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2004 President · OH

Columbus Dispatch · fieldwork ended 2004-10-24 (9 days before the election) · 2,880 respondents · Mail

The poll said

Democrat 50% · Republican 50%

even

The certified result

Democrat 48.71% · Republican 50.81%

R+2.1

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 50 − 50 = 0.00
  2. Actual margin = 48.707 − 50.814 = -2.107
  3. Signed miss = 0.00 − (-2.107) = 2.107
  4. Absolute miss = |2.107| = 2.107

The poll overstated the Democrat by 2.1 points and showed a tie.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4579, race ID 790 (538 database).