Bush-Cheney campaign officials said today that Bush advisor Karl Rove, working with chief of staff Andy Card and national security advisor Condi Rice out of the White House, took the lead Tuesday in refuting early media exit polls showing a big election night loss for President Bush. Officials said the trio, from the Old Family Dining Room, were glued to computers showing GOP exit polling data that conflicted with the early media polls that found Bush losing big in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Florida. Rove, working though the Republican information, found that the polls were flawed, especially in that they were not counting men proportionally. He and others sent out word that the polls were wrong, just as calls were coming in from gloomy aides around the nation.
Bush officials said that they got their message out at about 3 p.m., and memos from White House surrogates started filling GOP Blackberries criticizing the polls and explaining that the president was actually doing better than they showed. "We had good solid numbers," said an insider. "We were always running ahead" of Sen. John Kerry. Armed with the info, the White House blasted out talking points "just to keep our people up," said an official. –Paul Bedard, U.S. News
