My Letter to Nate Silver on the Huge Exit Poll Discrepancies We’re Seeing in the Dem Primaries

[Time for change]

Dear Nate:

I have followed your column with great interest from time to time. As an epidemiologist for over 40 years, I have a good amount of experience in statistics, and I have been very impressed with the great care you put into your statistical modeling, the way you explain it, and the accuracy of most of your predictions – Of course this Democratic primary season has been an exception to that accuracy, as it has frustrated and confused all pollsters, most notably in Michigan, but in many other states as well.

I have a big favor to ask of you, not on my behalf alone, but on behalf of our whole country: I have been struck by the huge discrepancies I have seen this year between exit polls and official election results in the Democratic Party primaries – most of them well outside of the margin of error. I believe that the following exit poll discrepancies in the Democratic primaries include all the primaries where exit polls have been taken this year:

Arkansas: 6.7 in favor of Clinton (official count compared to exit polls)
Alabama: 15.7 in favor of Clinton
Tennessee: 8.8 in favor of Clinton
Virginia: 4.5 in favor of Clinton
Georgia: 12.4 in favor of Clinton
Texas: 9.9 in favor of Clinton
Massachusetts: 7.8 in favor of Clinton
Oklahoma: 6.8 in favor of Sanders
Vermont: 0.9 in favor of Clinton
Mississippi: 10.4 in favor of Clinton
Michigan: 4.8 in favor of Clinton
Ohio: 10.2 in favor of Clinton
Florida: 3.2 in favor of Clinton
North Carolina: 1.8 in favor of Clinton
Illinois: 4.2 in favor of Clinton
Missouri: 4.0 in favor of Clinton
Wisconsin: 13.8 in favor of Clinton
New York: 12.0 in favor of Clinton

All of these discrepancies except one (Oklahoma) point in the same direction – They favor Clinton in the official count compared to the exit polls. In all but two of them, Vermont and North Carolina, they exceed the margin of error. I have not done formal statistical tests on this, but I’m sure you would agree that the odds against this happening by chance are astronomical.

I believe you would also agree that exit polls are likely to be far more accurate than pre-election polls: They measure how voters actually voted, rather than how they intend to vote at a later date; they do not rely on models (which can often be misleading) which estimate which voters are more likely to vote, and; it is far easier to get an accurate random sample because they do not rely on telephone samples, which are likely to misrepresent the population of actual voters. It has been pointed out that this last issue can also be a problem with exit polls when early voting /absentee ballots are taken into account. But that problem can be easily addressed by looking at exit poll discrepancies separately for early voting/absentee ballots vs. Election Day voting. And I believe that such an analysis would likely show some very interesting and informative results.

More importantly, exit polls are far more important than pre-election polls, in that they can be and are often used to monitor the integrity of elections (in other countries). Taken in the context of other extra-ordinary events happening during this Democratic primary season (I don’t know if the same thing applies to the Republican primaries because I haven’t been following them closely), the exit polls I quoted above make me extremely concerned that we are seeing here massive election fraud that threatens to destroy our democracy. The following items are the context that I’m talking about:

1) We have also seen massive voter disenfranchising in at least Arizona and New York. In Maricopa County, AZ (which constitutes about half the voters in the state), polling places were reduced from the previous election from about 200 to 60, with the result that voting lines reached as long as half a mile, and voters had to wait in line for several hours to vote. The result was that Election Day voters in that county (who voted heavily for Sanders) constituted less than 15% of total votes in the county (the rest being early voters, who voted heavily for Clinton). In both states, tens or hundreds of thousands of would-be voters who say that they were registered to vote in the Democratic primary found themselves to be purged from the voter rolls on Election Day. In Brooklyn alone, 70,000 would-be voters were purged from the voter rolls, and Mayor de Blasio (who endorsed Clinton) said “I am calling on the Board of Elections to reverse that purge”.

2) Sanders does far better than Clinton in caucus states and in primary precincts where ballots are hand counted rather than counted by machine. In both cases, massive election fraud would be much more difficult to perpetrate.

3) A public citizen observer, who attended a random precinct audit in Chicago, testified at a hearing that she observed that 21 Sanders votes were erased and 49 Clinton votes added to a hand count audit, in order for the audit to mimic the official results tabulated by the machine. As noted above, Illinois exhibited a 4.2% exit poll discrepancy, and if the official results were close to what the exit polls showed, Sanders would have won Illinois. We don’t know how many audited precincts in Illinois were characterized by apparent fraud (in both the initial count and the audit) and did not come to our attention because there was no vigilant public observer there to report her findings. I imagine that this finding by the public observer is just the tip of a very large iceberg.

This isn’t the first time this has happened, by any means. The most notable previous example is the Presidential election of 2004, which was characterized by substantial exit poll discrepancies nationally and in many states, most notably Ohio. Because the Electoral votes from Ohio determined the Presidency in 2004, it was thoroughly investigated. Even as early as January, 2005, the obvious “irregularities” in Ohio were so great that Senator Barbara Boxer officially objected to the results of the election, which required a public debate and vote in the U.S. Senate. Following numerous investigations by untold numbers of individuals and groups, eventually a hearing was to be held at which Michael Connell, Karl Rove’s “IT guru”, was to testify as to how he helped to orchestrate a massive electronic switching of votes in Ohio from John Kerry to George W. Bush on Election Day 2004. He had already signed an affidavit to that effect. Unfortunately, he died in a plane crash shortly before he was due to testify (just a coincidence?).

