This story actually started bubbling up more than a month ago but now it appears to be set in stone. One group of election analysts plan to release at least some exit polling and voter turnout numbers throughout the day tomorrow, beginning as soon as the polls open on the east coast. As you might imagine, this is giving the world of political journalism a bad case of indigestion on the eve of their biggest day of the year.
(Politico) -This year, a handful of different projects are underway to disrupt the rhythm and flow of information on Election Day — including one controversial effort that some worry could affect the actual election results.
Slate and Vice News have partnered with Votecastr, a company helmed by Obama and Bush campaign veterans, to provide real-time projections of how the candidates are faring in each state throughout the day. They expect to begin posting projections at 8 a.m. Eastern time on Election Day — a dramatic departure from current practice, where representatives from a consortium of news organizations (The Associated Press, ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Fox News and NBC News) huddle in a quarantine room without cell phones, pouring over the earliest exit poll data but declining to release anything that points to an election result until all the polls have closed.
Does anyone outside of this group of upstart data farmers actually think this is a good idea? We don’t even need to rely on the old rules of the road which the Politico article starts off with for an answer. Yes, the news networks have long held to an oath to not release the exit polls or make predictions until all the polls close in each state. That’s not only for fear of depressing turnout and swinging the presidential contest, but even moreso the down ballot races. This phenomenon doesn’t need to be rehashed in full here and it represents the “against” argument...
Read more at:
http://hotair.com/archives/2016/11/07/somebody-planning-collapse-exit-polling-protocols/
