As the day passes on this 2010 Election, and voters begin filing out of the booths, many of them will turn on the news, or search the web for exit poll results. Exit polls are given to voters after they cast their ballots. The polls will ask who they voted for. The purpose of an Exit poll is not really to provide news outlets a means to air an estimate of who has a lead, but rather to provide the board of elections a means to obtain demographic info on those voters who turned out, as well as make sure there is no voter fraud taking place.

As you begin to search online as well as turn on the various live news coverages of this election, you may want to note that there is a quarantine on exit polls which will be lifted at 5:30 PM. Because election officials do not want voters, who are casting their ballots later in the day, to be influenced by exit poll results, they set up this quarantine. The exit poll results will come in three waves. The first and second waves will present only a small fraction of data gathered earlier in the day. The third and final wave of results will only come in after polls have closed. In these, poll sample sizes are over 2,000 and can usually paint a good picture on how each candidate has fared. The first polls will close in Florida at 7 PM EST.