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News Organizations Sue Minnesota for Access to Voters
By Lily Garza
October 8, 2008
As the election nears, state and local governments are preparing for the possible chaos of November 4. Minnesota even went so far as to pass a law restricting press access to the voting sites. This landed them in hot water with many news organizations.
On Monday, September 28, six news organizations, including the Associated Press, ABC, NBC,CBS, CNN and Fox News, sued the state of Minnesota for the right to conduct exit interviews outside the polls. The state law, passed in April, bars anyone other than voters and election officials from standing within 100 feet of the polls. The media claims that the law violates their first amendment rights to gather information regarding the political process.
Without direct access to voters, the news groups claim that they will not be able to obtain good exit poll interviews, which they use to determine how and why people voted, to analyze political and social trends, and to predict the outcome of the elections.
Susan Buckley, a lawyer for the news organizations, said that distance from the polls will cause the reporters’ information to be inaccurate and unreliable because voters will just melt into the crowd or get into their cars and leave before exit pollsters can interview them, according to the Associated Press.
The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Minneapolis, asks the court to declare the law unconstitutional and to block the state from enforcing it on Election Day.
“Plaintiffs expect there to be enormous and unprecedented public interest in this year's general election and intend to cover it closely and in great depth," the news organizations said in supporting papers. "Their reporting will cover much more than simply the outcome of the election. It will also include comprehensive analyses of the various factors that influenced the electorate, such as race and gender, the economic crisis, and the war in Iraq, among others. This reporting will be valuable not only for our present understanding of this historic election; it will also inform the analysis of historians, social scientists, and others who will study the results for years to come."
The lawsuit was filed after the news organizations contacted the Secretary of State’s office to ask if they would be exempt from the law’s 100-foot restriction. They were told they would not be allowed as long as the law was intact.
Minnesota is the only state that has such a restriction in the current election. However, according to Buckley, this lawsuit is the 12th of its kind and has been brought in 10 different states. Courts in all 10 previous cases ruled that laws restricting exit polling activities violated the first amendment.
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