Officials: Over 1m voters have cast ballots ahead of Oct. 27 deadline to mail ballots

Over 1m Maricopa County voters have voted early

The deadline to mail in ballots is Oct. 27.

PHOENIX - Arizona voters who have mail-in ballots still sitting on their kitchen table are being advised to put them in the mail by Oct. 27 if they want assurances they’ll make it to county election officials by Election Day.

Secretary of State Katie Hobbs says ballots must be received by 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 3 to be counted.

There’s no postage required for early ballots.

After Tuesday, voters are urged to drop their ballots off at an official dropbox, county recorders office, or a polling place. Locations can be found on the Arizona.vote website.

In Arizona, election workers have already begun to tabulate early ballots. Early returns will be counted for two weeks until election day, and results of early voting will be released at 8:00 p.m. on Election Night.

"If voters want to be part of the first release of election results, they should vote early because those are the ballots we count ahead of Election Day," said Erika Flores with the Maricopa County Election Department.

A historic number of early ballots have already been returned. According to data from Maricopa County, more than 1.1 million voters in the county have already cast their ballots, representing nearly half of the county's registered voters.

"It makes me feel good to vote early," said one early voter, identified only as "Terese". "I got it done early so I know it’s going to count."