What you need to bring to vote mattered on Tuesday as Tennessee voters headed to the polls for the Midterm election. Nearly 1.3 million Tennesseans had already cast ballots before Election Day, and that early turnout set up the final count in the governor’s race and congressional contests.
The early-voting total was more than 26% of registered voters in Tennessee. It also topped the turnout from the 2022 midterm, while running about 9% below the 2018 governor’s race.
Marsha Blackburn’s ballot test
Marsha Blackburn, the GOP nominee and former state lawmaker turned congresswoman, entered Election Day as the favorite. She had become Tennessee’s first female U.S. Senator in 2019, but her lead had narrowed over the past year even in her own polling.
A week before Election Day, a poll conducted by the Hatley campaign put Blackburn at 34.5%, Jerri Green at 30.1%, Dave Hatley at 26.5% and Lauran Pinkston at 3%. That spread left the race close enough that turnout on Tuesday could still matter in the final count.
Forum skip in Murfreesboro
Blackburn also declined to take part in any debates or forums where she was on stage with all of her challengers. The Tennessee Press Association forum at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, held the previous week, was one of the appearances she skipped.
That choice left Green, Hatley and Pinkston to keep pressing their cases without her on stage. It also meant voters weighing the ballot had to compare a front-runner who stayed away with challengers who used public forums to reach people before voting ended.
Turnout after early voting
Luis Mata, the deputy executive director of the Tennessee Democratic Party, said on Sunday’s episode of Nashville in Focus on FOX 17, “The only poll that really matters is the one that's happening on Tuesday, on Election Day.” He also said, “What this poll does tell us, what these numbers tell us being so neck and neck is that Tennesseans are fed up, right? They want something different than the nearly two decades of Republican control of our state for far too long,”
Megan Lee Podsiedlik said, “She needs to ignite the base and and not showing up, maybe to this type of thing might not matter to the base, but she does have to show up for her base.” Jasper Hendricks added, “It's really going to be about who's going to actually touch the voters and turn out their voters on Tuesday,”
With nearly 1.3 million early votes already in, the remaining task on Election Day was simple: add enough new ballots to change the margin. The race now turns on whether Tuesday’s turnout can alter the lead that existed before voting closed.
