The VNS included major United States television networks and newspapers:
A possibly unwritten secondary mission of the Voter News Service was to provide election results as quickly as possible on election night - a point which came to haunt the VNS in the 2000 Presidential Election.The VNS received intense criticism for its 'flip-flop' calling of the state of Florida in that election. During the course of the evening, it first called the closely contested state of Florida for Al Gore, then George W. Bush, and then as 'too close to call'. Critics argued that the state should never have been called until the state's fate was clear. The Voter News Service also received specific criticism for calling the state of Florida for George W. Bush before the polls closed in the Florida panhandle, which was located in the Central time zone.
In 2002, the VNS intended to make calls in the November U.S. Congressional and Senate elections. It attempted to use a computer designed for VNS by an outside contractor to do this. A system failure occurred in this computer on election night, making quick delivery of data impossible. In fact, collecting and delivering the data took ten months.
The Voter News Service's failures in 2000 and 2002 caused the service to be disbanded.
In the 2004 presidential election, the plan is to have exit polling done by two veteran polling experts; vote counting will be handled for the television networks by the Associated Press.