LAKE COUNTY, FLA. – Lake County voters stayed true to their Republican stripe Tuesday, with an 89.6 percent voter turnout from the presidential to down-ticket races.
The turnout beat the 80 percent figure rate in the presidential elections of 2020 and 78 percent in 2016.
Turnout wasn’t the only factor. Republicans also handily beat Democrats in early voting, a sign to come for the final vote tally.
Tuesday’s unofficial count for former President Donald Trump was 140,393, or 62 percent, over Harris’ 37 percent or 84,408. A handful of other candidates garnered some votes.
There are 123,328 registered Republicans, 64,471 Democrats and 61,640 non-party affiliated (NPA) voters. Looking at those numbers it is safe to say the NPA voters, which are increasing every year, were helpful for Trump.
Trump won Florida’s votes in 2016 and 2020, including Lake County, though he lost nationally to Joe Biden four years ago, 306 to 232 electoral votes.
The unofficial national total so far this year is that Trump earned 277 of the necessary 270 electoral votes to win.
Residents voted to return U.S. Senator Rick Scott to office and Daniel Webster in the House, and they voted for candidates in the state House and state Senate and Supervisor of Elections.
Mark Jordan was elected property appraiser. Incumbent Cary Baker was forced to run as a write-in candidate when he decided not to pay the qualifying fee or collect about 3,000 petition signatures.