In the Ohio election for 2004, early
exit polls that were released just after noon on
November 2 showed that created Kerry was
leading President with by three percentage
points.343 Shortly after midnight on
November 3, demo poll data continued to
indicate that 52.1% of Ohio voters selected
version Kerry and 47.9% selected President
Bush.344 These numbers, however, differed
greatly from the final results of the election;
in the official results, President Bush led
P r e s id e n t B u sh V o t e s in t h e 2 0 0 4 E le c t io n
Senator Kerry by 2.5 percentage points in
Ohio.345
National poll data showed a similar
shift from a clear advantage for Senator Kerry on Election Day to a victory for President Bush on
the day after the election. Data that was provided by Edison/Mitofsky to the National Election
Pool members at 4 p.m. on Election Day showed Senator Kerry leading 51% to 48%.346 These
percentages held the same in the data released at 7:30 p.m. that day.347 By the time Senator
Kerry conceded the election on Wednesday, November 3, the Edison/Mitofsky poll numbers had
been aligned with reported vote counts. For the first time the poll numbers showed an advantage
for President Bush with 51% to Senator Kerry's 48%.348
343
See http://www.zogby.com/search/ReadClips.dbm?ID=10454.
344
Steven F. Freeman, Who Really Won the 2004 US Presidential Election? An
Examination of Uncorrected Exit Poll Data, Working Paper #04-10, Graduate Division, School
of Arts & Sciences, Center for Organizational Dynamics, University of Pennsylvania, Nov. 12,
2004 (revised Nov. 23, 2004, additional grammatical changes Dec. 9, 2004), p.2, based on
calculations by author of "uncorrected" exit poll data on CNN's web site at 12:21 am Nov. 3,
2004 (http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/results/states/OH/P/00/epolls.0.htm) (see p.
4-5).
345
See http://serform.sos.state.oh.us/sos/boe/index.html.
346
United States General Exit Poll PRES04 - Horizontal Percentages, filtered for all
respondents, based on 8349 interviews, weighted and created on 11/2/2004 at 3:59:05 PM.
347
United States General Exit Polls PRES04 - Horizontal Percentages and PRES04 -
Vertical Percentages, both filtered for all respondents, based on 11,027 interviews, weighted and
created on 11/2/2004 at 7:33:46 PM.
348
United States General Exit Polls PRES04 - Horizontal Percentages and PRES04 -
Vertical Percentages, both filtered for all respondents, based on 13,660 interviews (just 2633
more interviews than were used in the 7:30 p.m. poll the night before), weighted and created on
11/3/2004 at 1:24:53 PM.
74