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2004 President · national

Zogby Analytics · fieldwork ended 2004-11-01 (1 days before the election) · 955 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 49.1% · Republican 49.4%

R+0.3

The certified result

Democrat 48.13% · Republican 50.57%

R+2.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 49.1 − 49.4 = -0.30
  2. Actual margin = 48.130 − 50.573 = -2.443
  3. Signed miss = -0.30 − (-2.443) = 2.144
  4. Absolute miss = |2.144| = 2.144

The poll overstated the Democrat by 2.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 63864, race ID 39 (538 database).