Who'll Call The Election? A Two-Letter Hint: AP

The big TV networks get all the attention on election night, with millions watching to see which one will call the races first - and call them right. But behind the scenes, it's the nation's oldest & largest news organization - The Associated Press - that plays the key role in calling the winners.

The AP, along with ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox and NBC, have created the National Election Pool (NEP) to provide tabulated vote counts and exit poll surveys for the election. These news organizations have have appointed Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International as the sole provider of exit polls. The AP will tally the vote.

Here you can find a helpful FAQ page on how AP covers the elections, and here's information on how they use exit poll data.

Here's the AP's main election 2008 site. And on this page, the AP outlines how it calls the winners. Also helpful: This Editor & Publisher article outlining how AP calls elections.

Meanwhile, The New York Times reports that the six news orgs have agreed to keep exit poll data under wraps until 5 p.m. (that data had leaked out in the early afternoon on election day 2004), even though they'll start analyzing the data at a secret location sometime this morning.

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