So let me now get back to my request of you. You are a very well-known and highly respected public figure. You discuss in your columns a great deal about your pre-election poll findings and methodology. But I see almost nothing in them about exit polls. I did read on the 538 Website, while the votes were being counted in Ohio and New York, a brief discussion of how your own final exit poll differed substantially from what you were seeing in the official results, and surprise over that fact, but the discussion was very brief, I have seen nothing on the subject from the 538 Website since that time, and I can no longer find that brief discussion at your website, though I saved the link.

So what I am requesting of you is that you begin some serious discussion on your website of the substantial exit poll discrepancies that we’re seeing in the Democratic primaries. I request that the discussion focus on the implications of those discrepancies and perhaps some further thorough analysis of them, on par with the analyses you devote to pre-election predictions.

I know that that is asking a lot of you. I realize that our national news media castigates anyone who dares to question the integrity of our election system. But our democracy and the fate of our country and the entire world depend on it. If election fraud is being perpetrated here to the extent that I believe it is, and if it is allowed to stand, our democracy is rapidly being destroyed. You can shine a lot of light on this issue with thorough and intelligent analysis and discussion on par with what you devote to pre-election polls. I know that that would result in serious risks to you and your career, and only a very brave person in your position would do this, but I am making the request because the fate of our country depends on shining a light on this issue and giving it a great deal more public attention than it has received.

Thanking you in advance,

Dale Tavris


Note to DUers:

I sent the letter to Nate earlier this afternoon.

Since then, for the sake of posting on DU, I’ve made some slight changes after I sent the letter, based on new information that came to me (additional exit polls) or something that I decided would be worth adding (Karl Rove’s electronic manipulation of the 2004 Presidential election vote, which gave George W. Bush the win in that election). If you agree with me that this is an issue of utmost and urgent importance and you are a member of other organizations where publicizing this issue would be helpful, please consider doing so.

[silvershadow]

1. K&R

[MattP]

2. Exit polls don't include early voting or absentee

Which a few cycles ago didn't mean much but now is a huge deal especially with Bernie and Hillary

[Time for change]

7. That is not true

From the NY Times:

"Pre-election surveys of early voters have long been conducted by exit polling operations, and the results weighted and adjusted on election night as the live results come in and totals are known."

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/29/early-voting-and-exit-polls/?_r=0

[Adrahil]

18. Part of the answer for why the exits have been off sometimes is in your answer....

The exit polls are weighted by a model, and they are very sensitive to sample errors. Note that margin of error calculations take into account error sampling (to an 80% confidence level, typically) but NOT weighting errors. If the model weights incorrectly, that is NOT reflected in the MOE (which is why two polls can be vastly different, but both have small MOEs). Even them, the typical level of confidence for the MOE is only 80%, meaning that 20% of the time, the error will exceed the MOE just on sampling errors alone.

Also, as a someone who actually worked taking exit polls in college, I can tell you that the supporters of some candidates are MUCH more more eager to tell you who they voted for than others. And younger voters are less likely to feel that who they voted for is a private matter.

I'll be interested in seeing if you get an answer form Nate, though I suspect that if you are looking for evidence of fraud, you are unlikely to get it. Most exit pollsters, for example, say their polls should NOT be used to predict actual results because of all the issues I talked about above.

[Time for change]

19. Margin of error is way beyond 80% in any poll I've ever seen

More likely 95% or 99%.

As for weighting errors, why would anyone believe that they would be weighted in favor of Bernie in almost every poll.

And why do other countries with far better election integrity than us use them to monitor elections?

[Adrahil]

40. You missed the main part of my argument.

You'd expect a a miss outside the MOE about 20% of the time no matter what, pretty much. HOWEVER, that margin of error only applies if the weighting model is actually correct. That's why you can have two polls, both with an MOE of 3-5%, but they disagree by 10 points. Their weighting models are different, and if one poll is right, the other MUST be wrong, and it's possible both are. According to what I've seen from Nate so far, he has concluded that their weighting models have been off frequently.

I think the main reason the polls have favored Bernie is that many pollster have been overestimating youth turnout and underestimating minority turnout in their exit poll models, so they adjust their samples to reflect their expectations and get it wrong. It's pretty easy to do. These exit polls are taking small samples in a very dynamic environment. And that's why the exit pollster caution people to NOT use the exit poll results to predict final outcomes.

I don't think exit polling discrepancies have much to do with election integrity in this case. Primaries are notoriously hard to poll.

[Kip Humphrey]

101. Exit polls are, to coin a term I heard somewhere, "the gold standard" for determining election fraud

Apparently Hillarians on DU are now throwing exit polls under the bus with misinformation, smoke, and mirrors. Too bad since DU has had a solid reputation for election integrity and election fraud investigation.

[Adrahil]

108. OKay, then show me....

Where exit polls are the "gold standard" for PRIMARIES.

I see a tendency to reject polls when they disagree with us but embrace them when they reinforce our ideas.

I don't have an issue with investigating irregularities. But I think the Sanders camp has been very quick to jump to the conclusion of deliberate election manipulation and fraud.

[Time for change]

111. See response # 44

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1251&pid=1820535

They have developed a bad reputation here for two reasons:

1) Our national news media does not want any discussion about stolen elections. Keith Olbermann was fired from MSNBC because he was the only national news media figure who spoke about them.

2) In recent years, they have been deviating more and more from official vote counts, as electronic machines with no accountability have been manipulated to favor right wing candidates, in compliance with the owners of the machines, who are known supporters of right wing candidates and right wing causes.

[Adrahil]

113. Primaries are different animals.

As I understand, exit polls tend to be more reliable for general elections.

[Time for change]

116. Why would that be, and where did you get that from?

I see no reason whatsoever why they would be less reliable in primaries.

