When NBC News colors a state or district red or blue on election night, it’s because the NBC News Decision Desk has determined it can predict the winner in that race. Here’s how NBC News projects the winners steps taken to verify the results and answers to some frequently asked questions about the process.
How does NBC News predict race results?
On November 5, Decision Desk will project 610 races in all 50 states, from presidential elections to statewide and congressional races.
Predicting the winner means that the Decision Desk has determined that the trailing candidates cannot catch the leader and that the leading candidate will win the race. This decision is made through thorough analysis and the Decision Desk only predicts the race when it is certain of the outcome.
Early on election night, Decision Desk uses exit poll data to determine if it can predict uncontested races. Competitive races are called based on analysis of precinct and district level vote results. The analysis also examines differences between early and election day votes. Careful analysis of how many votes do not count in competitive races is a crucial part of the process. It must be reiterated that no match is predicted until the Decision Desk is absolutely certain of the winner.
NBC News will not predict a winner in this race until after the close of the last scheduled state polls.
What types of challenges and characteristics does the Decision Desk make?
Here are the key Decision Desk calls and features our viewers can expect to hear from NBC News on election night:
Too early to call: This characteristic covers two scenarios. First, there may be a significant difference for one of the candidates, but we have not yet met our statistical standards for predicting the race. The second is that there is not enough information to accurately determine the margin.
Too close to call: This characterization means that the final difference between the candidates will be less than 5 percentage points. This determination is made through statistical evaluation rather than raw vote counting. This is because raw vote counts can sometimes be misleading in determining how close a race is, depending on which votes are counted. For example, if a race is tied in raw vote counts, but the only seats with uncounted votes tend to lean toward one party, the race can easily be less competitive than it appears at the time.
The Decision Desk will not use this feature until we have statistical confidence that the race will be this close.
lean on: The Decision Desk will give a biased characterization when the front-runner is certain to win, but it may take some time before the race reaches our standards for a call. Will be used when a race is stabilized but the stat threshold is not met to call a race.
Predicted Winner: NBC News has predicted that the candidate will win the race.
How will NBC News call for Senate oversight?
When a party wins a majority of seats in the Senate — 51 seats for an outright majority, or 50 seats plus the tie-breaking vice presidency — the Resolution Desk will project control to that party.
How will NBC News call for House oversight?
When a party wins a majority of 218 seats in the House of Representatives, the Decision Desk will project control to that party.
NBC News is part of the National Constituency. What does this mean?
The National Electoral Pool, or NEP, is a consortium of the major news networks—ABC, CBS, CNN, and NBC—that pool resources to gather polling data and exit polls. NEP works with consumer research firm Edison Research to collect timely and comprehensive election data in the days, weeks and months that follow until election day and results are confirmed by all states. NEP licenses data to several news outlets, including Reuters and The Washington Post.
How are votes counted?
The NEP hires trained “data reporters” or “stringers” from local election officials to go to specific county and precinct locations to collect election results. These news reporters are at the polling stations before the polls open and long after the polls close. Other sources for election voting data include state and county voting computers and websites.
What is an exit poll?
An exit poll is a telephone survey of voters as they leave the polling station, as well as those who cast their ballots, that scientifically reach a representative group of voters in a state or nation using probability-based sampling methods. early or mail-in ballots. It is the only polling measure of real voters on election day and is conducted in more than 600 polling stations across the country.
On the voting day, the voters will be interviewed when they leave the polling stations. Exit polls also include extensive in-person interviews with early voters and telephone surveys of early and absent voters. About 20,000 interviews will be held.
One use of exit polls is to help analysts determine whether an uncontested race is predictable. However, the primary use of exit polls is to help viewers understand voter attitudes on various issues. Exit poll results answer important questions about candidate support, policy issues, and cultural and economic issues, and explain who voters are and what motivates them to vote.
What steps are taken to collect and report election data to challenge?
1. Data reporters (see above) and interviewers in the field collect the results.
On Election Day, the NEP will tally vote totals for statewide races, event ballots and all 435 House races in all 50 states. About 1,125 interviewers will work for NBC News to collect votes and conduct exit polls at the county and precinct level through NEP.
NBC News also complements the data collected by NEP with its own efforts to collect turnout data and precinct-level voting results.
2. Multiple sources provide voting results during voting day.
Data comes in from multiple sources on Election Day, with news reporters and interviewers across the country calling in timely and continuous results throughout the day. Polling data is also collected through state and county websites and feeds.
3. The correctness of the data is checked.
Voting results are strictly verified and verified. Part of the quality control is to check that the polling data is consistent across sources, and we also compare the polling to past election results to see if turnout is wildly different in many past races. Decision Desk vote counting analysts, along with computer software, trigger quality control alerts and senior team members review any vote totals that do not pass quality control checks.
4. NBC News independently analyzes data.
NBC News race predictions are completely independent of other news outlets’ predictions. The Decision Desk independently analyzes polling data and exit poll data and uses proprietary statistical models, as well as a team of experts, many of whom hold doctorates in data analytics, polling, election management and political science – to interpret the results and when the races will be called. decides. can be predicted.
5. Results and forecasts are delivered quickly.
Election day voting information is provided as soon as possible. Counting of votes in several states will continue for several days. Exit poll results are independently analyzed in real-time, and NBC News calls all races as soon as the Decision Desk is confident of a winner.