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2008 President · WA

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2008-11-01 (3 days before the election) · 663 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 56% · Republican 40%

D+16.0

The certified result

Democrat 57.65% · Republican 40.48%

D+17.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 56 − 40 = 16.00
  2. Actual margin = 57.653 − 40.476 = 17.177
  3. Signed miss = 16.00 − (17.177) = -1.177
  4. Absolute miss = |-1.177| = 1.177

The poll overstated the Republican by 1.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 16437, race ID 751 (538 database).