The 2002 Debrief · post-mortem · permanent archive
How did the polling industry do this cycle?
The 2002 industry MAE landed at 4.0pt — graded across 33 historical races with a known outcome — and 31 polls were analyzed across 14 pollsters. Signed bias −2.65pt: pollsters again systematically over-predicted Democrats.
INDUSTRY MAE
4.0pt
vs midterm avg
SIGNED BIAS
−2.65pt
D-leaning
POLLS · POLLSTERS
31
14 firms
RACES SCORED
33
w/ known outcome
Industry mean absolute error · 2002–2002
Per-pollster scorecard · 2002 · sorted by MAE
Signed bias · ±4.8pt
MAE · 0–4.8pt
Biggest-miss races · 2002
| Race | Expected | Actual | Miss | Direction |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| us-senate-2002-tx | R+8.50 | R+11.97 | -3.5pt | R-margin underestimate |
| us-senate-2002-nh | R+1.50 | R+4.45 | -3.0pt | R-margin underestimate |
| us-senate-2002-nj | D+9.00 | D+9.93 | 0.9pt | D-margin underestimate |