[CorporatistNation]

106. BUll S**T! Exit Polling Selects Pollees Randomly So "Enthusiasm" Is Factored Out!

So you deny that there has been substantial shenanigans in NY or AZ? I'm in Florida so I am more than aware of the kind of sh** that takes place and it is multi-vectored. Systemic and individuals... all doing their part. The machines should be eliminated and return to hand counting of paper ballots which is the ONLY way to ensure the integrity of the vote.

[Adrahil]

109. lots of issues...

There have been some irregularities. Shenanigans? that's a conclusion not yet supported by the facts. I do support investigations of the issues in AZ an NY, but have not yet seen ANY evidence of deliberate manipulation intended to benefit Clinton.

I think it is perfectly possible to have integrity with electronic voting, but I do favor open source systems (hardware and software), rather than for-profit voting machine companies.

[samson212]

117. This is evidence

a conclusion not yet supported by facts

You're responding to an OP which provides facts that support the conclusion. I'd say enough evidence that I want to know more. The point here is that for all those polls to be off by large margins in the same direction, either something nefarious is going on, or it's happened by coincidence, which is astronomically unlikely.

have not yet seen ANY evidence of deliberate manipulation intended to benefit Clinton.

Again, the OP includes some evidence. You say "deliberate" here to imply that there's no proof that Clinton herself was involved. I agree that that's true, and will probably remain so. But there is certainly evidence that someone is screwing around with our votes. I'm not sure why it matters to you if Clinton was involved. The integrity of the vote is in question; that should be the thing that worries you.

rather than for-profit voting machine companies.

I'm sure we can all agree that it's staggering that this obvious conflict of interest is permitted.

I think it is perfectly possible to have integrity with electronic voting

As a programmer, I disagree. The only way to be totally sure that the votes haven't been tampered with is to have a physical record which cannot be edited.

There should be no separation between the act of voting and the record it creates, since each extra layer introduces complexity which can be exploited. Even with electronic systems which produce a paper trail, there's no way to guarantee that somebody hasn't hacked the production of the paper record.

In NY, we fill out the ballot by hand, and it's counted by a machine on the spot. The original ballot gets dropped in a bin. The bins are locked, and can be opened and counted by hand if necessary. This would make it pretty hard to fake the actual votes, though even these systems could be hacked to report the wrong count. If we don't pay attention to discrepancies (of 12%) in the exit polls, we'll never take advantage of this lovely, very difficult to hack, paper trail we've got, and whoever screwed with the results will get away with it!

[Gothmog]

20. How do you sample vote by mail or absentee ballots

Due to the Texas voter id law which is still in effect, the Democratic Party is pushing vote by mail and the number of vote by mail ballots for Democrats have increased in Texas by ten times compared to prior elections. In my county we had less than 400 ballots by mail in 2012 and over 4,000 for the 2016 primary

[Time for change]

29. You do those samples the same way you do pre-election polling: by telephone

[Gothmog]

50. That is notvwhat is being done in the real world

[Time for change]

72. Yes, that is how it's done

[DhhD]

119. Seems like using information from the voter registration numbers: phone exchange areas, and

last few numbers of a zip code could promote an equatable telephone call out pre-election poll. A pre-election poll could be set up using information sort of like a VIN on a car. There is no direct identifying information on who the owner is, but a poll could be taken from the area of ownership with equal numbers of every type of car in the polling area, to get a reliable polling result.

[grossproffit]

3. My husband is less than truthful to exit pollsters. He thinks he's funny.

He thinks 40 is the cut off age for immaturity, so I've got another few years of this..

[goldent]

67. I know several people who said they are always economical

with the truth with any kind of polling. They feel that polls interfere with the political process, which is a fair point.

[Else You Are Mad]

4. Quit being a sore loser...

Obviously nothing is going on because Hillary is winning! There is no incentive at all to elect her over her challenger, so why would state officials and leaders want to what you are implying. Also sexism, Bernie Bro, something... Blah blah.

Since 2000 there has been so many examples of election fraud on both sides, it is mind blowing, yet we criticize other nations for their rigged elections (unless the US backed stooge won).

If some central American election had as many 'irregularities' the UN would lose its shit, yet here in the US, we just shrug and say stop complaining because you were a loser.

[SusanCalvin]

30. Yep. nt

[pdsimdars]

37. You forgot to include the most important point of your comment

[Else You Are Mad]

39. I figured it was obvious... nt

[pdsimdars]

84. Never take that for granted. Some people post things seriously that are just as looney

I have been fooled a few times and it really pisses me off.
Best to make it clear. You KNOW there have been posts almost like yours that were supposed to be serious. You underestimate how deluded people can get.

[bbgrunt]

5. Great letter! I would hope that you might send this

to more than just Nate. Does your encouragement to publicize this issue include copying your letter and signature and submitting it to news organizations and others?

[Time for change]

11. Thank you. It sure does include that.

Anything that gets this issue greater attention is necessary to addressing the problem.

As long as the public doesn't know about (and I doubt that many do know about it), nothing will be done to address it.

[Time for change]

14. His staff might bring it to his attention and recommend he read it.

I don't believe he is going to honor my request even if he does read it.

But it's worth a try.

These are desperate times. I feel that our democracy is being stolen from us.

[SalviaBlue]

23. No, he's much too important.

Why the hell not? Nate is highly educated. He can probably handle more than the average message board reader. I read the whole thing and I don't even have a college degree.

[brooklynite]

92. Here's Nate's answer:

Ten Reasons Why You Should Ignore Exit Polls

1. Exit polls have a much larger intrinsic margin for error than regular polls. This is because of what are known as cluster sampling techniques. Exit polls are not conducted at all precincts, but only at some fraction thereof. Although these precincts are selected at random and are supposed to be reflective of their states as a whole, this introduces another opportunity for error to occur (say, for instance, that a particular precinct has been canvassed especially heavily by one of the campaigns). This makes the margins for error somewhere between 50-90% higher than they would be for comparable telephone surveys.

