Stealing the 2004 Election, Revisited

When Robert F. Kennedy Jr asserted that the 2004 presidential election was stolen, he was sowing seeds in fertile ground. Most Americans now believe that Bush lies regularly, and many suspect that the Republican Party is willing to bend or break the law to win elections. Furthermore, Kennedy made several unassailable points about electoral irregularities, especially in Ohio, that could well have changed the outcome of the election.

But the core of Kennedy's article—the basis for his certainty that George Bush stole the election from John Kerry—is the fact that many exit polls showed Kerry ahead, in Ohio and in other states that Bush finally captured. Kennedy's understanding is flawed, both of the complex issues surrounding exit polling and of the specific exit polls conducted in 2004. As a result, his credibility is suspect and his conclusion remains debatable.

Today Mark Blumenthal, an expert on political polling who writes as the Mystery Pollster, posted part 1 of his response to Kennedy's article. It's well worth reading. Before discussing the exit polls, he agrees that Ohio did not conduct a squeaky-clean election but argues that fraud has not been proven:

First, despite its weaknesses, the Kennedy article raises some important and troubling questions about real problems in Ohio in 2004. … The summary of problems deserving attention includes long lines in minority precincts, efforts of the Republican Party to selectively challenge (or "cage") new registrants and the many examples of pure incompetence by local election officials.  And then there is partisanship of Republican Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, now his party's nominee for governor.…

Second,… I have never argued that the exit polls can be used to rule out or disprove the possibility that vote fraud may have occurred in Ohio or anywhere else during in 2004.  The question has always been whether the exit polls provide affirmative evidence that fraud did in fact occur. This involves a very basic concept of statistical inquiry:  We assume no effect until one can be proven, or more technically, we assume a "null hypothesis" until we can prove some alternative.  The same principle exists in law as the presumption of innocence.  We do not assume a crime has been committed and work backwards to try to disprove it.  We presume innocence until enough evidence has been established to prove guilt.

Everyone agrees that the 2004 exit poll results gathered by the news media consortium known National Election Pool (NEP) showed a small but statistically significant difference that favored John Kerry when compared to the official count.  But is that discrepancy evidence of fraud?  It might be, if we could rule out the possibility that other problems or potential sources of error in the exit polls that can also explain the discrepancy. What I have argued for the last year and a half is that the exit polls have many such weaknesses that have long been in evidence.

Blumenthal then discusses the exit polls in detail, first agreeing with Kennedy that the differences between exit-poll results and final tallies were ripe for examination: "The key point:  Everyone—including the exit pollsters—agrees that the average discrepancy was statistically significant." But he goes on to:

• debunk Kennedy's "distortion of the statistics," though "the overall exit poll discrepancy was widespread and statistically significant"

• describe the ways in which exit polls have not "evolved into an exact science" and are not "the most reliable" of surveys, as Kennedy claims, even though they "benefit from having ready access to actual voters who have just made their choices"

• detail what actually happened with exit polls in the countries of Georgia and Ukraine and Germany, where they were not as "exquisitely accurate" as Kennedy maintains

In short, the election of 2004 may well have been stolen, but the evidence is not ironclad. Promoting that idea on the basis of misapprehensions and distortions unfortunately creates a thicket of obstacles, making it more difficult to prove the case.

Now 2000, that's a different matter. That was a coup d'état.

Update: Kennedy replies to Farhad Manjoo at Salon.

Update 2, 6/8: Blumenthal has posted part II of his response to Kennedy's article. He describes several instances of "technically true but highly misleading statements," which taken together seriously undercut Kennedy's thesis.