What Will Hurricane Sandy Do to Early Voting?

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The massive storm is already leading to shutdowns and extensions at the polls.

early votingThis is what the early- and absentee-voting map should look like, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Hurricane Sandy is already messing with the map.

Updated 7:38 p.m. Snow, wind and rain could keep voters in the path of Hurricane Sandy from early or in-person absentee voting, delay mail delivery of absentee ballots, and cut into early-voting days by forcing states battered by the storm to halt early balloting. Here's what we know about what's happening so far:

Connecticut: Voter-registration deadline extended.

Maryland: Early voting suspended on Monday. "Due to the potential impact of Hurricane Sandy, Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley has declared a State of Emergency and ordered all Early Voting Centers in Maryland closed on Monday, October 29, 2012." Early voting had only opened on Saturday, October 27.

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Washington, D.C.: Early voting suspended Monday. The federal government is closed Monday for all non-emergency personnel. All Metro service for Monday -- rail and bus lines -- has been suspended. Early voting across the city had begun on Saturday, but the D.C. Board of Elections has "has suspended the operation of its early voting sites on Monday October 29, 2012 due to the forecast arrival of Hurricane Sandy."

Virginia: Kaine says to bring those yard signs indoors. Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Tim Kaine is asking supporters to uproot campaign signs and bring them indoors so they don't become wind-borne projectiles.

The storm could potentially slow the pace of of early or in-person absentee voting in the three swing states of Virginia, Ohio, and North Carolina -- and is already leading to major changes in the campaign schedules of President Obama and Mitt Romney.

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Garance Franke-Ruta is a senior editor covering national politics at The Atlantic. More

She was previously national web politics editor at The Washington Post, and has also worked at The American Prospect, The Washington City Paper, The New Republic and National Journal magazines. At The Prospect she won the 2007 Hillman Prize awarded to its group blog, "Tapped."

In 2006, she was fellow at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School in Cambridge, Mass., and in 2007, a summer fellow with The Iowa Independent, based in Des Moines, Iowa.

Garance has lectured at the Kennedy School, the Harvard Art Museums, Williams College, Wellesley College, Brandeis and Georgetown Universities, and taught in Georgetown's Master of Professional Studies in Journalism program. She also has made numerous appearances on national and regional television and radio programs.

Born in the South of France, Garance grew up in San Cristobal de las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico; New York City, New York; and Santa Fe, New Mexico. She has resided in Washington, D.C., since graduating from Harvard in 1997.

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