Skip to content

2020 Senate · AL

Morning Consult · fieldwork ended 2020-10-26 (8 days before the election) · 850 respondents · Online Panel

The poll said

Democrat 39% · Republican 51.1%

R+12.1

The certified result

Democrat 39.74% · Republican 60.09%

R+20.4

The arithmetic

  1. Poll margin = 39 − 51.1 = -12.10
  2. Actual margin = 39.737 − 60.095 = -20.358
  3. Signed miss = -12.10 − (-20.358) = 8.259
  4. Absolute miss = |8.259| = 8.259

The poll overstated the Democrat by 8.3 points and had the right leader.

Where these numbers come from

Poll and result: 538 raw_polls.csv. Poll ID 72617, race ID 6266 (538 database).