New Jersey voters will have nine days to cast early in-person ballots ahead of Election Day. The governorship and all 80 Assembly seats are on the ballot. (Dana DiFilippo | New Jersey Monitor)
Early in-person voting in New Jersey’s gubernatorial and Assembly elections begins Saturday.
New Jersey’s 21 counties will stand up 173 polling stations where voters can cast machine ballots ahead of Election Day. They are open between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m., or 6 p.m. on Sundays.
The state’s early-voting period runs through Nov. 2. Voters can cast ballots at any early polling station in their home county.
New Jersey’s leading gubernatorial candidates, Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D) and former Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli (R), are set to be busy this weekend.
Ciattarelli is holding a bevy of early voting rallies in North Jersey, including one in Clifton where he will be joined by Puerto Rico Governor Jenniffer González Colón. He is also hosting a tele-rally Friday night with President Donald Trump.
Sherrill is doing much the same, though with a focus on turnout in Camden and Middlesex counties. She will get a boost from some other prominent Democratic officials. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro will stump for her at a rally in Monroe Saturday, and Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly will join her at a Blackwood rally later that day.
All 80 Assembly seats are also on the ballot this year.
See a list of early voting centers
Nearly 1.2 million residents cast early in-person ballots in last year’s general election, smashing turnout records and pulling past mail-voting turnout that had, until then, accounted for an overwhelming share of New Jersey’s pre-Election Day voting.
New Jersey law requires the state to reimburse counties for early voting expenses for up to five, seven, or 10 early polling sites, depending on a county’s number of registered voters, and counties are required to set up at least three, five, or seven sites, depending on their size.
Three counties — Hudson, Essex, and Union — have opted to erect more early polling stations than will be reimbursed by the state this year. Essex and Union counties will each have 11 early polling stations, while Hudson will have 34.
The 173 early polling stations set a new record for the state. Last year, counties had a total of 168 early voting sites.
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