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2009 Governor · VA

YouGov · fieldwork ended 2009-10-29 (5 days before the election) · 742 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 40% · Republican 53%

R+13.0

The certified result

Democrat 41.26% · Republican 58.62%

R+17.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 40 − 53 = -13.00
  2. Actual margin = 41.255 − 58.619 = -17.364
  3. Signed miss = -13.00 − (-17.364) = 4.364
  4. Absolute miss = |4.364| = 4.364

The poll overstated the Democrat by 4.4 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 63901, race ID 1312 (538 database).