2. Exit polls have consistently overstated the Democratic share of the vote. Many of you will recall this happening in 2004, when leaked exit polls suggested that John Kerry would have a much better day than he actually had. But this phenomenon was hardly unique to 2004. In 2000, for instance, exit polls had Al Gore winning states like Alabama and Georgia (!). If you go back and watch The War Room, you’ll find George Stephanopolous and James Carville gloating over exit polls showing Bill Clinton winning states like Indiana and Texas, which of course he did not win.

3. Exit polls were particularly bad in this year’s primaries. They overstated Barack Obama’s performance by an average of about 7 points.

4. Exit polls challenge the definition of a random sample. Although the exit polls have theoretically established procedures to collect a random sample — essentially, having the interviewer approach every nth person who leaves the polling place — in practice this is hard to execute at a busy polling place, particularly when the pollster may be standing many yards away from the polling place itself because of electioneering laws.


http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/ten-reasons-why-you-should-ignore-exit/

[beedle]

96. That just a bunch of confimation bias

There's nothing there that says anything other than "every time we do exit polls the results seem to be outside the MoE, and point to fraud, let''s assume that it's the exit poles that are wrong and not an indication of fraud."

Exit polls are used all around the world for all kinds of purposes, one of which is to detect likely cases of fraud. Sure, some times the problem is the exit polls, but that is relatively rare, and where there are noticeable MoE differences they examine what the issue actually is ... poor polling methods, or actual fraud ... and if it a problem with the polling exist they fix that problem.

In the US it's always 'can't be a problem with our fucked up electoral system, and all the examples of fraud we discover in almost every election, let's just ignore the exit polls and let the corruption continue".

[MattP]

8. Exit polls would be a gold standard if you polled early voters

Or mail in voters

[Time for change]

12. They are included

See my reply # 7.

[Old Crow]

9. Excellent work. I hope your letter is read by as many people as possible.

Keep us posted as to any developments!

[JoePhilly]

10. What % of people decline to answer the exit poll?

[Time for change]

13. I believe it is very small

In any event, it seems to me that very few people would be reluctant to acknowledge that they voted for the Democratic Party's presumptive nominee. It seems to me that to the extent that people were afraid to admit who they voted for, that would hurt Bernie more than Hillary.

[JoePhilly]

16. I think it would vary greatly by state.

And its not just about fear. Its about peer pressure.

If you think your neighbors all love Cruz, and you did not vote Cruz, you decline, or you lie.

And I wonder why you think saying "Bernie" is scary? With all the Hillary hate going on, I can imagine lots of people voting for her, and then not saying so if asked by a stranger.

One other thing ... I think that LOTS of women who self-identify or publicly identify as Republican to their family, who are voting for Hillary. And they are definitely going to lie to exit pollsters. My mother-in-law is one of them.

[Time for change]

31. Hillary is and has been the presumptive nominee since the primary season opened

I can't see why more people would be reluctant to admit voting for the presumptive nominee than someone who is considered radical.

Anyhow, all these issues and much more apply to pre-election polling as well. Pollsters spend so much time talking about pre-election polls. Why not give some attention to exit polls (BEFORE they are adjusted to fit the official vote count)

[kgnu_fan]

15. wow, thank you for this work! nt

[Onlooker]

17. It appears that Edison used a consistent methodology that proved consistently wrong

It looks like they overcompensated for the way enthusiasm for Sanders would translate on a state-wide level. My guess is the exit poll methodology failed to show that enthusiasm for Sanders was fairly localized. Thus, when the extrapolated the data from where they took the exit polls and applied it across the state, it made incorrect assumptions about Sanders popularity.

Assuming they used the same methodology, it is not surprising that the results consistently favored Sanders. Perhaps they should have modified their methodology in the course of the primaries.

[7wo7rees]

21. Thank you. Have you had any contact with Palast? nt

[Time for change]

33. No, I don't

[7wo7rees]

36. Maybe you should. Your analysis is spot on. nt

[pdsimdars]

38. Or Taibi

[smiley]

22. K&R

Thank you for taking the time to write this letter.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

24. Basic math

New York: 12.0 in favor of Clinton

http://www.cnn.com/election/primaries/polls/ny/dem

Gender

Males were 41% of the electorate and went 50% for Clinton= 21%
Females were 59% of the electorate and went 63% for Clinton = 37%

There are only two categories for gender. Add em up-58%- Clinton's exact share of the vote.

You have to be careful with 1st wave , 2nd wave exit polls et cetera. Michael Dukakis won 1st wave exit polls against Bush Pere and I don't know anybody who thinks that election was fixed.

[Lucinda]

26. Yep.

[Time for change]

34. The exit polls in the OP are final exit polls, not first or second wave

[DemocratSinceBirth]

35. I cited the CNN Exit Poll

new york exit polls



http://www.cnn.com/election/primaries/polls/ny/dem

[Time for change]

46. CNN only shows us exit polls that are "adjusted" to fit the official vote count

They are worthless from the standpoint of monitoring elections.

The OP uses exit polls that have not been adjusted to mimic the vote count, and they are final exit polls.

[pnwmom]

25. Exit polls aren't as accurate as you think they are. They are more self-selected.

In that sense, this is nothing like epidemiology.

Also, the polling isn't based on all precincts, just a sampling of precincts that they choose to represent the whole. And that sample may or may not be very representative, since it is based on a previous year's voting patterns.

