JimEd Speaks Out

Barack Obama’s tendency through the Democratic primaries to perform better in exit polls than he actually does at the ballot box has some media organizations nervous heading into Election Night.

Television networks want to avoid having their performance become an issue for the third straight presidential election. Their political experts hope that experience gained during the primaries will help things run smoothly Nov. 4.

It was the exit polls’ overstatement of John Kerry’s support in 2004 that caused problems for the networks, particularly when the first wave of results were leaked on the Web. That led to a “quarantine room” reform that will be in place this year; the people with access to poll results are locked away until at least 5 p.m. EST, giving them time to check for any problems and keeping the early numbers from conveying false information and possibly affecting turnout.

The problems were more serious in 2000, when networks prematurely “called” Florida, and thus the election, for George Bush. It led to a congressional investigation into their practices.