With Election Day on Tuesday, more voters than ever are casting ballots for the midterms across the Chicago area and throughout the country.
Many are proving this election is important to them, with some voters waiting hours to cast their ballots.
"I think almost an hour, yeah, it feels like it's been several."
For Beatrice Moxon and Reena Shenoy, they say they had no other choice if they wanted to vote.
An hour and a half is how long people have been waiting just to get inside this Lakeview supersite on Halloween.
While some voters have waited 90 minutes, election judges at the Lakeview Supersite say there's been lines around the block all week and at times some have waited up to four hours.
It all comes as politicians and candidates were out across Chicago Saturday encouraging people to get out and vote — including Gov. JB Pritzker, who attended an event at a West Side church.
"Vote ... vote, vote, vote because Donald Trump is trying to take away your right to vote," he said.
So far, the Chicago Board of Elections says as of Friday, 235,000 people voted early at the polls or with mail-in ballots.
Northwestern University professor Tabitha Bonilla says that's about 15% of the vote submitted — which is 11% more voters than the last midterm election in 2022. Overall, she says Chicago is 30% ahead of the turnout four years ago.
Why such a turnout?
"We have an economy that is struggling, there is a war in Iran, and people are really unhappy with Donald Trump as things are," Bonilla said.
Another important issue, according to Bonilla, is immigration arrests in Chicago and surrounding suburbs in the last two years since President Trump took office.
"I have heard a couple of neighbors and people in the grocery store this morning about how they are excited to vote to show that they are upset with that particular incident in mind."
"I think both parties have pushed early voting and vote by mail by a far greater degree," said Kevin Coyne, chairman of DuPage County GOP.
Coyne says well over 100,000 voters have shown up to the polls there. While the county has seen a blue wave in recent years, he says this election has the potential to turn it back to red.
"We are expecting those county races to be very close again this year. The sheriff race, the treasurer's race in particular — those could easily be one-point races."
The League of Women Voters of Chicago says high early voting numbers can be attributed to young people at the polls.
The Chicago Urban League and Chicago Vote held a rally Saturday morning and marched to the polls to encourage voters between 18 and 35 to exercise their civic duty.
"You can't say you want change in your city and community and you're not voting," said Alexx Brown with the Metropolitan board of the Chicago Urban League.
CBS News Chicago reached out to the office of Pritzker's opponent, Darren Bailey, to see if he was holding any events on Saturday, but did not hear back.
