Pennsylvania has eclipsed 9 million registered voters for the first time and is expecting record turnout as voters cast ballots by mail or drop box and in person at county elections offices before the election and at the polls on Nov. 3.

As of Wednesday, the state had processed 9,050,870 voter registrations, said Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar. That number is expected to increase as paper registrations are processed. Monday was the deadline to register to vote in next month’s election.

“It’s really heartening to see that so many Pennsylvanians want to participate,” Boockvar said.

She said the new totals included 4,220,397 Democrats, 3,526,857 Republicans, 904,440 Independents and 399,176 who had registered under other banners.

Locally, registration numbers included 937,100 in Allegheny County, 44,558 in Armstrong, 141,470 in Butler, 81,712 in Fayette, 153,187 in Washington and 251,645 in Westmoreland.

Nearly half of all voters may participate through mail-in balloting for the first general election under the state’s new election law.

The state as of Wednesday had approved applications for 2,861,900 mail-in ballots, including 1,825,587 for Democrats, 714,079 for Republicans and 322,234 for unaffiliated voters and others, Boockvar said. She said that number is expected to top 3 million as officials continue to process mail-in ballot applications received at the deadline.

Boockvar said 1,179,808 mail-in ballots, or about 41% of those thus far requested, have been returned.

“Nearly 70% of the counties have received one-third of their mail-in ballots, and 40% of them have received 50% of their ballots,” she said.

Responding to complaints that some voters are awaiting electronic notification that their ballots have been processed, Boockvar said many counties are rushing to keep up with the volume of returns on the 18-year-old system that will only allow returns to be processed in groups of 1,000. She said those notifications have been lagging, but are now catching up.

Boockvar said returns of mail-in ballots are running much higher than they were at this point during the June primary. That is a good sign, she added.

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