RENO, Nev. (KOLO) –
The 2024 Presidential Election was roughly ten months ago, but most voters probably remember how they cast their ballot.
Was it mail-in voting, drop off, or in person voting?
Data from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission says in 2024 more people cast their ballot in person either through early voting or on election day when compared to mail-in voting.
A 2% increase the data shows when comparing 2020 to 2024.
“To me it is not surprising, you have a major party, the Republican Party, for now three elections national elections has challenged the validity and the accuracy of the American voting system,” says Professor Fred Lokken, head of the political science department at Truckee Meadows Community College. “One of the things they’ve been loudest about is mail-in balloting which is what Nevada, and a lot of other states pivoted to during the Great Pandemic.”
Lokken also suspects voters felt more comfortable to go out and vote in person in 2024 when compared to 2020 when our country was in the midst of the COVID pandemic.
Here in Nevada, the numbers seem to follow those from the Election Assistance Commission. We rounded off the percentages.
While more voters cast a ballot in 2020 compared to 2024, the way voters cast their ballots in 2024 showed as slight shift.
In 2020 about 52% of voters either early voted or cast their ballot on Election Day. In 2024, a little more than 54% of voters cast their ballots that way.
For mail-in ballots in 2020 more than 47% of the vote was cast that way. In 2024 about 45% of ballots were mailed in.
Lokken says mail-in balloting has given Nevadans yet another way to vote.
The Silver State it seems tries to accommodate all voters the best it can.
“Nevada has taken a strategy of everything everywhere all at once,” says Lokken.
Lokken says the 2% finding nationwide is interesting, but he believes we’ll have to examine a few more presidential election years to see if there’s a big trend toward in-person voting.
He says just getting more people to vote should be the end goal.
For more information:
https://silverstateelection.nv.gov/vote-turnout/
https://www.nvsos.gov/silverstate2020gen/vote-turnout/
https://www.eac.gov/news/2025/06/30/us-election-assistance-commission-releases-2024-election-administration-and-voting
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