RICHMOND, Va. -- Voting has been smooth on Election Day 2020 in Virginia, according to Virginia Department of Elections Commissioner Christopher Piper.
"This was obviously the first year that Virginians didn't need an excuse to cast an absentee ballot. So we anticipated higher numbers. But the enthusiasm Virginians showed for casting early ballots is unprecedented," Piper said. "As a result, we've had a quiet morning."
At the end of the early voting period last Saturday, 2.7 million ballots had been cast (1.8 million in-person and 956,000 absentee ballots).
"That's a total of 46% of registered voters have already cast ballots," he said." Sixty-eight percent of our total turnout in 2016."
He said he had seen no reports of voter intimidation at the polls on Tuesday.
"While there have been minor issues, nothing that we didn't anticipate, necessarily, and at no point was voting interrupted in the Commonwealth," Piper said. "As a result, we feel very confident going into the rest of the day that voting will continue to be successful here in the Commonwealth."
He expected to address the process of counting votes cast by Virginians at a 4 p.m. briefing.
This is a developing story.
