Philip Bump and the Washington Post have some egg on their face after doing a “statistical analysis” that demonstrated what the electoral map would look like with 100% turnout. What they got were two maps, one that looked like this:
Which was, evidently, not enough to raise enough alarm bells to reconsider the project (instead they just note the flaw and move on). Vox immediately pounced:
But here’s the gigantic problem: state-specific exit poll numbers were only available for 18 states in 2012. There’s also a national exit poll that offers composite results for the whole country. So for the 32 states without individual exit poll results, the Post used those national exit poll numbers to make projections.
The problem with that is that looking at how women voted nationally isn’t a good way to project how women in conservative Kentucky will vote. Similarly, how white people voted nationally doesn’t tell you all that much about white voters in liberal Vermont, as Josh Barro argued on Twitter.
That’s why the Post’s map based on racial projections comes up with the odd result of the South going Democratic and much of New England going Republican — because they had no individual exit poll data for those states. Instead, they assumed that white voters in each of them, under full turnout, would vote like white voters did nationally (59 percent for Mitt Romney).
Even if they got rid of the skew (which they didn’t quite), valuable information was lost. Given the strain that news organizations are under, it’s perhaps not reasonable to expect them to stand out voting booths in Rhode Island or South Dakota, but it would be really nice if someone one. These elections only happen once every four years. And the Washington Post would save itself some embarassment.
The Washington Post did go back and look at the data from 2004, though, from back in the halcyon days when all states were counted. The results were actually a bit unexpected, as (to whatever extent the data reveals anything) Bush might have done better in 2004 than he did, potentially flipping Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Only a bit unexpected, though, as Bush underperformed in the electoral college (which was closer than the national popular vote). It should also be added that the 2004 vote count is less useful than today, due to various demographic changes. Which is why having the 2012 data would be nice.
I’m reminded of the proposition 8 polls, where someone pulled exit poll data from one precinct in LA and used it to show that Black Voters supported prop 8 by some absurdly high margin. Trying to make a story out of numbers is never going to work if you don’t make an effort to get good numbers.Report
This just sounds like sloppy journalism.Report
Is it just me or are we seeing more of this sort of thing? I can feel some of the desperation of old media trying to keep up with new media antics in some of these mistakes.Report
IIRC, the objection to exit polling was not the gathering of information, but the use of that information when deployed on the broadcast media before analysts really had time to understand the sudden rush of data. The solution to that problem is not to foreclose the gathering of data, but rather maturity in its use once gathered.Report
The reason they stopped gathering the information (in most states) was a financial one. “Who needs the data for North and South Dakota? We know which way they’re going to go.” (My initial criticism being “But Vermont and Maine are important?!” but those two were also dropped later, apparently.)
Which is true, as far as that goes. And I understand the decision. But there’s still value in collecting the data, even for useless states. Which is why I hope somebody (state university political science departments?) steps up in 2016.Report
The embargo on exit poll info isn’t because of insufficient analysis; it’s because telling people the results of an election before voting has ended may influence election participation and thus results.Report
Yeah, this. We already know people are prone to peer pressure and tend to “like” what other people like.
Also, ppl might look at exit polls and falsely think it’s already in the bag for their guy and stay home, or panic because they think their guy is getting pasted and rush to the polls.Report
The former is more common than the latter. Which is part of why I think the treating of pre-election polls as holy writ (or holy science, and only knuckl-dragging science-hating heathens are skeptical of them) is dangerous. Bad polls could distort elections, instead of just misreporting them.Report
That’s why Romney lost. Millions of his supporters didn’t bother to vote because they read about the unskewed poll results and thought his election was in the bag.Report
Pre-election polls and exit polls were incredibly reliable until … what was it again? Bush’s first run? Since then they’ve been politicized by the GOP and conservatives just like everything else has been.
I don’t wanna go on record saying that there were election shenanigans that year. And for a few cycles after. But my conscience forces me too.Report
There are always election shenanigans.Report
Among other things, an election needs to be closer than the 2012 one was for polls to change an outcome.Report
Exit polling is becoming less useful as any sort of indicator anyway. Colorado has switched to sending a mail-in ballot to every registered voter, and IIRC now has something >90% of all votes cast being cast by mail (or early drop off). Arizona, by virtue of a permanent no-excuse absentee ballot list, had >60% of all votes cast being mail-in this last time. California had >50%. I expect both of those states to adopt the practice of sending a mail-in ballot to every registered voter in the next few years (if the legislatures drag their feet, both have easy citizen initiative processes).
If/when those two states adopt universal mail ballots, you would have something over 75% of registered voters in the West (as defined by the Census Bureau) getting a mail-in ballot.Report
It’s true that going forward they may need to find another way. (Day before election poll + day after + exit polls + results?)
I can’t find validation, but I think the National exits weren’t technically exits this year. But I could be wrong.Report
As the County Recorders have all of the relevant data, I anticipate a profitable new line of business for them, selling breakdowns of the vote by gender, race, etc. Not as useful as exit polls for same-day news, but probably better for post-election analysis.Report
Except who precisely voted for whom, I assume.Report
I expect to live long enough to see some County Recorder — not necessarily one where it’s all mail-in ballots, although that does seem more likely — either accidentally send individual votes out due to insufficient quality control, or have that information be extracted by hackers. Hell, if the health insurance companies, who are presumably going to face stiff HIPAA penalties, are going to leak customer information 80M people at a time, some poor schmuck of a County Recorder is eventually going to have actual ballots with names leak.Report
See?! Mail-in ballots are totalitarian!Report
Also, yet another reason to mutter at the increased availability and utilization of alternative voting methods. Mutter mutter.Report
Here’s my map, based on voters I drove home from the polling place with:
And other than that, Ms. Kael, did you haveagoodvoting experience?Report
I have a hard time explaining Scott Walker’s victories, because no one I polled votes in Wisconsin.Report
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