Democrats appear to be souring on mail-in ballots ahead of the 2026 midterms, according to a new NBC News poll released Sunday, with the share of registered Democratic voters who plan to vote by mail falling sharply from two years ago.
Just 23 percent of registered Democrats now say they intend to cast their ballots by mail this fall, down from 34 percent at a comparable point in September 2024, according to the survey. The drop β 11 percentage points β marks one of the clearest shifts in voting-method preferences since the pandemic-era election of 2020, when mail voting surged nationwide.
Instead, Democrats are moving toward in-person voting. Thirty-six percent say they plan to vote early at an in-person site, up six points from the same period in 2024. Another 36 percent say they will vote at their polling place on Election Day, roughly unchanged from 35 percent two years ago. Five percent say they are unsure how they will vote or are unlikely to vote at all.
Independents Follow a Similar Path
The shift is not limited to Democrats. Independent voters are also showing less appetite for mail ballots. About a quarter β 25 percent β say they plan to vote by mail, down three points from 28 percent in 2024. Meanwhile, 28 percent of independents say they will vote in person before Election Day, up from 22 percent two years ago. Election Day voting among independents slipped to 37 percent from 41 percent. Fifteen percent say they are unsure or unlikely to vote.
Republican voters, by contrast, have barely budged. According to NBC’s report, the GOP figures were “virtually unchanged” from 2024: 16 percent plan to vote by mail, 26 percent early in person, and 53 percent on Election Day.
The poll was conducted September 11β15 and surveyed 1,000 registered voters through a mix of telephone interviews and an online survey delivered via text message. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
Trump’s Push Against Mail Voting and a Supreme Court Check
The findings land in the middle of a running fight over how Americans cast their ballots. President Donald Trump has made ending mail-in voting a priority, pushing new criteria for states to send out mail ballots before the midterms. On the evening of September 14 β while the NBC poll was still in the field β the U.S. Supreme Court blocked that executive order, keeping existing state rules in place for now.
Democrats have leaned heavily on mail voting since 2020, when the Covid pandemic pushed millions of voters to avoid crowded polling places. The new numbers suggest that reliance may be easing, at least in the plans voters report to pollsters.
What the Split Means for November
The divergent habits of early and Election Day voters could shape how election night unfolds in 2026, according to Democrat pollster Jeff Horwitt, whose firm Hart Research Associates conducted the survey alongside Republican polling firm Public Opinion Strategies.
Horwitt pointed to a sharp partisan divide depending on when ballots are cast. Among early voters, Democrats hold a 23-point advantage on the congressional ballot, he noted, while Republicans lead by 14 points among those who vote on Election Day.
“So, if a blue wave comes in, it will hit land at different times, and even on different days or weeks,” Horwitt said, describing how the timing of results could shift as mail and early ballots are counted before in-person Election Day votes are tallied.
The poll offers no single explanation for why Democratic voters are turning away from mail ballots, though it coincides with a national political environment in which mail voting itself has become a subject of sustained partisan dispute. What the survey does show is that the pandemic-era pattern, in which Democrats were far more likely than Republicans to vote by mail, may be narrowing.
For now, the parties are heading into the fall with distinctly different expectations about how their voters will show up β and when.
Source: www.breitbart.com β https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2026/09/20/poll-more-democrats-plan-to-ditch-mail-in-ballots-and-vote-in-person-in-midterms/