Seeing some of the comments concerning the General Election last week, particularly in the 14th congressional district, I’m going to address a couple of the more general topics here.
Covering the congressional primary in the spring, I learned for the first time how dependent the media is on the Associated Press (AP). A race is not “officially called” until the AP formally calls the race, and then mainstream media will officially declare a “projected winner”.
For instance in March, I found it very disturbing the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) did not formally acknowledge Jim Oberweis as the winner of the 14th congressional district Republican primary.
Even with all 7 county clerks reporting “100% reported”, the AP waited 4 days before calling the race. Why the delay, given vote-by-mail (VBM) was not used widespread was puzzling, but I learned, following the AP social media thread tells me when the race is called.
Covering other primary elections throughout the year into last week’s General Election, I know to check the AP before saying a race is called.
Only one time in the past 8 months have I seen the AP retract a projected outcome of a congressional election, and that was determining if a candidate would be facing a runoff back in June.
So on Saturday, Nov 7, when this tweet went out from the AP on the Pennsylvania presidential returns:
Shortly after the 10:25 AM CST AP call of Pennsylvania, this tweet went out from AP 3 minutes later:
From there forward, with AP projection of Joe Biden winning the Electoral College, the former vice president was given the title “President-Elect”, as well as a new title for Senator Kamala Harris.
Now no state has “certified” its ballots. The projection is based on “unofficial returns” and based on a respective state’s laws, the returns become “official” when the local election board “canvasses” the result.
For President and Vice President, the formal declaration of a winner takes place before a joint session of Congress, presided by the current Vice President, formally accepting the Electoral College results.
The Electoral College will formally cast its votes on December 14 in each state capitol, plus the District of Columbia.
This goes to my response I started tweeting Saturday after the AP called the presidential race, which I share for the first time here on McHenry County Blog:
“As I said to another user earlier this morning, I accept the will of the voters, and accept any candidate’s right to call for a recount and for any irregularities to be checked.”
John Lopez, part of tweet 11/7/20
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And that is where our country is at concerning the presidency, and concerning why the 14th district race remains uncalled in spite of the apparent trend of VBM ballots favoring Congresswoman Lauren Underwood.
I’m going to provide my commentary, analysis and conclusions to not only the 14th district race, but to many comments I’ve seen in threads since the election and on Twitter in coming days, but wanted to share where I stand when it comes to any election.
I’ve read a couple of commenters say they do not come to McHenry County Blog for my analysis, which is an opinion negated by the fact they comment on my articles.
As I have been reminded multiple times, my conclusions, including educated guesses based on facts, does not make my conclusions facts. I’m still going to write about them, and if anyone wants equal time above and beyond comments, please send your submissions to Cal via email.
Lopez, it’s called fake news.
We’re inundated with it!
Even locally with the soon to close NWH.
Lopez – I don’t come to you for political analysis just like I don’t watch Fox News to learn about what’s happening in the world.
I like to see what the ring wingers are saying so I can at least speak the language and have a conversation with you people.
If you don’t check in on Fox News, it’s hard to understand all the conspiracy theories.
Now my beef with you and your coverage is this…. you wrote a post about “Why Jim Oberweis on Threshold of Winning” and why “Underwood seat about to be flipped.”
You wrote this Friday, November 6.
The AP didn’t call the race but you had no problem whatsoever telling the people who come to this site why something was about to happen which is never going to happen.
Now that it’s clear that Underwood has a commanding lead, there’s nothing from you about “Why Lauren Underwood on Threshold of Winning.”
There is nothing from you about “Underwood seat is not about to be flipped.” I don’t care if you wait until the AP calls the race or not.
I don’t care if you recognize the extremely strong position she’s in.
I just want to point out how dumb it is that you wrote these pieces on Nov 6 but then went back to just reporting straight numbers when things went south for Jim.
You talk about “learning lessons” from covering the primary.
A better more believable “lesson learned from the desk of John Lopez” would have been something like,
“On Friday, November 6, 3 days after the election, I made it sound as if Oberweis was in a commanding lead. He was not. I missed the mark. It now appears that Underwood is in a very strong position. Her position is much stronger than Oberweis’ position on Friday. I made a mistake and I will acknowledge that Underwood is likely to win but maybe we should wait.”