EL PASO, Tx., May 19, 2026: Early voting got underway yesterday for the March primaries runoff elections. Yesterday, 5,509 voters marked a ballot for the eight local runoff seats. The Republicans are voting between convicted felon Manny Barraza and newcomer Adam Bauman who appears to be relying on social media to win the election, in addition to state and national runoffs.
Of the 5,509 ballots cast yesterday, 2,159 were in-person ballots and 3,350 were mail-in ballots. Of those, 1,320 ballots were cast by Republican-affiliated voters, suggesting that they are voting between Barraza and Bauman to represent them against incumbent Veronica Escobar in the November elections. However, 78 of the Republican affiliated voters are not in the congressional District 16 area suggesting they are casting ballots for the other statewide and national runoffs.
Ten voters, who did not vote in the March primary, cast ballots yesterday. In addition to the ten new voters, another 492 voters who cast a ballot yesterday did not have a party affiliation assigned to them according to the May 14 voter data released by election officials.
In Texas, party affiliation is assigned to the voter according to the ballot they cast in the March primary. A voter who cast a Republican ballot in the last March primary would be assigned a Republican affiliation through 2026. However, the party affiliation only matters during the ongoing early voting period because presumably a voter who cast a Republican ballot in March cannot cast one in the Democratic runoff elections. It is unclear why the county’s latest data does not show a party affiliation for the 492 voters.
Party affiliation in Texas does not limit who a voter can cast a ballot for in the upcoming November elections.
The much-anticipated faceoff between incumbent Lucilla “Lucy” Najera and challenger Dora Oaxaca Rivera appears to not have driven voters to the polls during the first day of early voting. Only 928 ballots were cast in the JP 5 race. It is the JP 1 seat that drove the most voters to the polls yesterday.
The race between Denise Butterworth and Octavio Dominguez, one of the quietest races in the ongoing runoff elections led to 1,620 ballots cast in that race. For the JP 2 race between incumbent Brian Haggerty and challenger Christie Saiz, no voters cast ballots yesterday.
There were 599 ballots cast for the two seats in JP 6 yesterday.
Early voting continues through May 22. Voters can cast ballots at any polling station. Election Day is May 26.
Want us to do a deep dive analysis into the early voting ballots for a specific race? Let us know with a quick email to staff[@]elpasoheraldpost.com.
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