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2008 Senate · MT

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2008-10-25 (10 days before the election) · 368 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 60% · Republican 32%

D+28.0

The certified result

Democrat 72.92% · Republican 27.08%

D+45.8

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 60 − 32 = 28.00
  2. Actual margin = 72.916 − 27.084 = 45.832
  3. Signed miss = 28.00 − (45.832) = -17.832
  4. Absolute miss = |-17.832| = 17.832

The poll overstated the Republican by 17.8 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16491, race ID 1564 (538 database).