Employees at the Monroe County Board of Elections are working 12 hour days to process thousands of voter registration forms that have come in over the last several days.
Friday was the deadline to register for those who want to vote in the November election.
As of late Monday morning, the number of voters registered in Monroe County has surpassed the previous record of 442,771 set in 2008.
"This year, right now, with not all of the registrations processed because we've been crushed with them, is 458,449," said Republican county elections Commissioner David Van Varick.
Neither Van Varick nor his Democratic counterpart, Commissioner Tom Ferrarese, care to speculate about what voter turnout will be like on November 8.
"It's really hard because a lot of people are saying 'Well, gee, people are going to stay home,' Ferrarese said. "A lot of people are saying they're getting they're people out because they know everybody else is getting their people out." Ferrarese said typical voter turnout for a presidential election year would represent the low to mid 70 percent range of eligible voters.
Officials have no doubt that whether eligible voters cast ballots in the general election, the often heated 2016 presidential race is on most people's radar.
"There's never been a campaign covered like this one's being covered,” said Van Varick. "There was a time when all people knew about a presidential race was what they read in the morning paper and heard on the six o'clock news, and that's certainly not the case anymore."
Democrats still had the edge over Republicans in Monroe County in terms of the number of voters registered, by a margin of more than 50,000 as of Monday morning.
