Early voting is Oct. 19 outside the Durham County Main Library. (Photo: Lynn Bonner)

Former President Donald Trump is a persistent critic of early voting. But his campaign this year told his supporters to vote before Election Day.

With this move, the GOP enters the final week of election season in North Carolina with more voters casting ballots than Democrats.

More than 2.7 million ballots had been accepted through Saturday, with nearly 29,000 Republicans voting more than registered Democrats.

Voter turnout in more than half of western North Carolina counties damaged by Helene exceeded the statewide average of 35% through Saturday, according to an X post by Catawba College political scientist Michael Bitzer.

Most Western North Carolina counties are strongly Republican.

Voter turnout is closely watched in this presidential battleground state. In 2020, Former President Trump defeated President Joe Biden in North Carolina by 74,500 votes. Former President Barack Obama, the last Democrat to win the state, won the state by nearly 14,000 votes.

Democratic consultant Morgan Jackson said she wasn’t concerned that Republican turnout was up slightly from four years ago and Democratic turnout was down slightly.

“We have six more days of early voting,” Jackson said Sunday evening. “I think the Democrats will be better off after this week and even after today.”

Thomas Mills, editor of PoliticsNC, looked at the numbers last week and sounded the alarm over low Black voter turnout, down 77,000 votes from the same time four years ago.

In an interview Thursday, he said the gap is narrowing but suggested fine-tuning the message and focusing more on rural eastern North Carolina. Efforts there would help both Vice President Kamala Harris and U.S. Rep. Don Davis, a First District Democrat who is in a competitive race.

“They need to focus their attention on Black working-class voters in more rural communities,” he said.

He wrote Friday that Black voter turnout would need to be 72% to 73% for Harris to win.

As part of Democrats’ push to get out the vote, former President Barack Obama spoke in Charlotte on Friday night and Black church leaders encouraged voting at Souls to the Polls events on Sunday. Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, will be in Charlotte, Greensboro and Asheville on Wednesday, when Harris is scheduled to speak in Raleigh.

“We always knew this would be a close race, but we’ve built an operation to reach voters in every corner of North Carolina and will work hard in the final stretch, including early voting efforts across the state. Harris’ campaign said in a statement: Souls to the Partnerships with churches for Polls events, ballot campaigns on campuses and other efforts.

In statewide elections, Democrats are looking to score big victories in urban counties, including Wake and Mecklenburg County. Turnout in the 12th Congressional District, which includes Charlotte, lags behind all other districts, according to voter tracking conducted by the conservative John Locke Foundation.

Julia Buckner, senior organizing counsel for Mecklenburg County Democrats, said in a text message that each election cycle has its own rhythm and that her group is working on a get-out-the-vote plan.

“Of course we are monitoring the situation and there is a decline in the numbers in District 12 so far,” Bruckner said. “But we have a good plan to get out the vote, and we’ve already knocked on more than 225,000 doors this cycle.”

Harris is working for the votes of Republicans who do not want Trump. More than 250,000 voters chose Nikki Haley over Trump in this year’s primaries, and there’s a question of how many people will vote for Harris or not vote for president, Jackson said. More than 23 percent of Republican voters chose Haley, but by then she had no chance of winning the nomination.

He said most of the people who have voted so far are core voters.

The 2% to 4% of voters who would be considered true undecided voters have not yet voted, so candidates’ late closing arguments are important.

“They will be decisive for undecided voters who have not decided yet,” he said.