Election Verification Exit Poll

AN ELECTION VERIFICATION exit poll (EVEP) is a relatively new concept in exit polling, differing in approach and purpose from traditional exit polls, usually done for the media. The purpose of a media exit poll is to strategically poll many precincts to obtain a representative sample for an entire district (such as a state or city) so that election outcomes can be predicted. A series of demographic data are gathered in media exit polls so pollsters can tell, for example, how African Americans, women, union members, church goers, rural people, and other demographic groups voted. Most of the polling is done well before polling places close on Election Day, so that the exit poll results can be tabulated and presented by the news outlets immediately after the polls close.

In sharp contrast, an election verification exit poll's objective is not to predict election results, but, rather, to audit or verify the accuracy of vote counts in selected precincts. Therefore, EVEP pollsters focus on targeted precincts, polling very comprehensively so that official election results in these targeted precincts can be verified. For example, in the 2006 congressional elections, The Warren Poll, sponsored by Election Integrity, interviewed close to 6,000 voters in selected precincts in Montgomery, Delaware, and Chester counties in Pennsylvania. However, because verifying particular precinct [Page 213]results is not an objective of media exit polls, typically only 1,000–2,000 voters are interviewed in an entire state; thus, relatively few voters are interviewed in any given precinct. Consequently, an EVEP should be considerably more reliable for the targeted precincts than media exit polling, because a much larger sample of voters would be interviewed in these selected precincts. Therefore, if EVEP results differ significantly from the actual reported results in the targeted precincts, it would be reasonable to conclude that something was wrong with the official count, especially considering that exit poll methodologies have normally proved quite reliable. Media exit polling can incidentally serve to cast doubt on official vote counts, but such polling is not designed to verify election results.

Staff of Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International working on exit poll information for Election Day 2004.

Election integrity groups have pushed for more EVEPs because official counts are not always accurate, due to innocent errors or vote fraud. Exit polling in the United States, as well as in other countries, have been used to question the official results. For example, in the 2000 election in Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic claimed that he had defeated Vojislav Kostunica. However, exit polling cast great doubt on the accuracy of the reported count, suggesting that the vote count had been corrupted. Public and media pressure eventually forced him to concede, turning a stolen election into an honest election result. The honesty of vote counts in the United States has been questioned since the 2000 presidential recount fiasco in Florida. The introduction of new electronic voting machines, especially ones that produce no paper trails, has caused many groups, including a considerable number of state and national political leaders, to call for remedies to vote count problems. Some have specifically advocated the use of EVEPs, especially in precincts that have historically had problems with fair vote counts. EVEP proponents believe that EVEP findings can be used to challenge dubious official vote counts in court.

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