Republicans Remain Ahead by 35,000 Colorado Votes: 1,943,000 Mailed Back by Election Day

Most of the mail-in vote arrived at county clerk offices on Tuesday, Nov. 6.  The expected total vote is about 2,700,000, and mail-in voting should be 70 percent of the total (now 72% of active voters have early voted).  Democrats reduced their deficit to less than two percent of the total vote.

Democrats won the early vote by two percent in 2008, they lost it by six percent in 2010 and are losing by two percent now.  Obama won the state by nine points in 2008, and if early vote is an indicator, he is down four points.  Does he win the state by five points or do partisan returns in the early vote offer little evidence of significance?

The county-level returns indicate a close election.  Democrats have closed the gap in Arapahoe, but Jefferson and Larimer still show Republican leads.