Georgians have cast more than a million ballots one week into early voting, running about 12 percent ahead of where the state stood at the same point in the 2022 midterms. The figure comes from data released by Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office and was reported by the Washington Examiner on Tuesday.

The pace was set on the first morning. Georgia recorded 188,667 in-person votes on October 13, the opening day, against 134,962 on the first day in 2022. That is roughly 40 percent more people through the door before anybody had settled into a routine.

Georgians are electing a governor this year, and the Senate seat on the ballot is Jon Ossoff’s, with Representative Mike Collins running against him. Early voting in the state runs through October 30.

It is not only Georgia. More than 812,000 Texans had voted early as their window opened. Ohio counted 228,470 by October 13. North Carolina is running ahead of its 2022 pace and behind its 2024 one, which is what a midterm against a presidential year looks like.

One comparison is worth making honestly rather than leaving it to be discovered later.

Georgia’s opening day was well below 2024, when more than 310,000 people voted on day one. That was a presidential election and presidential years always pull more. Against the right yardstick, which is the last midterm, the state is up.

Here is what a turnout number is and what it is not.

It is a count. Nobody modelled it, nobody weighted it, and nobody had to guess at who is likely to vote, because these are people who already did. That makes it a harder number than almost anything else published between now and November 3.

What it cannot tell you is who is winning. A ballot cast does not announce which name is on it, and a record turnout is consistent with either side being the one that showed up. Anybody reading a winner out of these figures is reading something that is not in them.

What it does tell you is that people are not sitting this one out. Forty percent more on the first morning in Georgia is not apathy, whoever those forty percent are voting for.

President Trump was in North Carolina on Tuesday campaigning as early voting ran there.

Twelve days left, and in a growing number of states the votes are already in the box.