Please be aware that while Florida polls close at 7 p.m., Florida has two time zones. Voting will not be completed statewide until 7 p.m. Central / 8 p.m. Eastern, at which time, unofficial preliminary election results will be released.

AKA... waitin' on the Panhandle... then begin releasing vote counts...
*****************************************************************************************

The big mistake in Florida in 2000 Bush/Gore race was calling the race before all the polls in the largely republican panhandle ....I wonder how many votes that cost Bush suppressing the vote in the panhandle? Certainly the media have learned their lesson by now...and the panhandle will have to come in bigger than ever for Trump to win Florida with the heavy early voting of Latino/Hispanic voters who have already voted early and likely went for Clinton.

@tour2ma said:

Excellent question...

From Florida:

Please be aware that while Florida polls close at 7 p.m., Florida has two time zones. Voting will not be completed statewide until 7 p.m. Central / 8 p.m. Eastern, at which time, unofficial preliminary election results will be released.

Can't find answer as to when News Orgs begin announcing "and we can now project a winner" of individual states for the National race. But I am sure it is after all the polls in a given state are closed. I think the 2000 klusterfook (to borrow a phrase) included a Florida call before panhandle polls were closed... the first of a few erroneous calls that nite.

As for making a national call... not turning up any restrictions, but the most recent hit was from 2008 survey of the networks by the NYT where all seemed good to go as soon as they were "sure"...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/04/us/politics/04network.html

Yeah I couldn't find any actual restrictions either. I would assume the news outlets would be loath to give up any means within their power to affect the election.

WSS

@bbedward said:

Problem is though, Cuban support while strong isn't the whole story. Trump should badly lose every other minority group here which of course is a lot. Outside of Cubans the other strong ethnic groups will definitely not vote Trump.That's why as I've noted I think FL this year will serve as an incredible case study for future elections.

@jrb12711 said:

Trust me, I can provide very accurate context on this. There's two types of Cubans-pro Cuba (liberal) and anti-Cuba (republican). Living in South Florida and knowing a lot of Cubans rich and poor this is a VERY mixed bag, In general, more are anti-Cuba (aka republican) believe it or not which is hurting the liberal cause due to Obama. I can speak to this knowing folks fairly known in the SoFlo Cuban community.

Not from Florida but I've also heard that Trump has pretty strong Cuban support.

Which is why I've heard the Hispanic vote will likely be more pro-Trump in Florida than in places like Nevada and Arizona.

@mld-woody said:

Trust me, I can provide very accurate context on this. There's two types of Cubans-pro Cuba (liberal) and anti-Cuba (republican). Living in South Florida and knowing a lot of Cubans rich and poor this is a VERY mixed bag, In general, more are anti-Cuba (aka republican) believe it or not which is hurting the liberal cause due to Obama. I can speak to this knowing folks fairly known in the SoFlo Cuban community.

@bbedward said:

Lots of Cubans though which isn't exactly the same thing as Mexicans

I don't think Trump sees a difference. And when it comes to the negative effects of Trump's comments, I don't think it really matters.

@jbluhm86 said:

I think if Trump loses Florida, it'll be because of the Hispanic votes

Lots of Cubans though which isn't exactly the same thing as Mexicans

@bbedward said:

I think if Trump loses Florida, it'll be because of the Hispanic votes

@westside-steve said:

Excellent question...

From Florida:

Please be aware that while Florida polls close at 7 p.m., Florida has two time zones. Voting will not be completed statewide until 7 p.m. Central / 8 p.m. Eastern, at which time, unofficial preliminary election results will be released.

AKA... waitin' on the Panhandle... then begin releasing vote counts...

Can't find answer as to when News Orgs begin announcing "and we can now project a winner" of individual states for the National race. But I am sure it is after all the polls in a given state are closed. I think the 2000 klusterfook (to borrow a phrase) included a Florida call before panhandle polls were closed... the first of a few erroneous calls that nite.

As for making a national call... not turning up any restrictions, but the most recent hit was from 2008 survey of the networks by the NYT where all seemed good to go as soon as they were "sure"...

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/04/us/politics/04network.html

@bbedward said:

@pumpkin-eater said:

Yeah that's exactly what I meant.

My bad, I initially thought you were referring to network polls conducted before the election, like polls in battleground states. But, yeah, I can see your argument there. I think if a battleground state was called for either candidate before polls closed, that could have a negative impact on voter turnout from the opposing candidate's potential voting base. I think that might of happened to John Kerry in Florida in 2004, but i'm not 100% on that.

@westside-steve said:

Didn't somebody change some kind of rule so that the news wasn't allowed to report results of states on the East Coast until voting was over? If not, they should.

WSS

I don't think its a law, but more of a gentlemen's agreement between networks to not disclose exit poll data until the polls. Or, at least it was during the last presidential election. But yeah, I agree that there should probably be some sort of law to ban releasing exit poll data until all polls are closed. Some other countries around the world prohibit releasing exit poll results until all polls are closed, and some outright ban exit polling

@jbluhm86 said:

The corrupt media is also calling several states for Trump:

http://www.270towin.com

So, what is your point, exactly?

Stuart

Good question because you missed his point.

WSS

@bbedward said:

Not very motivated if they do...

And it still cuts both ways as HRC voters may relax as much or more than Trump voters are discouraged.

Fact is with nearly 70% of the expected Florida vote expected to be early voting, the state may be an early call. But it all depends upon how close the count is and as PE pointed out earlier in my Target thread (and it finally sunk in), 538 does have the state as a toss-up.

@jbluhm86 said:

The corrupt media is also calling several states for Trump:

http://www.270towin.com

So, what is your point, exactly?

It's pretty clear hes talking about on Tuesday while polls are open.

If they call Florida for Hillary then people in the West would assume the race is over and not vote

Big (legitimate) dust up over that a few years ago.

@pumpkin-eater said:

To discourage Trump voters in Colorado and Arizona from voting.

The corrupt media is also calling several states for Trump:

http://www.270towin.com

So, what is your point, exactly?