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2004 Senate · SD

Scott Rasmussen (Rasmussen Reports) · fieldwork ended 2004-10-12 (21 days before the election) · 500 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 49% · Republican 49%

even

The certified result

Democrat 49.42% · Republican 50.58%

R+1.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 49 − 49 = 0.00
  2. Actual margin = 49.424 − 50.576 = -1.152
  3. Signed miss = 0.00 − (-1.152) = 1.152
  4. Absolute miss = |1.152| = 1.152

The poll overstated the Democrat by 1.2 points and showed a tie.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 4705, race ID 1643 (538 database).