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2004 President · OK

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2004-10-19 (14 days before the election) · 627 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 34% · Republican 64%

R+30.0

The certified result

Democrat 34.43% · Republican 65.57%

R+31.1

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 34 − 64 = -30.00
  2. Actual margin = 34.430 − 65.570 = -31.140
  3. Signed miss = -30.00 − (-31.140) = 1.141
  4. Absolute miss = |1.141| = 1.141

The poll overstated the Democrat by 1.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4613, race ID 791 (538 database).