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2016 Senate · LA

Trafalgar Group · fieldwork ended 2016-12-05 (5 days before the election) · 2,500 respondents · IVR · partisan sponsor (REP)

The poll said

Democrat 39.77% · Republican 55.88%

R+16.1

The certified result

Democrat 39.34% · Republican 60.66%

R+21.3

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 39.77 − 55.88 = -16.11
  2. Actual margin = 39.345 − 60.655 = -21.310
  3. Signed miss = -16.11 − (-21.310) = 5.199
  4. Absolute miss = |5.199| = 5.199

The poll overstated the Democrat by 5.2 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 52341, race ID 1469 (538 database).