The interviewer stands outside the station and attempts to get every 4th or 5th (or whatever) person to talk to her. So several people can walk out of the building, and most of them just walk away. One of them stops to talk to the interviewer. Thus, there is a high degree of self-selection going on. And younger people are more likely to cooperate than older people, so that's another factor.

In New York, exit polls showed that up to 20% of Democratic voters identified themselves as Independents -- even though this was a closed primary. This could have been because of the lawsuit that was announced days earlier. The lawyer who filed was hoping to get the judge to decide the primary had to be opened. So he was urging all independent Bernie supporters to vote with a provisional ballot and hope it would get counted.

Those ballots weren't counted, however, because on the day of the election the judge ruled against them. This, and the self-selection of excited Bernie supporters to speak with the pollsters, could account for the discrepancy in the exit poll results.

Also, confirming the NY results is that the aggregate of polls on 538 was within 1 percentage point of the final results. That was probably more accurate than the exit polls because the aggregated polls were working with lists of registered Dems, while the exit polls included a significant fraction of people who said they were Independents.

ON EDIT: Hillary voters, being older, are also more likely to vote early or by absentee (depending on the state). And their votes wouldn't show up in exit polls. That might in itself be enough to explain most of these apparent discrepancies. People who vote at the polling places do not necessarily reflect all voters, including those who mail in their ballots.

[factfinder_77]

27. Nate Silver 2008: Ten Reasons Why You Should Ignore Exit Polls - from Mark Bluemthnal

Oh, let me count the ways. Almost all of this, by the way, is lifted from Mark Bluemthnal’s outstanding Exit Poll FAQ. For the long version, see over there.

1. Exit polls have a much larger intrinsic margin for error than regular polls. This is because of what are known as cluster sampling techniques. Exit polls are not conducted at all precincts, but only at some fraction thereof. Although these precincts are selected at random and are supposed to be reflective of their states as a whole, this introduces another opportunity for error to occur (say, for instance, that a particular precinct has been canvassed especially heavily by one of the campaigns). This makes the margins for error somewhere between 50-90% higher than they would be for comparable telephone surveys.

2. Exit polls have consistently overstated the Democratic share of the vote. Many of you will recall this happening in 2004, when leaked exit polls suggested that John Kerry would have a much better day than he actually had. But this phenomenon was hardly unique to 2004. In 2000, for instance, exit polls had Al Gore winning states like Alabama and Georgia (!). If you go back and watch The War Room, you’ll find George Stephanopolous and James Carville gloating over exit polls showing Bill Clinton winning states like Indiana and Texas, which of course he did not win.

3. Exit polls were particularly bad in this year’s primaries. They overstated Barack Obama’s performance by an average of about 7 points.

4. Exit polls challenge the definition of a random sample. Although the exit polls have theoretically established procedures to collect a random sample — essentially, having the interviewer approach every nth person who leaves the polling place — in practice this is hard to execute at a busy polling place, particularly when the pollster may be standing many yards away from the polling place itself because of electioneering laws.

5. Democrats may be more likely to participate in exit polls. Related to items #1 and #4 above, Scott Rasmussen has found that Democrats supporters are more likely to agree to participate in exit polls, probably because they are more enthusiastic about this election.

6. Exit polls may have problems calibrating results from early voting. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, exit polls will attempt account for people who voted before election day in most (although not all) states by means of a random telephone sample of such voters. However, this requires the polling firms to guess at the ratio of early voters to regular ones, and sometimes they do not guess correctly. In Florida in 2000, for instance, there was a significant underestimation of the absentee vote, which that year was a substantially Republican vote, leading to an overestimation of Al Gore’s share of the vote, and contributing to the infamous miscall of the state.

7. Exit polls may also miss late voters. By “late” voters I mean persons who come to their polling place in the last couple of hours of the day, after the exit polls are out of the field. Although there is no clear consensus about which types of voters tend to vote later rather than earlier, this adds another way in which the sample may be nonrandom, particularly in precincts with long lines or extended voting hours.

8. “Leaked” exit poll results may not be the genuine article. Sometimes, sources like Matt Drudge and Jim Geraghty have gotten their hands on the actual exit polls collected by the network pools. At other times, they may be reporting data from “first-wave” exit polls, which contain extremely small sample sizes and are not calibrated for their demographics. And at other places on the Internet (though likely not from Gergahty and Drudge, who actually have reasonably good track records), you may see numbers that are completely fabricated.

9. A high-turnout election may make demographic weighting difficult. Just as regular, telephone polls are having difficulty this cycle estimating turnout demographics — will younger voters and minorities show up in greater numbers? — the same challenges await exit pollsters. Remember, an exit poll is not a definitive record of what happened at the polling place; it is at best a random sampling.

10. You’ll know the actual results soon enough anyway. Have patience, my friends, and consider yourselves lucky: in France, it is illegal to conduct a poll of any kind within 48 hours of the election. But exit polls are really more trouble than they’re worth, at least as a predictive tool. An independent panel created by CNN in the wake of the Florida disaster in 2000 recommended that the network completely ignore exit polls when calling particular states. I suggest that you do the same

[Time for change]

42. Yes, all of our national "news" media tries to get us to ignore exit polls

in the same way they give Hillary so much more attention than Bernie and have been trying to coronate her as the
nominee before the primaries even started.

Anyhow, I'm not claiming that any given exit poll proves who won. But in the context of all the known cheating that's been going on with massive voter purging, and in the face of the magnitude and consistency of the exit poll deviations from the official vote counts, and when we use machines to count our votes that are being manufactured by very conservative companies, and when we already know of at least one documented audit where the hand count deviated greatly from the machine count and the election workers changed the hand count to be consistent with the machine count, surely this deserves serious and thorough investigation.

