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2017 Governor · VA

Emerson College · fieldwork ended 2017-11-03 (4 days before the election) · 810 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 49% · Republican 46%

D+3.0

The certified result

Democrat 53.89% · Republican 44.98%

D+8.9

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 49 − 46 = 3.00
  2. Actual margin = 53.894 − 44.977 = 8.917
  3. Signed miss = 3.00 − (8.917) = -5.917
  4. Absolute miss = |-5.917| = 5.917

The poll overstated the Republican by 5.9 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 50533, race ID 1214 (538 database).