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2002 Senate · CO

SurveyUSA · fieldwork ended 2002-11-01 (4 days before the election) · 739 respondents · IVR

The poll said

Democrat 46% · Republican 50%

R+4.0

The certified result

Democrat 45.77% · Republican 50.70%

R+4.9

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 46 − 50 = -4.00
  2. Actual margin = 45.769 − 50.696 = -4.927
  3. Signed miss = -4.00 − (-4.927) = 0.926
  4. Absolute miss = |0.926| = 0.926

The poll overstated the Democrat by 0.9 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 63770, race ID 1651 (538 database).