OH-12: Early voting shows Democrat Danny O'Connor with large lead over Troy Balderson
WASHINGTON — Early voting in the three major counties which form much of the 12th congressional district indicate Democrat Danny O’Connor is running far ahead of Republican Troy Balderson in the August 7 special election to fill the seat left vacant by the retirement of Republican Pat Tiberi.
In heavily Republican Delaware County, of the 1,785 absentee ballots filed by Thursday afternoon, 62.1 percent were marked for Democrats while just 37.9 percent were marked Republican.
In Licking County, 57.3 percent of the 1,650 absentee ballots returned so far are marked Democrat while in Franklin County 78.5 percent of the absentee ballots returned by mail are for the Democrats.
Although it does not necessarily mean that all those who marked their ballots Democrat will vote for O’Connor, the early returns indicate an extremely competitive race for what has been a solid Republican seat since 1983.
For another point of comparison, Republican ballot requests were far higher for the May 8 primary for the seat, with 61.8 percent of those requesting absentee ballots in Delaware County asking for a Republican ballot and 61.1 percent of those requesting absentee ballots in Licking County asking for the GOP ballot during the primary.
The non-partisan Cook Political Report in Washington Friday rated the race a toss-up.
The early returns from Licking and Delaware counties include both early and absentee votes filed by mail or in person. Franklin County’s returns show only those returned by mail.
Both O’Connor, who is Franklin County Recorder, and Balderson, a state Senator from Zanesville, as well as Green Party candidate Joe Manchik are on the Aug. 7 ballot to replace Tiberi, a Republican who left Congress in January to take a job with the Ohio Business Roundtable. Were O’Connor to win, he’d be the first Democrat to win the seat since 1980. The district includes Delaware, Licking and Morrow counties as well as parts of Franklin, Marion, Muskingum and Richland counties.
http://www.dispatch.com/news/20180720/early-voting-shows-danny-oconnor-with-large-lead-over-troy-balderson
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