Olmsted County sees increase in total voters during 2026 election from previous midterms

ROCHESTER, Minn. (KTTC) – Olmsted County officials reported that voter turnout increased during the 2026 elections compared to previous midterms.

In an interview with KTTC’s Eric Min, Olmsted County Property Records and Licensing Director Luke Turner said just over 79,000 residents voted last Tuesday, equating to a roughly 70% voter turnout.

According to Turner, a large portion of those votes came during the early voting period.

“When I compare that to previous midterms, we’ve averaged anywhere from 55%-65% turnout, so this is higher. A lot of that’s driven from the early voting and the absentee voting, with almost one-third of our total vote coming early. So we had over 26,000 come from early voting. The majority of that was that early voting period 18 days before the election,” Turner said.

Turner revealed that while the 2026 midterms saw about 10,000-15,000 fewer votes than the 2024 presidential election, early voting totals were about the same across both years.

“The early voting portion kept neck-and-neck with the 2024 early voting, which was shocking to us. We were expecting maybe 20%, 30% lower, and it was neck-and-neck the whole way,” Turner described.

Turner also responded to questions about being one of the last counties in the state to report their final vote tallies on Election Day, describing the process in Olmsted County as being, “really unique”.

“So the end of the night process is really unique here in Olmsted County. So there’s a few things to note. First, all the results have to be hand-carried by our election judges. So we do have 111 precincts and that with 64 total polling locations, there are hundreds of people that need to come to our office and be processed on election night. One of our big goals was to start early and really participate in the process. We were successful with our first uploads before 9 a.m., and we tried to have a steady increase of results throughout the night, so we met that goal, and obviously we’ll continue to work to get results out as fast as possible,” Turner detailed.

While Olmsted County was one of the final counties to report, Turner said that the large number of early votes did not contribute to any counting delays like it did in 2024.

“So one of our challenges in 2024 was that we did have a later initial batch from processing the absentee. It took us a long time. We weren’t able to have those in until a few hours afterwards, and that caused a delay in [2024]. This year, that wasn’t the case. We took a number of steps, including changing how we process batches, including the staffing of election judges for those absentee ballots. Our absentee was uploaded and complete well before the first judges were back,” Turner said.

Turner urged the public to have patience with election judges, who work almost the entire day to verify results.

“Yeah, I mean, for Olmsted County, our partners with the various cities and school districts that also provide judges and the clerks throughout the county, there’s a lot of work that go into elections. And it’s not work that happens every day. It’s work that happens cyclical. So for individuals, this may be their first time worrying or thinking about elections in multiple years. So it’s a tough process, and it’s a process that’s always new. I’d like to thank all the clerks, city clerks, school district clerks, as well as all of our election judges. It’s very difficult to pick up, and honestly, it’s a very big commitment for a community member to be willing to not only dedicate a full day, a 20-plus hour shift potentially, but take on the responsibility of certifying accurate results for a precinct is a big ask, and we appreciate all the judges,” said Turner.

The county now faces a possible recount after Minnesota’s U.S. House District 1 race was decided by just a couple hundred votes. Turner described what that recount process will look like for Olmsted County.

“So for the recount, we first have to canvass results. Once the results are canvassed and certified, the candidate has a set period of time to formally request a recount. Once that happens, once we have a formal request, really the ball starts rolling. One of our big challenges will be finding teams of balanced election judges to do the counting. Staff will help administer providing the ballots and maintaining the chain of custody. Election judges will do the physical work of hand counting and verifying the count. So it really is a hand count to verify the results of the ballots is the scope of the process,” Turner said.

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