[farleftlib]

44. The whole world depends on exit polls to validate elections.

Exit polls are an exceptionally accurate measure of elections. In the last three elections in Germany, for example, exit polls were never off by more than three-tenths of one percent. Unlike ordinary opinion polls, the exit sample is drawn from people who have actually just voted. It rules out those who say they will vote but never make it to the polls, those who cannot be sampled because they have no telephone or otherwise cannot be reached at home, those who are undecided or who change their minds about whom to support, and those who are turned away at the polls for one reason or another. Exit polls have come to be considered so reliable that international organizations use them to validate election results in countries around the world.

http://www.michaelparenti.org/stolenelections.html

[beedle]

97. Exactly, Nate's "10 lame excuses"

basically just say "when the exit polls disagree with the claimed results, we just make unsubstantiated claims that exit polls are inherently inaccurate, just assume the exit polls are the problem and nit the obviously broken and inherently flawed electoral systems".

Yes, there are examples around the world were exit polls were off by more than the MoE in legitimate elections, but in all cases they investigate what caused the problem and adjust the exit polls to reduce the chance of error in the future ... everywhere that is than America, where the excuses are made, known examples of real fraud are ignored, and the 'experts' are more interested in upholding their reputation than they are with enabling people to have their democratic say in a so-called democracy.

[Tom Rinaldo]

28. Thank you. K&R n/t

[firebrand80]

32. He's gonna TL;DR the hell out of that nt

[Scuba]

41. Silly lefties. Unicorns, rainbows and fair elections are just blue sky pipe dreams.

[All in it together]

43. How about sending the letter rewritten for former President Carter.

He hasn't checked on elections here, but has in other countries.

This is very important if we want to keep our democracy and have faith in our elections.

Let's go back to paper ballots and counting machines that can be verified as correct. We need hand counts sometimes.

Thanks for doing this.

[Time for change]

45. Actually, he has assessed elections here

See "Building Confidence in U.S. Elections", with an Executive Summary signed by Carter:
http://www.eac.gov/assets/1/AssetManager/Exhibit%20M.PDF

[YouDig]

47. I can't believe people put this much effort into these crazy theories.

[Time for change]

48. Yeah, it's really crazy to think that someone in this country would try to steal an election

I don't think it's ever happened before.

We really shouldn't be concerned about such things.

[YouDig]

49. It's crazy to think that Hillary, or Bernie for that matter, tried to steal

this primary. Yes it is.

[Time for change]

64. First I didn't accuse Hillary of doing it personally

But there is certainly a great deal of evidence that it is being stolen on her behalf. Whether she personally knows about it or condones it is not for me to say.

I think that you are very naive to believe that it is crazy to think that elections are being stolen when it has been found out that 70,000 Democratically registered voters in Brooklyn alone have been purged the voter roles. Is Mayor de Blasio (who has endorsed Hillary) crazy to say that this is going to be investigated and he is going to try to reverse the voter purge?

[YouDig]

66. There's zero evidence that it was "done on her behalf." It's the exact same amount of evidence that

it was done on Bernie's behalf.

[nadinbrzezinski]

73. There was also zero evidence, as in hard evidence

that it was done on behalf of Bush in 2000. There was better evidence, but still not that you would admit it, in 2004

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009SAV5H0/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?ie=UTF8&btkr=1

Either you did not remember 2004 or you were not politically engaged. But at this point, just like 2000 and 2004, I do not beleive the election is legitimate, and I will once again, once the primary gets here, pretend to vote, in pretend elections that have way too many problems to be considered clean.

We actually need foreign observers.

And yes, our elections are far from free and honest, go correct the fools at Harvard, and tell them this is a conspiracy theory ok.

https://sites.google.com/site/electoralintegrityproject4/projects/expert-survey-2/the-year-in-elections-2015

[AzDar]

123. ...

[BlindTiresias]

134. Entirely spot on.

[Samantha]

79. This is a stunning piece of work and I thank you for compiling it and sharing it with us

And it does explain why Clinton constantly says "Bernie can't win."

Sam

[leftofcool]

129. I suppose exit polls wouldn't matter if Bernie was ahead in delegate count?

[CoffeeCat]

51. That's exactly what the Republicans said about the united party that was the Democrats

and all Democrats knew damn well that Bush stole it by rigging the machines, flipping votes and other suppressive tactics.

Did we have video proof of the theft? No. We never will.

We all know when an election is rigged. You can only make so many excuses for so long. Exit polls, votes flipping, voter suppression, not enough voting machines, disenfranchised voters. All of it has happened right in front of us--and we're just suppose to accept this unprecedented level of fail happening in our elections?

It's not happening on the Republican side! Our elections have been a complete cluster fuck and a joke. Every state brings new bullshit.

Sick and tired of felllow Democrats making excuses for this. I barely even recognize our party any more.

[YouDig]

52. "Did we have video proof of the theft? No." Good point.

For all we know it Bernie could have been rigging the machines, but I'm not going around throwing out stupid unjustifiable accusations because there's no evidence of anything.

[CoffeeCat]

57. Again, we had no evidence that Bush did it either

but we all knew.

More than half of our primaries and some of the caucuses--have been shitstorms.

Meanwhile, the Republicans press on with their normal elections--as Democrats disenfranchise voters, have machines flipping votes, people waiting in line for 6 hours, people's registrations being flipped to R and I, exit polls that are off by several points from the final result.

You're certainly not convincing me.

[YouDig]

58. I'm sure people "just know" that Bernie cheated too. But what actually happened

is that more people voted for Hillary, period.

