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    • Live updates on the 2024 election for Palm Beach County, Florida
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    Live updates on the 2024 election for Palm Beach County, Florida

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    Check here throughout the day for live updates on the 2024 general election in Palm Beach County.

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    (This story has been updated to add new information.)

    Electors in Palm Beach County, including one who is on the presidential ticket, flocked to the polls on Tuesday to vote in the general elections of November 5. This election day marks the end of a contentious campaign season in both national and local races.

    Polls close at 19:00. Vote counting is expected to extend beyond election night, and determining the winner of the presidential race could, too.

    Meanwhile, Palm Beach Post reporters are stationed around the county to report on voter turnout, conditions at the polls, breaking campaign activity and updates from election officials. Check here for updates throughout the day.

    ➤ 2024 Florida General Election Results

    West Palm Beach resident Colleen Sullivan, 58, said she has lost friends because they disagree with her support of Trump for president, but she is firmly behind this year’s Republican nominee.

    She said it’s helpful to have different opinions and believes people can be friends despite who they voted for.

    “All my gay friends hate him, and my friends in New York don’t talk to me anymore,” Sullivan said after voting Tuesday at Belvedere Elementary School in West Palm Beach. “I say, ‘Let’s talk about it,’ but then people choose to unfriend someone they’ve been friends with for life.”

    Sullivan, who believes Election Day should be a national holiday, chose to wait to vote until Tuesday because she said she is a traditionalist and worries that mail-in ballots are too easy to tamper with. He also likes to chat with neighbors while waiting to vote.

    “What’s wrong with doing a little networking?” Sullivan said.

    Although traffic to vote was steady at Belvedere Elementary, she said there were no lines inside and voting was “lightly quiet.”

    Others were more reluctant to discuss their vote.

    A 26-year-old new West Palm Beach resident named Reed did not want to give his last name or divulge who he voted for, saying it was a personal decision.

    “You don’t want it in the hands of the wrong people,” he said.

    — Kimberly Miller, The Palm Beach Post

    Pollsters at the Jupiter Community Center polls recalled Tuesday the verbal confrontations they saw last week, some pitting Republicans against Republicans.

    Tammy Hopkins, a canvasser encouraging people to vote for Ric Bradshaw for sheriff, said the biggest point of tension was not between Democrats and Republicans.

    A group of Trump supporters accused another group of Trump supporters of being “RINOs” — Republicans in name only — when they held signs or handed out voting guides endorsing Bradshaw for Sheriff and Wendy Sartory Link for the supervisor of elections, she said. Both are democrats.

    Outside the community center was a profanity-laced sign that read, “Trump and DeSantis did not endorse Democrats.” Beside him, a Trump dummy held a sign with the words “VOTE THE BALLOT.”

    Hopkins said people wearing Trump gear shouted “You’re not a real Trump person!” and “RINO!” at her several times last week while holding signs with Trump and Bradshaw. She said she was surprised by what she heard.

    More: West Palm Beach man charged with racist threats, voter intimidation at Loxahatchee polling place

    “I was treated horribly by them,” said Hopkins, 44, who lives in Tequesta and said he voted for Trump. “It’s sad that the Republican groups are fighting.”

    Still, Democrats and Republicans got along pretty well at the community center, she said. Two nearby canvassers, both supporting Kamala Harris, agreed.

    Cindy Santner, a volunteer with the North County Democratic Club, greeted voters with another volunteer at the Jupiter Community Center. She called the sidewalk section “their safe corner” because Republicans and Democrats were nice to each other during their time there.

    “I voted for Harris because if Trump gets elected, it scares me,” Santner, 69, said of Jupiter. “I voted Democrat for my nieces. Their future and their rights are at stake.”

    — Maya Washburn, The Palm Beach Post

    At Belvedere Elementary School in West Palm Beach, lines were short, but concerns high among voters casting ballots for president.

    Mary, 65, and her son Luke, 28, who both asked to be identified only by their first names, waited until Election Day to vote together for Democratic candidate Kamala Harris. Mary lives on Flagler Drive across the street from Mar-a-Lago, the residence and club of former President and current Republican candidate Donald Trump.

    He doesn’t like seeing the Intracoastal Waterway boats guarding the property with guns drawn. He doesn’t like falsehoods being presented as truths which he sees as a theme in Trump’s campaign. And, she said, she’s afraid, “no, terrified” of what will come from the country if Trump is reelected.

    More: A prescription for reducing stress on election day that cuts across political divides

    “I’ve been stressed for months,” Mary said. “The news, rightly so, is relentless. Every day, I feel like my head is going to explode.”

    Both mother and son are concerned that there is a greater tendency for violence during this election.

    “I was here the first time and there were people driving big trucks and blasting music,” Luke said of the Trump supporters. “It almost feels more dangerous now.”

    — Kimberly Miller, The Palm Beach Post

    Former President Donald Trump voted at the Morton and Barbara Mandel Recreation Center on Seaview Avenue in Palm Beach on Tuesday.

    Members of the media — including those from India, Portugal, Germany, Denmark and Japan — gathered outside the Recreation Center early to try to catch a glimpse of the Republican presidential nominee.

    Supporters of the former president also gathered there ahead of his arrival on Tuesday. Some sat on a wall outside Palm Beach Public School, while others waited near the Recreation Center’s tennis courts. Some tennis players paused their games as they waited for Trump to appear.

    Read more: Trump votes in the general election at a polling place in Palm Beach

    The Trumps left the Recreation Center to head home to Mar-a-Lago, where they will reportedly wait until around 10 p.m. Tuesday before heading to the Trump campaign’s election night viewing party at Palm Beach County Convention Center in West Palm Beach.

    This is the third time Trump has voted for himself in a general election presidential race. His 2020 vote at the Main Library of the Palm Beach County Library System made him the first sitting president to vote in person as a Florida resident.

    — Kristina Webb, Palm Beach Daily News

    Palm Beach County Women Voters are voting in far greater numbers than men have so far, according to data provided by the Supervisor of Elections.

    Florida Democrats said they expected a larger-than-usual turnout of women — even among Republican voters — because of the proposed constitutional amendment that would reverse strict abortion limits passed by the GOP-led Legislature and Gov. Ron DeSantis.

    By numbers: In Palm Beach County, women voters turned out in force for early voting

    Until Monday morning, November 4, more than 570,000 votes were cast in the county, of which 56% came from women. Already, nearly 65 percent of registered voters have cast ballots, and more than 150,000 are expected to do so in person on Election Day. Four years ago, 76 percent of registered voters cast ballots.

    National polls have shown women rooting for Vice President Kamala Harris, but most statewide polls suggest Trump has a comfortable lead in Florida. In his previous campaigns, Trump won Florida both times.

    — Mike Diamond, The Palm Beach Post

    Hannah Phillips covers criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at [email protected]. Help support our journalism and subscribe today.

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