Missouri Election Results
From the Secretary of State's Office
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Issues: | All | |||
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Senate: |
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House Senate Minimum # of Precincts: % | |
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That information is what county election officials report to the Secretary of State's office starting on election night after there are no lines waiting to vote and the polls have closed.
The major additions added by MDN is the one-sentence description of ballot issues and projections of legislative candidate winners.
Before there are actual returns, MDN projections are made only when there is just one candidate for a legislative seat -- no third-party or writein candidates.
After we get returns, projections also will be based on the candidate with the lead after the minimum percentage of precincts you entered has been achieved.
Give careful thought about the minimum percentage of precincts reporting returns. Early returns can be very misleading.
For a few weeks after an election, that information is unofficial, until certified by local election officials and reported to the Secretary of State.
In chosing information to display, there are several options:
For example, the option for congressional races will not be displayed since congressional races appear only on the statewide primary or general election.
Also, since the number of races for a special election on relatively small, the All check box automatically will be selected for state legislative races and ballot issues -- even if there was not a ballot issue or a chamber race on the ballot.
For vacant seats, the party will be based on the last time it was filled prior to the selected general election.
On election night, you can set the minimum percentage of precincts reporting before a projection is displayed for a race.
If you're a political junky aware of the party-voting patterns in the counties, this may help better predict the ultimate outcome -- or discount early results.
This option is available only when there are statewide races (general elections, statewide primaries or presidential primaries).
No update will be enable if you leave this entry blank. If you enter a number less than 5, it will be adjusted to every five minutes.
Note: Only those options that might be available will be displayed when you select a specific election.
For example, the Statewide nor Pres. Primary option for state candidates will not be displayed if you have selected a special election since no statewide offices (federal or state) are subject to a special election.
The options for a special election will be displayed regardless whether there were any races in that category. For example, at the time this help page is being written, the June 2013 special election was the last time a Congressional race was on a special election ballot.
Also, since there are so few races on special election ballots, all the All boxes will be checked. There's no problem if there were no candidates or issues in a category.
One of the two command buttons at the top of the display is to print the results.
A significant advantage of using this button is that will remove and shading used to better distinquish the lines of results.
Another advantage is that it will save you paper and toner by eliminating the large-font size identifying each race.
If you want the larger font, just mark with your cursor the race(s) you want to print, and then left click that should give you the option to print the material you have selected.
When I first covering Missouri government, covering election results was a nightmare to get results on election night.
Missouri Network's newsdirector, Bob Priddy, established a swifter and more reliable system by creating the Missouri Elections Constorium that solicited funds for the organization to reimburse Secretary of State staff to provide to consortium election-night results they got from county officials which then were provided to the news organizations.
But when Rebecca Cook became secretary of state, she decided providing election night returns was a state responsibility and set up web-based platform for reporting the results on election nights that continues to this day.
If you're interested in the details, check out a column I wrote in 2020 about the history of election-night reporting and my own small role in helping fix a but in Cook's vote reporting system for the public.
Missouri Digital News is produced by Missouri Digital News, Inc. -- a non profit organization of current and former journalists.
You can contact MDN at mdnmail@mdn.org. |