In Alabama, nationwide and locally, Donald J. Trump won the U.S. presidency on Nov. 5. A glance at this year’s General Election numbers reveals no surprises in Cullman County voting patterns.

In an election year that featured no contested local races, the presidential vote drove strong local turnout at the polls, augmented by a Cullman County taxation referendum and small handful of state races. More Cullman County voters cast a ballot in this year’s General Election than in the 2020 election — though thanks to a commensurate surge in recent voter registration, voter turnout as a percentage of all registered voters actually saw a slight local dip for 2024.

With 66,582 registered voters this year, Cullman County’s voter turnout for the 2024 election stands at 64.99 percent, a smaller ratio than the 67.1 percent local turnout in 2020 (which fielded votes from a smaller overall pool of 62,597 registered voters). In all, 43,269 local voters cast a ballot in the 2024 election, compared with 41,985 when the presidency was on the ballot in 2020.

Trump won big in Cullman County on Nov. 5, achieving even greater approval from local voters this year than he earned in the 2020 race. Claiming 89.71 percent of all local presidential votes cast, Trump won 38,669 Cullman County votes, compared with Harris’ 4,033 votes (representing 9.36 percent of the local presidential total). In 2020, Trump received 36,880 votes in Cullman County, compared with Democrat Joe Biden’s local take of 4,478 votes.

The GOP also enjoyed a marked advantage over Democrats in straight-party voting this year, compared with the Cullman County straight-party vote four years ago. In this year’s General Election, 27,520 local voters cast a straight-party Republican ballot (compared with 25,951 in 2020); while 2,276 cast a straight-party Democratic ballot (compared with 2020’s higher straight-party turnout of 2,532 votes).

The proposed Cullman County ballot measure, which would have approved a 15 percent additional tax on locally sold medical cannabis if it had passed, drew 38,229 votes — fewer than the 43,269 local votes cast in Cullman County for the General Election overall. The outcome was decided by the only narrow margin to feature in any local vote this year: The “no” vote won out with 19,660 votes (51.43 percent), compared with a “yes” vote of 18,569 (48.57 percent).

The voting data used for this article reflects 98.04 percent of all Cullman County votes cast in the 2024 General Election, excepting only the 1.96 percent of local votes that were cast by provisional ballot. Data relating to the 2020 General Election was supplied by the Alabama Secretary of State’s office.