Hancock City Hall was one polling place in Houghton County Tuesday.

As of Tuesday morning, 1.71 million people had returned absentee ballots from among more than 2 million who had requested them, Michigan Secretary of State spokesman Jake Rollow announced.

Every county’s absentee rate was up over 2018, the last election held before Michigan voters approved no-reason absentee voting. Baraga County was one of four counties in the state where the number of absentee ballots returned by Tuesday had already doubled the 2018 number. As of Tuesday, 1,081 voters had cast ballots in Baraga County, a 315.8% increase.

In L’Anse Township, 731 absentee ballots had been issued by 8 a.m. Election Day, 629 of which had been returned. Clerk Kristin Kahler estimated those absentee ballots would make up about 40% of the final tally based on the in-person turnout so far. That would be down slightly from the 50% number seen during the 2020 presidential election, the first in Michigan with no-reason absentee ballots.

Shortly after 10:30 a.m., the township had seen more than 300 in-person votes, which Kahler said was “definitely up” from prior midterms.

L'Anse Township residents wait in line at their polling place.

Hancock had issued 659 absentee ballots, 579 of which had been returned by election day.

Election workers at Precinct 1 at City Hall said turnout had been steady.

Mary Ackerman voted Tuesday morning.

“It’s my duty,” she said. “You can’t gripe if you don’t participate.”

Ackerman said her main issue was “women’s rights.” Her friend Fran Grossman had been waiting outside with Ackerman’s dog while she voted. Grossman had already voted by mail. She said all of the issues had motivated her.

“The question would be if I didn’t vote, why the hell didn’t I vote?” she said.

In Houghton, 727 absentee ballots had been issued before Election Day, 640 of which had been returned by voters.

Election workers at Dee Stadium said in-person turnout was up noticeably.

One of the Houghton voters, Madeline Webb, said she’d been motivated by Proposal 3 and the governor’s race between Gretchen Whitmer and Tudor Dixon.

“It’s my civic duty,” she said of voting. “It’s just what I’m supposed to do.”