Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach predicts turnout for Tuesday’s elections will be about 50 percent, even without more than 20,000 people on a suspended voters list because they haven’t provided proof of citizenship.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports Kobach on Thursday predicted about 872,000 people will vote out of about 1.74 million registered voters. The prediction is based in part on the pace of advance voting and high interest in the gubernatorial and U.S. Senate races.

Kobach’s Democratic challenger Jean Schodorf says the prediction probably is accurate, but notes it’s lower than in previous midterm elections. Turnout in 2006 was 52 percent, and in 2002 it was 53 percent.

Kobach’s numbers indicate a little less than 9 percent of all registered voters already have cast ballots through advance voting.