ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Elections officials said they saw massive turnout -- and long lines -- across Northern Virginia on the first day of early voting for the November presidential race.
In Alexandria, officials said they'd already seen four times as many early voters by noon as they saw in all of 2016. By 4:30 p.m., 967 people had voted, nearly eight times the 123 people who early-voted in the city in the entire presidential election in 2016.
The lines moved quickly, and even after they cut it off at 5 p.m., it only took a few minutes for the remaining dozen voters to get inside.
More than 75% of Alexandrians voted for Hillary Clinton in the last election, so Democratic leaders say they are heartened that so many people are turning up early.
"It's important to get it done now, before any other issues come up," early voter Elizabeth Smith said.
Smith said she feared that if she didn't vote now, her vote won't be counted.
"I am concerned about my ballot counting because there has been a slowdown in the US Postal Service," Chavon Edwards, another early voter, said.
The commonwealth has 44 more days of early voting coming up.
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There were supporters of President Trump at the polls Friday, too. One man WUSA9 spoke to declined to give his name, but said he was voting early for Trump. He said he's confident America's electoral system will be fine.
"It's always worked, has been working," he said. "It works."
In Fairfax County, scores of people lined up early to vote, and there were reports that it took some voters up to four hours to cast their ballots.
"There's always a hitch," Stephen Hunt, the chairman of the Fairfax County Electoral Board, said. "The question is how quickly and well do your respond to it."
Hunt said 140,000 people have already requested mail-in ballots, which is three times as many as 2016. This is the first election, however, where Virginians have not needed an excuse to vote early or absentee.
President Trump has questioned the legitimacy of mail-in ballots on several occasions.
"There's fraud, there's missing ballots," the president said in Minnesota on Thursday.
Democratic Sen.Mark Warner said he's encouraged by the turnout Friday.
"If you have people coming out on this, the first day, it gives me faith that we will get through this virus," Warner said. "We will get through the misinformation and disinformation. But the best way we can do that is get out and vote, no matter who you're for."
His Republican opponent, Daniel Gade, said he's encouraged too.
"Republicans, as a matter of principle this year, many are voting on Nov. 3, but I would say to my supporters, definitely go vote now, as soon as you can," Gade said. "We don't know what COVID is going to look like in a month and a half. Then plan on going and bringing some friends to the polls."
Early voting in Virginia ends Oct. 31 at 5 p.m. Angela Maniglia Turner, the General Registrar in Alexandria, said more voters usually turn up later in the voting window.
Bruce Brown, chairman of the Alexandria Electoral Board, predicted that by the end of Election Day, some 90% of registered voters will have voted, which would be an extraordinary number for an American election.