Over 3,000 people registered to vote online Monday before the midnight deadline. The elections office says that shows there is big interest in this year's election.
And across the state, there are more than 679,000 new voters this year alone. There are 327,000 registered voters in Kern County. Of those, roughly half vote by mail, a practice that is becoming more and more popular. "About 10 years ago there was a switch to allow voters to vote by mail for any reason. In addition they could become permanent vote by mail voters. prior to that you had to have basically a doctor's note or be out of the precinct on Election Day," says Karen Rhea, kern county elections.
And the number of people opting to vote by mail is increasing exponentially. So far the elections office has 33,0000 ballots already turned in. Workers are not allowed to open them yet, but they have started sorting them by precinct, with this million dollar machine that can sort 20,000 ballots per hour.
If you still need to vote, you can still mail your ballots in, come down to the elections office or head to your local polling place to cast your ballot.
And for the first time, a drive up ballot drop off at the elections office will be open the Saturday before Election Day.
