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2004 President · MI

Mitchell Research & Communications · fieldwork ended 2004-10-18 (15 days before the election) · 400 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 43% · Republican 47%

R+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 51.23% · Republican 47.81%

D+3.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 43 − 47 = -4.00
  2. Actual margin = 51.231 − 47.812 = 3.419
  3. Signed miss = -4.00 − (3.419) = -7.419
  4. Absolute miss = |-7.419| = 7.419

The poll overstated the Republican by 7.4 points and had the wrong leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4591, race ID 777 (538 database).