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2012 President · VA

Ipsos · fieldwork ended 2012-11-01 (5 days before the election) · 1,197 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 49% · Republican 40%

D+9.0

The certified result

Democrat 51.16% · Republican 47.28%

D+3.9

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 49 − 40 = 9.00
  2. Actual margin = 51.156 − 47.283 = 3.873
  3. Signed miss = 9.00 − (3.873) = 5.127
  4. Absolute miss = |5.127| = 5.127

The poll overstated the Democrat by 5.1 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 30598, race ID 698 (538 database).