WASHINGTON — Many more Virginia voters are expected to cast ballots Tuesday than the last time both major parties held presidential primaries, so elections officials want to ensure voters are prepared before coming to the polls.
Fairfax County General Registrar Cameron Sasnett says the most important things voters can do to get in and out quickly is to come prepared and make sure that they go to the correct polling place.
All Virginia Election Day polling hours are 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Voters can check their registration details and polling locations here.
“On Election Day, the only thing that you need to bring with you is your photo ID,” Sasnett says.
Acceptable IDs include a driver’s license, passport or other government-issued photo identification issued by the federal, state or local government. IDs from Virginia colleges or high schools and employee identification cards are also acceptable.
“One thing that we do not do in Virginia is register you by party. Anybody can go in, and at that point it becomes an indication whether you want to participate in the Republican process or you want to participate in the Democratic primary, and from there it really becomes all a party thing,” he adds.
Absentee voting activity in Fairfax County, Virginia’s most populous, has increased by about 75 percent compared to 2008, the last time both Democrats and Republicans held contested presidential primaries.
“When you see numbers like this in absentee, it shows that we’re going to see a big increase [in turnout],” Sasnett says.
He says there are enough poll workers ready at all of the county’s 242 polling places. But they are not expected to be faced with the more than 70 percent turnout of a usual presidential general election.
In the 2008 primaries won by then-Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain, turnout in Virginia was only around 29 percent.
Nothing else is on the ballot for Virginia voters, which could also help cut down on lines seen in some general elections.
“Usually makes it a lot quicker when you just fill in that bubble to the left of the one candidate that you’re choosing,” Sasnett says.
A number of school systems, including Fairfax County, Loudoun County, Prince William County and Stafford County, have closed Tuesday at the request of local and state elections leaders.
After votes are cast and tallied by local electoral boards, the results are eventually given to the state parties, which each have their own ways of settling on the final delegates who will be sent to the national conventions this summer. Both the Republican and Democratic parties in Virginia split their delegates proportionally.
The Republican Party of Virginia belatedly asked to rescind plans to have voters who chose to participate in the Republican primary sign a statement that they are Republicans. The frustrated State Board of Elections approved the request, so voters on Tuesday will not have to sign the statement to participate in the Republican primary.
On both sides, voters will see the names of candidates no longer running for president on the ballot.
“There have been a lot of folks who have suspended their campaigns,” Sansett says. “Suspension is not the same thing as withdrawal.”
Lindsey Graham, Chris Christie, Carly Fiorina and Rick Santorum have officially withdrawn, but all did so after the ballots were printed.
Sansett continues: “We still count all those votes. As long as they were on the ballot, we’ll still count them. We present those results to be certified to the state board, which will present them back to the parties, and the parties will determine who’s still eligible at the time.”
On the Democratic side, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley is still listed, while on the Republican side candidates including former Virginia governor Jim Gilmore, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee and former HP CEO Carly Fiorina are still listed.
