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2009 Governor · NJ

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2009-10-27 (7 days before the election) · 640 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 43% · Republican 43%

even

The certified result

Democrat 44.88% · Republican 48.46%

R+3.6

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 43 − 43 = 0.00
  2. Actual margin = 44.879 − 48.457 = -3.578
  3. Signed miss = 0.00 − (-3.578) = 3.578
  4. Absolute miss = |3.578| = 3.578

The poll overstated the Democrat by 3.6 points and showed a tie.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 63787, race ID 1311 (538 database).