[EL] The timetable of reporting results on or after Election Day

Fri Sep 4 14:02:19 PDT 2020

They already do this.

On Fri, Sep 4, 2020 at 4:56 PM David <david.l.epstein at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> I've been thinking for a while that one way to help ease election night
> confusion is for networks to do "extended" exit polls. That is, they should
> not just ask people at the polling stations whom they voted for, but also
> do a telephone/online canvass to see if people voted by mail, and if so
> whom they voted for. Then announce the (statistically) combined results on
> election night.
>
> It won't be perfect, and it won't eliminate the need for days-long
> recounts in some areas, but at least we'd have a better idea on election
> night as to what's going on.
>
> Has anyone heard of/suggested this before?
>
> David
>
>
> On Thu, Sep 3, 2020 at 4:09 PM Paul Gronke <paul.gronke at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I’m leery of generalizing from the California example because California
>> has traditionally allowed absentee ballots to be dropped at polling places.
>>
>> As far as I understand the California work flow, the absentee ballots
>> that were delivered to local precinct poling places are placed in a special
>> bag (often called the “red bag”) and these bags / ballots are not even
>> opened until Election Night, and in some counties, not until the next
>> morning.
>>
>> That contrasts with other jurisdictions where those ballots are placed
>> into drop boxes which are emptied on a very regular basis leading up to and
>> including Election Day.
>>
>> Just to give another example from Oregon, which is also not a great
>> example because we’ve been voting by mail for two decades, and the voters
>> and the LEOs have all adapted their processes to account for this. We
>> typically see about a quarter of all of our ballots come in during the last
>> two days, and 15-20% on Election day (
>> https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Ballot-Return.pdf).
>>
>> And for states like NC, much will also depend on the ability to get
>> temporary staff in place to process the ballots and put in place the
>> administrative procedures to move the ballots through on the last few days.
>>
>> Larry is right that there will be a substantial number of ballots that
>> have not yet been processed at the close of polls on Election Day.  I just
>> am not sure its going to be the same magnitude as we’ve traditionally seen
>> in California.
>>
>> ---
>> Paul Gronke
>> Professor, Reed College
>> Director, Early Voting Information Center
>> http://earlyvoting.net
>>
>> General Inquiries: Jane Calderbank calderja at reed.edu
>>
>> Media Inquiries: Kevin Myers myersk at reed.edu
>>
>> On Sep 3, 2020, at 12:53 PM, larrylevine at earthlink.net wrote:
>>
>> Given what we know about absentee ballot voting patterns and human
>> nature, it is unlikely any elections office will be able to process the
>> number of ballots arriving the day before the election in time to be part
>> of the Tuesday night total. Some 20 years’ worth of tracking in California
>> shows 84% of the absentee ballots arrive at elections offices in the last
>> 12 days, including what gets turned in at the polls. The flow increases
>> day-by-day. The Monday arrivals will include what the post office didn’t
>> deliver Sunday, plus the regular Monday mail and probably a residue from
>> Friday and Saturday. Elections offices are under great stress the day
>> before the election in preparing for the actual day. North Carolina’s good
>> intentions are likely to run into a different reality. But it won’t be any
>> different any place else. It will be up to the media reporting on election
>> night to keep reinforcing the information about the need to count all late
>> arriving absentee ballots and provisional ballots after election night and
>> that the election night reports are by no means complete. Even then, there
>> will be certain interests intent upon fomenting doubt and confusion.
>> Larry
>>
>> *From:* Law-election <law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> *On
>> Behalf Of *Samuel S. Wang
>> *Sent:* Thursday, 3 September 2020 12:20 PM
>> *To:* law-election at uci.edu
>> *Subject:* [EL] The timetable of reporting results on or after Election
>> Day
>>
>> Dear Election Law List,
>>
>> The timetable of reporting results on Election Night may lead to
>> substantial public unrest. In a recent NBC/WSJ survey, in-person voters
>> break heavily toward Trump, while mail voters break heavily toward Biden.
>>
>> What do we know about the planned timetables of reporting results in all
>> the states?  This timetable may dramatically affect what the public sees on
>> Election Night. If one candidate is ahead on Election Night, and the other
>> pulls ahead in the days following, major protests might ensue.
>>
>> For example, my understanding in North Carolina is that if a mail-in
>> ballot arrives in the local elections office by 5:00 pm on Monday, November
>> 2, the day before Election Day, it goes through the board approval process
>> and through the tabulator, and will count in the unofficial election
>> results released on November 3, Election Day. That approach could reduce
>> any massive swings in the vote count.
>>
>> Another solution would be to advocate for a deliberate and unhurried
>> report of final or near-final totals. For example, in the April primary and
>> state judicial elections, Wisconsin officials did not release results until
>> something like a week after the election. That strikes me as a sensible and
>> de-escalating move.
>>
>> Sam Wang
>>
>> >>>
>> Prof. Samuel S.-H. Wang
>> Neuroscience Institute, Washington Road
>> Princeton University
>> Princeton, NJ 08544
>> Virtual office: http://princeton.zoom.us/my/samwang
>>
>> Neuroscience: synapse.princeton.edu
>> Elections: election.princeton.edu
>> Redistricting: gerrymander.princeton.edu
>>
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>>
>>
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>
>
>
> --
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Lead Research Scientist | Catalist <http://catalist.us/>
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