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2004 President · CO

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2004-10-31 (2 days before the election) · 705 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 47% · Republican 50%

R+3.0

The certified result

Democrat 47.04% · Republican 51.71%

R+4.7

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 47 − 50 = -3.00
  2. Actual margin = 47.038 − 51.711 = -4.673
  3. Signed miss = -3.00 − (-4.673) = 1.673
  4. Absolute miss = |1.673| = 1.673

The poll overstated the Democrat by 1.7 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4298, race ID 760 (538 database).