Ohio: Clinton tied with Trump in new Emerson poll
By Results of a new poll conducted by Emerson were circulated. The poll asked interviewees from Ohio for whom they will vote: Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton or Republican candidate Donald Trump.
Ohio is traditionally a swing state, where Republicans and Democrats have historically achieved similar levels of support among voters. This is why the election outcome here is viewed as critical in determining the overall result of the presidential election.
Emerson poll results
According to the results, real estate developer Donald Trump and former New York Senator Hillary Clinton have identical levels of support, each with 43.0% of the vote.
The poll was conducted from August 25 to August 27. A total of 800 likely voters responded. The sampling error is +/-3.4 percentage points. This means that the levels of voter support for both candidates do not differ significantly.
Putting the results in context
Individual polls can include substantial biases, and should be treated with caution. At least, one should examine how a poll's results compare to benchmark forecasts.
In order to make the results comparable to benchmark forecasts, one can convert them into two-party vote shares. The results of the actual poll mean 50.0 % for Clinton and 50.0 % for Trump for the two-party vote share.
Comparison to other polls
An average of recent polls in Ohio has Clinton at 49.4% of the two-party vote. In comparison to the average forecast of other polls Clinton performed 0.6 percentage points better in the poll. This deviation is outside the poll's margin of error, which suggests that the poll is an outlier.
The poll in comparison with PollyVote's forecast
The most recent PollyVote predicts Clinton to gain 51.3% and Trump 48.7% of the two-party vote in Ohio. Clinton has 1.3 percentage points less when the results of the poll are compared to the combined PollyVote forecast for Ohio. The PollyVote forecast is thus outside the poll's margin of error.
