Despite a lot of precinct walking, a plethora of signs, and TV ads, voter turnout in this historic presidential primary election was, in the opinion of this newspaper, abysmal. Of 176,676 voters registered only 46,374 bothered to vote by the three methods tallied. 26,839 voted by mail; 2,559 voted by turning in their mail ballot at a precinct; and 16,976 voted by going to their precinct in person. These tallies are as of 8:23 a.m. on Wednesday, June 8, 2016. Still to be counted over the next 30 days are vote-by-mail ballots which did not arrive but were postmarked in time, but that is not expected to be a large number nor change the final outcome of any race. The next semi-final official report will be issued on Monday, June 13, 2016 with certification still an estimated 30 days away.

Those 26.55 percent of voters were from both major parties and four minor parties plus “Decline to State” voters who were offered Democratic party ballots. Of the two major parties, a higher number of Democratic party voters — 26,162 out of 88,026 registered — turned out, but percentage-wise, a few more Republicans voted (12,277 votes of 40,883 registered for 30.03 percent).

The county as a whole voted at 56.51 percent for Hillary Clinton for Democratic Party Presidential candidate, as compared to 42.55 percent for Bernie Sanders and the balance for other candidates. In the Republican side, 70.78 percent voted for Donald Trump while John Kasich took the Number Two spot at 16.75 percent. Ben Carson and Ted Cruz, who have both pulled out of the race, each still garnered less than 1,000 votes each.

We will post more results in another report, keeping in mind that certification is still a month away.