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2004 President · PA

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2004-10-16 (17 days before the election) · 619 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 51% · Republican 45%

D+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 50.92% · Republican 48.42%

D+2.5

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 51 − 45 = 6.00
  2. Actual margin = 50.924 − 48.424 = 2.500
  3. Signed miss = 6.00 − (2.500) = 3.500
  4. Absolute miss = |3.500| = 3.500

The poll overstated the Democrat by 3.5 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4666, race ID 793 (538 database).