ATHOL – Voter turnout for the primary election held at Athol Town Hall on Tuesday was similar to the rest of the state, with 11% of registered voters taking part, though many did so ahead of time.

Town Clerk Nancy Burnham said that the most of the 1,015 ballots cast were mail-in, and activity at the polls was fairly slow on Tuesday.

“We had people coming in, but it was slow, which is normal for a primary,” Burnham said.

A three-way race for the Republican nomination for a U.S. Senate seat was the only contest on the ballot, between Robert J. Antonellis, Ian Cain and John Deaton. In Athol, Deaton took the majority with 289 votes. A total of 407 Republicans voted in Athol.

Deaton would go on to win the nomination, receiving 60,341 votes statewide, well ahead of his opponents.

Elizabeth Warren ran uncontested for the Democratic nomination to retain the U.S. Senate seat she has held since 2013.

On the Democratic side, 590 Athol residents voted, all for uncontested races. Eighteen voted as Libertarians, although these were all write-ins, as there were no Libertarian candidates on the ballot.

Last week, Secretary of State William Galvin announced that voter turnout was expected to be 15%, based on ballots cast at that time by mail and in early-voting hours.

Turnout was much higher in 2020 at 36.6%, or more than 1.7 million votes cast. In that election, there was a contested Democratic primary against Sen. Edward Markey, a crowded primary for the U.S. House seat that former Rep. Joseph Kennedy III gave up to run for Senate, and an ongoing pandemic, which likely increased interest in mail-in voting.

Max Bowen can be reached at 413-930-4074 or mbowen@atholdailynews.com. Reporting from the State House News Service was used in this article.