How the Sentinel’s newsroom is covering this year’s election
Q: How is the Orlando Sentinel covering the 2020 election?
TheOrlando Sentinel has a team of reporters, visual journalists, editors and opinion writers covering the local, state and federal races this year from all angles.
Our group will fan out across the region on ElectionDay, Nov. 3, to bring you the results and reaction. On election night, our staff reporters will be covering local and state races, and we will use the Associated Press and other wire services for some federal races and the presidential election.
You’ll find all the news stories and editorial endorsements written over the past several weeks in our online Voters Guide at orlandosentinel.com/2020. You’ll also find a Spanish language voter guide and daily election coverage from our El Sentinel staff at orlandosentinel.com/ espanol
Q: Where is the data coming from for results on election night?
The Sentinel relies upon results provided directly by county elections offices, the state division of elections andthe Associated Press for results outside our region.
Q: Who’s calling the races on election night?
The Sentinel generally relies on the Associated Press to call state and national races. We also consider what other major news organizations are reporting before we issue a call. For local races, it basically is a matter of math: editors and reporters check the results to see if any candidate has an insurmountable lead. Until that happens, races are considered too close to call. We are never in a hurry to call a race before the outcome is clear.
Q: Will the Sentinel declare a winner in the presidential election on election night?
This year, in particular, we might just have to wait andsee. It all willdependon just how close the race is and whether a candidate has obtained the necessary 270 electoral college votes to win. In Florida, voters havetwodays after the election to fix mail-in ballots rejected for mismatched signatures. Final results in other swing states could take even longer as some of them are not allowed to begin counting mail-in votes until ElectionDay.
Q: Howoften will the election results be updated?
The first results are usually released shortly after the polls close at 7 p.m. EST and consist of the mail-in balloting and early voting that happened before Election Day. The western part of the Panhandle is on Central time, so the first results from those counties don’t come in until 8 p.m. EST. Some counties can finish within a couple of hours, while other more populous ones, especially those in South Florida, can take
longer. Long lines can complicate the situation. State law says if a person is in line by 7 p.m. local time, when polls are scheduled to close, they still must be allowed to vote. So that polling station stays open, delaying its results.
Q: What are the different ways toget themostupdatedresults on election night?
Come to OrlandoSentinel.com on Election Night or download our Orlando Sentinel app and watch the numbers roll in as they
are updated. Individual county election websites also post the numbers, as does the state division of elections. The state site tends to lag behind what you can see at the county level, and it will not put out any results until the final polls close in the Panhandle at 8 p.m. EST. Still, during the primary, the results of some local races were known less than an hour after the polls closed, thanks to the massive influx in early voting – and the ability of the counties to release those results quickly.
Q: What’s the
the difference between Sentinel’s Editorial
Board and the newsroom?
The newsroom consists of reporters, visual journalists and editors whose jobs are to gather information and report news stories in a fair, impartial manner. The Editorial Board is a separate group of people whose job is to produce opinion content, including columns, letters to the editor and editorials, which express the Orlando Sentinel’s institutional opinion. The Editorial Board’s views do not influence how the newsroom reports or covers stories.
Q: Who decides the Orlando Sentinel’s candidate endorsements?
Election endorsements are the opinion of the Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board, which consists of Opinion Editor Mike Lafferty, El Sentinel Editor Jennifer A. Marcial Ocasio, Viewpoints Editor Jay Reddick, editorial writer and columnistDavid Whitley, andEditorin-Chief Julie Anderson. Sentinel Columnist ScottMaxwell participates in interviews with candidates and Editorial Board deliberations.
Decisions are typically reached through a consensus, though some Editorial Board members may ultimately disagree with the outcome.
Q: Do newsroomreporters take part in Editorial Board candidate interviews?
Yes. News reporters are allowed to listen to interviews to collect information for news stories, but they do not participate in the Editorial Board’s process of selecting a candidate for an endorsement.
The candidate interviews — more than 80 of them conducted for the primary and general elections — also are recorded and posted on our website at orlandosentinel. for anyone to watchanddrawtheir ownconclusions.