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2002 Senate · MN

Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy · fieldwork ended 2002-10-31 (5 days before the election) · 625 respondents · Live Phone

The poll said

Democrat 41% · Republican 47%

R+6.0

The certified result

Democrat 47.34% · Republican 49.53%

R+2.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 41 − 47 = -6.00
  2. Actual margin = 47.336 − 49.529 = -2.193
  3. Signed miss = -6.00 − (-2.193) = -3.807
  4. Absolute miss = |-3.807| = 3.807

The poll overstated the Republican by 3.8 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 25524, race ID 1664 (538 database).