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2020 President · PA

Suffolk University · fieldwork ended 2020-10-17 (17 days before the election) · 500 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 48.6% · Republican 42.4%

D+6.2

The certified result

Democrat 50.01% · Republican 48.84%

D+1.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 48.6 − 42.4 = 6.20
  2. Actual margin = 50.008 − 48.844 = 1.164
  3. Signed miss = 6.20 − (1.164) = 5.035
  4. Absolute miss = |5.035| = 5.035

The poll overstated the Democrat by 5.0 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 71533, race ID 6249 (538 database).