COLUMBUS – Three weeks from Election Day, Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted announced that 151,697 absentee ballots were requested by mail and in-person for the Presidential Primary Election on March 15 by the close of business Friday. 10,104 Ohio voters have already cast their ballots.

Based on an informal survey of Ohio’s 88 county boards of elections, as of Feb. 19:

· 151,697 absentee ballot applications received statewide

· 10,104 absentee ballots have been cast

o 1,621 absentee ballots cast by mail.

o 8,483 absentee ballots cast in-person.

· 141,593 absentee ballots outstanding

In total, 335,542 voters cast absentee ballots during the 2012 Presidential Primary Election. During the 2008 Presidential Primary Election, 557,686 voters cast absentee ballots.

In addition to the Presidential Primary, Ohioans will nominate candidates for the United States Senate, the Ohio Supreme Court, Congress, the state legislature and many local races. 465 local issues in 82 counties will also be decided. A complete list of Presidential and statewide candidates is available here and a list of local issues is available here.

Ohio voters have the option to vote by mail from home 24 hours a day, seven days a week and 211 hours to vote early in-person over a four week absentee voting period, which began on Feb. 17.

The online Voter Toolkit is a one-stop location for all necessary voting information. Ohio voters can visit MyOhioVote.com/VoterToolkit to check their voter registration status, find their polling location, view their sample ballot and track their absentee ballot.

In the first five years of Husted’s administration, 98.95 of absentee ballots were accepted, an improvement of 1.22 percent over the four years of the previous administration.

For more information, visit http://www.sos.state.oh.us/SOS/Upload/sites/ballotTracking/ballotTracking.aspx?http://myohiovote.com/votertoolkit.