Why I built this site, and why you need to vote early

Let's be honest. A 60-second video can only hold so many receipts. I spend hours pulling the public records, the official data and the vote counts, and then most of it gets cut so the video fits. So I built this site to hold the full story. Every day you'll find my take for the day here, plus the tools I use myself.

Here's what's on it right now:

• The early vote tracker, updated every morning with who has already voted in every state that reports it.
• Where and when to vote, with early voting dates for every state and the official polling place lookup.
• Start texting for a win, the Republican apps that let you get your friends and family to the polls from your phone.

Early voting is how we won in 2024

For years Republicans saved their vote for Election Day. In 2024 the RNC finally stopped fighting early voting and started using it. Their Bank Your Vote push had one line that said it all: "When Republicans vote early, we win." (Fox News)

Then look at what happened.

North Carolina. At the end of early voting in 2022, registered Democrats had cast about 155,000 more early ballots than registered Republicans. In 2024, registered Republicans finished early voting about 35,000 ballots ahead of Democrats. That's a swing of roughly 190,000 ballots in two years, straight from the NC State Board of Elections ballot files. Trump carried North Carolina.

Nevada. By the final days of early voting, registered Republicans had cast 393,811 early ballots to 344,539 for Democrats, according to the Nevada Secretary of State (Fox News). Trump won Nevada, the first Republican to do it since 2004 (PBS NewsHour / AP).

Nationally, more than 80 million Americans voted before Election Day, and NPR called Republicans voting early in person "one of the more surprising early voting patterns this year" (NPR).

Party registration tells you who voted, not how they voted. But when we banked our votes early, we stopped spotting Democrats a three-week head start, and our campaigns could spend the final days chasing the voters who hadn't shown up yet instead of everyone.

Where we are right now

As of the October 14 pull, in the 22 states that track party, registered Democrats have cast 53 of every 100 early ballots and registered Republicans have cast 28. Some of that is normal this early, because mail ballots come in first and in-person early voting hasn't opened in most states yet. But a midterm is won by whoever shows up, and we can't let that lead harden.

So here's the ask. If you don't trust mail ballots, fine. Vote early in person. Then text five people you know and ask when they're voting. We'll swamp Election Day, but we can't afford to leave a single vote on the table.

Find your early voting dates and watch the numbers move every morning.

I'm your Common Sense Gay.