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2016 House · SD-1

Nielson Brothers Polling · fieldwork ended 2016-10-25 (14 days before the election) · 600 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 41% · Republican 51%

R+10.0

The certified result

Democrat 35.90% · Republican 64.10%

R+28.2

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 41 − 51 = -10.00
  2. Actual margin = 35.897 − 64.103 = -28.206
  3. Signed miss = -10.00 − (-28.206) = 18.206
  4. Absolute miss = |18.206| = 18.206

The poll overstated the Democrat by 18.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 47873, race ID 6122 (538 database).