California tops 20 million registered voters

More than 20 million Californians are now registered to vote.

That’s according to data from Secretary of State Alex Padilla released Monday.

Those 20 million voters make up 79 percent of the state’s total eligible voters. That’s the highest number of registered voters in California since 1996.

The new numbers from Padilla come roughly a year before California hosts its presidential primaries on Super Tuesday with a handful of other states. The state hasn’t had a primary that early since 2008.

Voter registration statistics from February show independent voters continue to outnumber Republicans by nearly 1 million voters. The state has 8.6 million registered Democrats, 4.7 million Republicans and 5.6 million registered independents.