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2008 Senate · VA

Public Policy Polling · fieldwork ended 2008-11-01 (3 days before the election) · 1,557 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 62% · Republican 36%

D+26.0

The certified result

Democrat 65.03% · Republican 33.73%

D+31.3

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 62 − 36 = 26.00
  2. Actual margin = 65.033 − 33.729 = 31.304
  3. Signed miss = 26.00 − (31.304) = -5.304
  4. Absolute miss = |-5.304| = 5.304

The poll overstated the Republican by 5.3 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16422, race ID 1577 (538 database).