Over 18,000 have cast early in-person primary ballots so far, feuding Republicans to hold competing conventions next month

LANSING, MI (WKZO AM/FM) – More than 18,000 voters have cast an early, in-person ballot in the presidential primary in Michigan.

Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson says nearly 766,000 people have also returned their absentee ballots ahead of the February 27 election. This is the first election with statewide early voting for at least nine days.

Benson says if you are voting absentee, you need to physically take your ballot to a drop box or the clerk’s office instead of putting it in the mail now.

Meantime, the fractured Michigan Republican Party is planning two competing conventions March 2. Newly-elected chairman Pete Hoekstra says he will welcome people to the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel in Grand Rapids that day to select Republican presidential delegates.

Chairwoman Kristina Karamo, who has refused to leave office despite the Republican National Committee and former President Trump recognizing Hoekstra as the chairman, is holding a March 2 convention in Detroit at Huntington Place.

The delegates would attend the Republican National Convention in July in Milwaukee.