Ellianne Lieberman was excited to find two ballots in Friday’s mail: one for her, and one for her husband -- and for the first time, her husband’s ballot has something new: a party affiliation.

Lieberman said her husband realized he wanted to take part in the May 20 primary. “As it kept going, he was thinking well, maybe I do want to vote for a presidential candidate.”

He’s one of the thousands of Oregonians who filed new registration cards in the days before the April 29th deadline. But officials say those voters need to be careful: if they don’t take care to send in the correct ballot, the one with the most current party affiliation, their vote won’t count.

“If you have made a change to your party affiliation in the last two weeks, you should wait for a ballot that reflects your most current registration,” said Tim Scott, Multnomah County Elections Director.

They’re working overtime at the Elections office in at SE 11th and Madison, processing all the new registration cards. On April 29th, the deadline to register, 10,500 new cards came in.

Scott says this happens every election cycle, but the volume of re-registered voters has forced two separate supplemental ballot mailings.

Democrats have been the big winners in attracting voters in Oregon. In Multnomah County, nearly 9,000 new Democrats are on the voter rolls. The number of registered Republicans dropped by 655.