New Monmouth*Monmouth* poll in Colorado: Trump trails by a strong margin
By MonmouthMonmouth released the results of a new poll, in which respondents from Colorado were asked for whom they will vote: Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump.
In Colorado, the election outcome is often close. This is the reason why the state is commonly referred to as a purple state, which makes it particularly interesting from a forecasting perspective.
MonmouthMonmouth poll results
According to the results, 48.0% of respondents intend to cast a ballot for former First Lady Hillary Clinton, whereas 35.0% are going to vote for businessman Donald Trump.
The poll was carried out from July 9 to July 12 with 404 likely voters. Given the poll's margin of error of +/-4.9 percentage points, the difference between both candidates is statistically significant.
Putting the results in context
As a general rule, however, one should not have too much faith in the results of single polls, as they can incorporate large errors. Instead of relying on results from single polls, research in forecasting recommends to consult combined polls or, even better, the combined PollyVote forecast that includes forecasts from different methods, each of which draws upon different data.
In order to make the results comparable to forecasts from benchmark methods, one can convert them into shares of the two-party vote. This yields figures of 57.8% for Clinton and 42.2% for Trump.
Results vs. other polls
An average of recent polls in Colorado sees Clinton at 55.9% of the two-party vote. This value is 1.9 percentage points lower than her respective numbers in the MonmouthMonmouth poll. This deviation is within the poll's margin of error, which suggests that the poll is not an outlier.
Comparison to the combined PollyVote
The latest PollyVote anticipates Clinton to gain 53.4% of the two-party vote in Colorado. Hence, Polly's combined forecast is 4.4 points below her polling numbers. The PollyVote forecast is therefore within the poll's margin of error.
