(KSTP) — More than 919,000 Minnesotans have already cast ballots since early voting began on Sept. 20. That’s about 600,000 fewer at this time than during the COVID pandemic election in 2020, but more than double the number from 2016.

With all those early ballots already cast, just how confident are Minnesotans that the ballots are secure and will be counted in an accurate and timely manner?

According to our final KSTP-TV/SurveyUSA pre-election poll, 47% have a “great deal” of confidence in a secure election and another 29% have some confidence. Fourteen percent have a little confidence and six percent have no confidence at all.

Carleton College political analyst Steven Schier says the fact that 76% have a “great deal” or “some” confidence in election security is encouraging. So far, Minnesotans are confident in their election system and that probably will produce less controversy on Election Day,” Schier told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS after reviewing our survey results.

However, questions have been raised a couple of times this fall about ballot boxes being left unattended at Edina City Hall and a couple of counties having inaccurate ballots that needed to be corrected. That seems to have impacted Republican confidence more than Democrats or independents.

According to our poll, only 25% of Republicans are confident in election security, compared to 69% of Democrats and 43% of independents. “There are questions raised about election administration,” Schier says, “but Minnesotans generally have higher levels of trust in government than Americans do overall and this is an example of that.”

Minnesotans are generally less confident in a peaceful transfer of power regardless of who wins the presidential election. Just 46% say they’re confident there will be a peaceful transition and 40% say they’re not confident. However, it’s one of the few areas all three groups are close to agreement on an issue. Forty-seven percent of Republicans, 46% of Democrats and 47% of independents are confident of a peaceful transition.

We also asked Minnesota voters about media coverage of the presidential candidates. Thirty-two percent of respondents say it’s been fair to both Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris, while 33% say it’s been unfair to Trump. Another 12% say coverage has been unfair to Harris and 10% say unfair to both.

“A plurality of Minnesotans think the media has been unfair to Donald Trump,” Schier says. “This also reflects national surveys that indicate that. But you also have to keep in mind the media world is really fragmented now and the mainstream media doesn’t have control over the messaging the way it did 20 years ago.”

SurveyUSA interviewed 900 adults from the state of Minnesota 10/24/24 through 10/28/24. Of the adults, 801 were identified as being registered to vote; of the registered voters, 728 were determined by SurveyUSA to be likely to vote in the November general election and were asked the substantive questions which follow. This research was conducted online, using nonprobability sample of online adult panelists chosen randomly by Lucid Holdings LLC of New Orleans. The combined pool of survey respondents was weighted to US Census ACS targets for gender, age, race, education, and home ownership, and to recalled 2020 presidential vote.