City of Milwaukee have a 74% return rate on their own. The County has about 5k more early votes than mail votes.
Dane County has a 77.33% mail return rate and has passed 150k ballots total.

Waukesha had a strong day of early voting and about 2k early votes ahead of Dane (while being about 50k votes back overall due to lower mail voting- where they are in line with the statewide rate at 75.30%)

Milwaukee remains ahead of the statewide turnout rate at 28.62%, but

behind other large counties like Dane (33.66%), Waukesha (38.18%) and Brown (31.29%). The highest turnout is in ruby-red Washington county at 38.61%. Rural counties continue to lag badly in turnout with Clark County in the back at 8.72% turnout of registered voters.

We JUST missed a million votes cast by about 11k, so tomorrow will definitely be the day for those of you who voted in yesterday's poll. We will also likely pass 500k mail ballots tomorrow, so a day of milestones is in store.