Stevens considers resurrecting a couple election ideas

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. Ted Stevens is considering resurrecting a couple of election ideas after reviewing the Nov. 7 election.

Stevens said he believes televised election reports from the East Coast affected voting in Western states. He would like to see uniform polling place hours nationwide. And he wants television stations prohibited from broadcasting information about exit polls.

Stevens said he came up with a similar proposal that passed in the Senate in the 70s but died in the House.

Stevens understands that limiting the media could raise difficult free speech issues.

''It's a very touchy thing,'' he said.

The senator said the Federal Communications Commission could ban exit poll reporting as a condition of obtaining a federal license to broadcast television signals on a particular frequency.

''It's not regulating them, it's conditioning them,'' Stevens said.

Both Stevens and Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, said the exit poll reports were discussed at a Republican strategy meeting in Florida last weekend.

Stevens also said the Internet, which didn't exist when he made his last proposal, would be harder to control because the FCC has no control over who uses it. ''I do not think we could condition the Internet releases,'' he said.

Stevens said something needs to be done about televised exit poll projections, which he said ''influence elections.'' He believes that some Republicans, hearing the networks' incorrect projections that George W. Bush had lost Florida, may have decided not to vote because they thought Al Gore's election was a foregone conclusion.

''Our people just didn't go to vote,'' Stevens said. ''In California, some of the people who were calling to get out the vote just went home.''