[CoffeeCat]

61. I'm really starting to seriously doubt that (nt)

[Time for change]

69. Actually, the large exit poll discrepancy in Ohio led to numerous investigations

by private citizens and groups, and eventually massive evidence was accumulated of election theft. Voter purging of hundreds of thousands of voters was well documented, and then there is Karl Rove's IT guru, Michael Connell, who was about to testify to his role in the electronic election theft of Ohio, and had signed an affidavit to that effect, and then shortly before he was due to testify in court he died in a plane "accident".

[nadinbrzezinski]

74. I missed that part of the story

and wondered, So another plane went down... what a coincidence!

[Time for change]

91. Yeah, really

I'm sure that plenty of people posting to this OP would say it was a coincidence because as long as you don't have absolute proof, nobody should worry about it or say anything about it.

I forgot to provide the link. It's in the OP, but here it is again:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021835756

It's a very interesting and important story.

[LAS14]

53. Isn't there something wrong with the New York stats?

The exit polls were 12 points less for Clinton than the actual vote, not 12 points more.

[Time for change]

104. Exactly -- That's the problem

It should serve as a red flag that maybe the official count was way off -- i.e. election fraud

[goldent]

68. I feel the same way.

Our system is not perfect, but I don't buy any of the claims about rigging the vote technically with voting machines, etc. And I don't see how paper ballots would eliminate this theories (someone once told me that the voting machines were intended to reduce mistrust in paper ballots).

[ailsagirl]

54. You sure put a lot of work into this, Time for change

[LonePirate]

55. Why are you assuming exit polls are the epitome or standard of accuracy and are infallible?

There is no basis for exit polls being the definitive statistical sample of any election.

[Time for change]

59. I never said that they were the definitive standard

But when almost all the exit polls show large discrepancies in the same direction, and in the context of all the voter suppression that is going on, and when the election machines are owned and operated by very conservative companies, and when we've seen this happen in previous elections (especially with George W. Bush), this requires serious and thorough investigation.

In my letter I didn't ask Nate to make a declaration that they are definitive proof of fraud. I asked him to analyze and discuss them in as thoughtful and thorough a manner as he discusses his pre-election polls, which are of considerably less value.

[LonePirate]

75. You are suggesting that exit polls are the true election barometer and not the actual results

The exit polls have indeed been awful this cycle but you're suggesting the exit polls are right and the actual results are wrong in case after case after case. I think we have reached the point where exit polls are little more fun topics of discussion and should not be taken seriously by any means.

[Time for change]

77. I am suggesting that they very well could be much more accurate than the official vote counts

It hasn't been proven, but they definitely should be thoroughly investigated, with such things as a large amount of hand counted audits to see to what extent the hand counts match the official counts.

The negative side of that is that it would require some effort and money.

The positive side is that it could save our democracy.

That's a no-brainer for me.

[nadinbrzezinski]

70. You shouyld inform, among others, the US Department of state of this fact

for example the Orange Revolution used, exit polls as one of the measures.

http://www.ukrweekly.com/old/archive/2004/500413.shtml



And until 2000 they were actually the gold standard in the US, and the News Consortium was considered the gold standard.

[LonePirate]

76. You're not serious with that comparison between Ukraine and the US are you?

The exit poll time in the sun has long since passed. People need to quit using them as a basis for any sort of argument about the outcome of a race. They are barely more accurate than tea leaves.

[nadinbrzezinski]

78. I am serious in the sense that the US Department of State uses them as a gold standard

and that until 2000 they were the GOLD STANDARD IN THE US and considered reliable. I am going to be kind and assume you have no memory of that. Because if you do, then you should remember the shenanigans, in both 2000 and 2004, But you really should do some reading into VOTER CAGING, POLL MANIPULATION, and EXIT POLLS. You also should look into the CONYERS report on 2004, and what happened in OH. Oh and electronic voting is extremely easy to flip in central tabulators, Just ask OH, or Mexico... both have recent experiences with this that are fairly well documented. Yes, I just compared Mexico to the United States.

Also you might might want to go correct the idiots at Harvard as well, before they continue to spread these silly theories.

https://sites.google.com/site/electoralintegrityproject4/projects/expert-survey-2/the-year-in-elections-2015

We have been steadily dropping in that for years. We have also been steadily dropping in freedom of the press.

And yes, at this point I consider our elections so compromised I do not expect my vote to count. At least both parties should offer a burger and the beverage of your choice, becuase it is that blatant anymore.

By the way, you do know the United States is currently considered an oligarchy right? A marker of those are pretend elections.

At the risk of you calling me a commie, Stalin had it right. It does not matter who votes, but who counts them.

[Mesee]

56. My letter to Nate Silver.

The night of the election in NYS all media outlets reported exit polls for Hillary and Bernie were razor thin. Please explain how she received around the 60% in Down State. All day on this site people were reporting problems in the Boro's and Long Island. You might want to contact Professor Mark Chrispan Miller from NY University. He has written on election fraud. Brillant and very Professional with deep passion.

[Time for change]

60. Great

I hope he's flooded with letters like yours and mine.

[snot]

62. K&R'd & bookmarked.

[MrMickeysMom]

63. Nate should either stand up for his expertise or say why he didn't...

I hope this prompts him to stand up. His record was highly accurate for a reason. So, there's a reason these things have changed.

Now, why aren't we all furious over THAT? Rhetorical questioner, I am...

[Unicorn]

65. Thank you!

[Tarc]

71. I first voted in 1996, and have never been asked how I voted upon leaving

This isn't done at every voting place, y'know.

[Time for change]

90. Yes, I'm well aware of this

Every attempt is made to take a sample of precincts that adequately represents the voting population. No poll polls all people or all precincts.

