Delays, queues, confusion, but millions more roll up

By Caroline Overington

November 4, 2004
Student Brittany Taylorin the rain in Cleveland

Student Brittany Taylorin the rain in Cleveland
Photo: AP

US voters are supposed to be an apathetic bunch, but not this year. They turned out in record numbers to vote in what many said was the most important election of their lives.

Pollsters say 173 million people registered to vote, the largest number in history.

As many as 120 million of them - 10 million more than in 2000 - made the effort to vote.

In some states, it poured rain, but that did not stop them. In other states, the wait for a ballot sheet was four hours long, but that did not stop them. They came with fold-up chairs, flasks of coffee and newspapers.

The election was held on a Tuesday, which meant many had to work, but that did not stop them. They got up early, and voted in the cold light of dawn.

The elderly and the disabled eagerly accepted rides in mini-vans driven by volunteers.

One American astronaut even voted from space.

There were long lines in almost all states, but observers said large numbers chose to wait rather than walk away.


Many reflected on the 2000 election. According to the US Census Bureau, about 111 million people, or 60 per cent of eligible voters, cast a ballot at the previous election, but two states, Florida and New Mexico, were decided by less than 1000 votes.

Perhaps for the first time, voters this year believed the mantra "every vote counts".

In Ohio, a key state for both candidates, one county official reported more votes in the first hour than in the entire election day in 2000.

Officials in some Ohio counties kept the polls open past the official closing time of 7.30pm to accommodate those who had been queueing for hours.

The Democrats sent volunteers out to give them food, hot chocolate, radios and umbrellas to protect them from rain.

When it became obvious that the newly introduced voting machines were slowing down the process, officials handed out paper ballots, which they promised to count.

In Florida, 1.5 million more names were on the rolls than there were in 2000. Many groups were responsible for getting new names registered in Florida: the Council for American-Islamic Relations ran a "Get out the Muslim vote" campaign, which saw the number of Arab voters on the rolls soar.

Republicans and Democrats ran frenetic campaigns to get black people, who traditionally vote less often than whites, to the polls.

Most impressive was the number of people aged 18 to 29 who voted. There was a huge effort to get them to the polls. Many were motivated by a hip, MTV-based campaign called "Rock the Vote". The Electoral Commission said almost 1.5 million more young Americans were registered to vote this time round.

- with agencies