Every weekday through November 4, Bleeding Heartland will post updated totals absentee ballots requested and returned, statewide and in Iowa’s four Congressional districts, based on data from the Iowa Secretary of State’s website. The latest tables are after the jump. Previous tables are here. If turnout in this year’s election is roughly on the level of 2010, with about 1.1 million Iowans participating, than approximately 15 percent of those who will vote have already requested early ballots.

Today Nate Cohn posted his analysis of the Iowa early voting numbers at the New York Times’ Upshot blog. His main takeaways:

Over all, the early voting tallies in Iowa tell us that both Democrats and Republicans are better mobilized than in 2010 – which is no surprise in a state where there was no competitive contest that year – but not as well mobilized as in 2012. The Republicans are more obviously outperforming their past figures, but Democrats may be doing a better job of turning out marginal voters. The early vote tallies seem consistent with the polls: a close contest in which either side could prevail.

I agree with the broad conclusions but think Cohn is missing a few important factors.

First, every day since the Iowa Secretary of State’s Office started updating the absentee ballot figures, Democrats have added more ballot requests than Republicans. We don’t know whether that trend will continue for the next five weeks, but it’s encouraging for Democrats.

Second, Cohn ignores the no-party voters who have requested early ballots (about 35,000 people as of yesterday). But independents added considerably to President Barack Obama’s advantage in the early vote in 2012. On the eve of that general election, registered Iowa Democrats who had returned early ballots outnumbered registered Republicans who had done so by about 65,000. But Obama received 137,355 more early votes in Iowa than Romney, meaning he must have been supported by about two-thirds of the roughly 200,000 no-party voters who cast early ballots. Democratic canvassers have done more this year than Republicans to target independent voters, which could add to the party’s early voting advantage.

Third, Cohn repeatedly characterizes the 2010 midterm election in Iowa as uncompetitive, presumably because Terry Branstad and Chuck Grassley were heavily favored in the races for governor and U.S. senator. But aside from the national mood that favored Republicans in 2010, one huge factor driving turnout in Iowa was the first judicial retention elections following the Iowa Supreme Court’s 2009 decision allowing same-sex marriage. That motivation for social conservatives is absent this year because no one on the Supreme Court is up for retention. Branstad recruited unsuccessful U.S. Senate candidate Sam Clovis to run for state treasurer right after this year’s Republican primary in an obvious attempt to give that part of the GOP base more reason to turn out. I’m skeptical that social conservatives will be as energized to vote for the Republican ticket as they were in 2010.

Any relevant comments are welcome in this thread.  

Absentee ballots requested by Iowa voters as of September 29, 2014

Congressional district	Democrats	Republicans	no-party voters	Libertarian	Iowa Green	total
IA-01	23,459	10,894	10,181	42	33	44,609
IA-02	26,671	11,009	10,774	34	41	48,529
IA-03	23,163	11,952	7,713	41	27	42,896
IA-04	15,750	12,256	6,530	23	13	34,572
statewide	89,043	46,111	35,198	140	114	170,606

Absentee ballots received by Iowa county auditors as of September 29, 2014

Congressional district	Democrats	Republicans	no-party voters	Libertarian	Iowa Green	total
IA-01	4,624	2,631	1,402	9	4	8,670
IA-02	4,028	2,054	983	7	4	7,076
IA-03	2,794	2,010	694	4	2	5,504
IA-04	2,474	2,179	794	3	2	5,452
statewide	13,920	8,874	3,873	23	12	26,702