[CharlotteVale]

80. K&R

[Chezboo]

81. Thank you for doing this.

Do you follow Richard Charnin's work on this?

[Admiral Loinpresser]

82. I hope you are wrong, but afraid you may be on to something. K and R!

[nenagh]

83. K&R

and thank you..

[cui bono]

85. Nice. You should send this to all publications everywhere, and all elected officials.

And all progressive political action groups.

.

[silvershadow]

86. K&R

[DCBob]

87. Exit polls are mostly bogus for all sorts of reasons.

Self selection being the most obvious.

[Time for change]

94. As I've explained many times on this thread

I'm not claiming absolute proof. I'm just saying that the magnitude and consistency of the exit poll discrepancies, especially taken together with everything else that's occurred during these elections, especially the massive voter purging, needs a thorough investigation. I wrote the letter to Nate Silver because he has the capability of doing a lot of additional statistical investigation on this and discussing it at his site. But it will take a lot of courage for him to do that, because he would be certain to be vilified by those who can't bear talk about a stolen election in this country -- and there are plenty of them, even on DU.

But to say that exit polls are mostly bogus is a gross exaggeration and ridiculous statement. They are used routinely to assist in calling elections.

[DCBob]

99. Ok.. they are mostly inaccurate.

Hows that?

[Time for change]

102. I doubt that they are as inaccurate as our official vote counts

But we won't know for sure unless extensive investigations are done, right?

[DCBob]

103. No vote is ever going to be perfectly accurate.

The exit polling helps somewhat for demographics analysis but I really doubt its does any good determining whether there were voting irregularities. I think there are better indicators than that in place.

[Time for change]

107. Perfectly accurate?

Are you serious.

I am not claiming they are perfectly accurate. In NY they are off by 12 percentage points. That's a huge difference from perfectly accurate.

I did not say that the exit polls have already determined that there was fraud. I am saying that they are a huge red flag that needs to be investigated.

[DCBob]

114. How should I have said it.. "entirely accurate" "completely accurate" "fully accurate"?

There are always going to be errors... right?

But using the exit polls as the method for determining poll inaccuracies makes no sense. Everyone knows exit polls are inaccurate.

[Time for change]

118. Any informed person knows that election fraud is rampant in this country

Exit polls are the best we have for a routine check on the accuracy of election results. Electronic machines are easily manipulated. Exit polls that are 12 points off strongly suggest fraud.

[nadinbrzezinski]

98. Quick, tell the State Department they are silly

but this is exactly what allows for the shit that has been happening now for close to two decades

[DCBob]

100. The topic is election exit polls.

[smiley]

88. kick

[Uncle Joe]

89. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, Time for change.

[Ferd Berfel]

93. K&R

[kgnu_fan]

95. Any responses from Nate?

[Time for change]

105. Not the last time I checked, about an hour ago

[EndElectoral]

112. Wonderful letter. Please keep us advised if and when Silver responds.

[Time for change]

115. Thank you

No response yet, but I sure will post it if and when I get a response.

[mojowork_n]

120. Still nothing? Have you tried calling in to Thom Hartmann?

Or maybe just posting to his blog?

[Time for change]

121. No word from Nate Silver

I'm working on a post now that discusses the importance of exit polls to any election integrity effort, to combat the arguments the Hillary supporters are putting forth.

Their is nothing but silence on this issue from our national news media, as was the case when Bush stole the 2004 election. There appears to be an unwritten law that forbids any discussion of them. I notice that since the issue of the exit poll discrepancies in the Democratic primaries have been getting some attention, there were no exit polls available for public viewing from any of the five states earlier this week.

[Time for change]

125. Also

Since there was so much disputing of the accuracy of election polls by Hillary supporters in this OP, I wanted to address exit polls in a separate OP, which I just completed and posted:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511870937

My daughter will be calling in to Thom Hartmann on Monday, and we will write to him if she can't get through on the call. She might refer him to the above OP. He has discussed my DU OPs on his show in the past.

[EndElectoral]

122. Is there any independent group that investigates these discrepancies ?

It seems since the advent of computer voting that exit polling is so often wrong when in fact prior it was the gold standard.

[BootinUp]

124. Taking Nate to School?

[RandySF]

126. Would this qualify as Stage 3: Bargaining?

[Time for change]

130. CNN routinely "adjusts their poll numbers" after the votes have been counted to fit the

official count

Either Joshua Holland doesn't know that or he's pretending not to know that.

[merrily]

128. Thank you. Silver has been blatantly biased from the off, though.

[Time for change]

132. Thank you for the idea

I will contact Common Dreams tomorrow.

[BlindTiresias]

135. Truly excellent OP

Please give us some follow up, your abilities of analysis are exemplary.

[Time for change]

136. Thank you. No response from Nate yet

I took the advice of DUtobeornot2be, in the above post, to send this to Common Dreams. This is my letter:

I would appreciate it if you would consider posting my letter to Nate Silver as an “open letter”. I have previously sent the letter to him and posted it at the Democratic Underground, but I think it could get a lot more exposure if published at your site.

The purpose of the letter is to shine a light on exit polls that, I and many others believe, taken into conjunction with much other evidence, point to vast election fraud in the Democratic primaries this year. My hope is that more hand counted audits will be done, and that that could prove beyond a doubt that this election is being stolen, and will lead to the nomination of Bernie Sanders. I believe that if this election fraud is allowed to stand, our democracy is gone – maybe forever
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511819256

I worked for 40 years as an epidemiologist, which intimately involves the use of statistics (in public health, rather than politics, but the general principles are the same), so I feel confident that the questions I’m posing to Nate are legitimate, and that I could engage in a conversation with him about it.

Thank you for your consideration of this.

Dale Tavris