At hearing, consultants call election coverage 'seriously flawed'

Tauzin, (R-Louisiana) says that his investigation found no "intentionally misleading or biased reporting" though he is critical of the network's practice of calling winners

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Consultants who conducted investigations of television network coverage of November's election told a House committee Wednesday they found a seriously flawed system.

"Television news organizations staged a collective drag race on the crowded highway of democracy, recklessly endangering the electoral process, the political life of the country and their own credibility, all for reasons that may be conceptually flawed and commercially questionable," said Ben Wattenberg of the American Enterprise Institute, reading from the report he and two other experts prepared on CNN's election coverage at the request of the network.

Wattenberg and other consultants told the House Energy and Commerce Committee they recommended a series of steps to correct problems found in their study, including using exit polls for analysis rather than to project winners, waiting until a significant number of votes are actually counted and "taking more time to get it right."

ELECTION GUIDELINES Full-text of independent report on TV election night performance* and CNN statement regarding future election coverage * Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader     MESSAGE BOARD The Florida vote

Wattenburg also said federal grants given to states to improve their voting procedures should require that they no longer release vote counts until all polls are closed nationwide. "It seems to me this offers a simpler form of getting at this problem," he said.

Joan Konner of the Columbia University School of Journalism, also a member of the independent CNN review, said the panel found that the networks' reliance on the same source, the Voter News Service, for data led to much of the problems.

"We believe that relying on a single source of information contradicts well-known, deeply entrenched, best journalistic practices," she said. The study recommended an overhaul of VNS and the addition of a competing source of voting data.

Also expected to testify before the committee are top executives from ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox, NBC and The Associated Press, plus the director of VNS, which was formed by the networks and AP in 1993 to conduct exit polling. The results of those surveys were a key basis for coverage by the networks and the wire service that led to incorrect election night calls.

In opening comments, committee Chairman Billy Tauzin, R-Louisiana, said an investigation by the committee's staff found "VNS modeling is seriously flawed" and resulted in unintentional bias in favor of Democrats.

Tauzin was critical of the practice of calling winners in some states before polls had closed nationwide, saying it has been shown to discourage people from voting. "Exit polling data produced from VNS may have had a serious effect upon the outcome of elections in some local and other races out West," he said.

Tauzin is offering legislation to make a uniform poll closing time across the country, 9 p.m. ET, and he said he would count on the networks voluntarily holding off projecting winners until after that time.

On Election Night, the news organizations used VNS data to declare Democrat Al Gore the winner in Florida, only to later retract that prediction and much later give Florida and the presidency to Republican George W. Bush -- a call that also had to be retracted. Bush eventually was declared the winner in the state, but only after weeks of recounts and court fights.

The initial call for Gore was made before polls had closed in the state's Panhandle, which is in the Central Time zone.

In his opening comments, Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., read a press release put out by the Florida secretary of state a week before the election asking the networks not to call any races in Florida until after the Panhandle polls had closed.

Tauzin has said his investigators have not found any "intentionally misleading or biased reporting" on the part of the networks but said networks need new procedures to prevent a similar situation from happening again.

In their opening statements, Democratic members of the committee repeatedly expressed concern about what they called the "flawed voting process," including poor ballot design and bad counting procedures.

Rep. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, accused Republicans of taking actions to reduce minority voting in Florida, and said there is a pattern of "voter intimidation, suppression and harassment created and carried out by the Republican Party at the highest levels." He criticized what he called the "conservative, corporate-owned" media for not fully investigating such allegations.

Full text of independent report on TV election coverage (requires Adobe Acrobat reader)
Statement from CNN regarding future Election Night coverage

House Energy and Commerce Committee

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