Early and Absentee Voting Could Determine Bradenton Results

As of noon today Manatee County's voter turnout was nearing 30 percent of registered republicans, thanks in large part to absentee and early voting.

The Supervisor of elections mailed out nearly 12,000 absentee ballots and Nancy Bignell, assistant supervisor of elections, said many of those ballots have been returned.

"I think the thing that helped us is the absentee ballots," she said. "People are still walking them in."

This morning the elections office picked up four ballots that had been overnighted. Voters have until 7 p.m. tonight to bring their absentee ballots to the elections office.

Some early and absentee voters who didn't wait until the last minute may wish they had procrastinated. The ballot was printed when nine candidates were still in the race, today the field has been narrowed to four. Those ballots alread cast for Herman Cain, John Huntsman or Rick Perry still count as a vote cast.

And while everyone's talking about Newt Gingrinch and Mitt Romney as the ones to watch in Florida. But Paul Houston isn't voting for either of them. And he's telling the twittersphere. 

When asked early this afternoon who he was voting for, he simply replied not Newt, not Mitt. But he did reveal more to Bradenton Patch.

Before he headed out to the polls, he said he was likely going to vote for Rick Santorum. He said he and his wife didn't agree on his choice, mostly because it seemed like the race was between Romney and Gingrich, so a vote for Santorum, might as well be a vote for Romney.

But Houston didn't care. If he was going to vote, he was going to vote for Santorum.

"He's the only one who has been consisten throughout the election," Houston said. He was frustrated that after winning Iowa, Santrum's campaign seems to have stalled.

Houston said he couldn't cast a ballot for Newt who has been married three times because he didn't want President Obama to be the most moral candidae in the general election. Houston also couldn't get past Mitt Romney's religion.

"He thinks he's going to get his own planet," Houston said, a reference to the Mormon belief that those who go to heaven will become God over their own universe. He also didn't like that Romney's great grandfather was a polygamist and that his father was born in Mexico. 

Houston had put off voting that morning, thinking that maybe his vote wouldn't count unless he voted for Gingrich or Romney. But in the end, his wife helped convince him that he needed to case his vote.

He did. And he voted for Rock Santorum just after 1 p.m. today. As soon as he cast his ballot, he was headed off on a planned motorcycle trip to Key West.

By then, voting in Manatee County had slowed considerably. All was quiet. There were no complaints at any of the precincts and the supervisor of elections office was waiting for voting to pick up again at 5 p.m. today.

Precincts close at 5 p.m. and results will begin coming out just after 7 p.m. In this election cycle those early and absentee votes might just decide the race for Manatee County.

Stay tuned for results tonight from Patch.