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2009 Governor · VA

Scott Rasmussen (Rasmussen Reports) · fieldwork ended 2009-10-27 (7 days before the election) · 1,000 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 41% · Republican 54%

R+13.0

The certified result

Democrat 41.26% · Republican 58.62%

R+17.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 41 − 54 = -13.00
  2. Actual margin = 41.255 − 58.619 = -17.364
  3. Signed miss = -13.00 − (-17.364) = 4.364
  4. Absolute miss = |4.364| = 4.364

The poll overstated the Democrat by 4.4 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 63755, race ID 1312 (538 database).