For big elections, the television networks often rely on a private consortium called the National Election Pool (NEP). NEP does projections and predictions.
NEP makes some calls for the television networks, but NEP is composed of CBS, CNN, FOX, NBC, ABC, and AP. It could hardly be called an independent source of information for those networks.
NEP has AP (Associated Press) do the actual vote tabulating, and NEP also contracts work out to Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International to do exit polls and projections based on those polls.
In 2012 CALIFORNIA did a vote for PROP 37 about GMO labeling. Two days after the election, many votes in California remain uncounted.
Santa Clara County: 180,000 votes remain uncounted.
Orange County: 241,336 votes remain uncounted.
San Diego County: 475,000 votes remain uncounted.
LA County: 782,658 votes remain uncounted.
In just those four counties, 1.6 million votes remain uncounted.
The California Secretary of State’s website indicates that Prop 37 was behind by 559,776 votes.
So in the four counties, there are roughly three times as many uncounted votes as the margin of Prop 37’s defeat.
There are 54 other counties in the state.
So why is anyone saying Prop 37 lost?
People will respond, “Well, it’s all about projections. There are experts. They know what they’re doing. They made a prediction…” NEP, Edison Media Research, and Mitofsky International are the experts in this case.
