Now-Defunct Fake Polling Company Released Fake Polls As a 'Social Experiment'

My fellow guinea pigs! Stand up and be counted! We have only our lab coats to lose!

I have been writing about politics for more than 50 years, and I've never heard anything more outrageously dangerous in my career. A "polling company," Median Strategies, now out of business, posted on its website that it was set up as a "social experiment" (it says) to "examine how purported polling information could enter and spread through the political information ecosystem without independent verification," according to Fox News. "Median Strategies has concluded its polling project and will not publish additional polls."

Median Strategies published two polls. One was in the Wisconsin governor's race, where DSA candidate and state Sen. Francesca Hong had a 20-point lead over Milwaukee County executive David Crowley. The other was in the Los Angeles mayoral race, where the fake poll showed incumbent Mayor Karen Bass 12 points ahead of Nithya Raman in the June primary.

Hong lost to Crowley by less than a percentage point, while Bass nipped Raman by five points. Bass and Raman will be in a runoff election in November.

Median Strategies first released a poll showing Bass with a 12-point lead over Los Angeles City Council member Nithya Raman, a rival in the June mayoral primary and a Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) member. The poll cited the responses of 560 Angelenos, with a 4.1% margin of error.
Bass ended up edging Raman by five points in the primary, with Republican Spencer Pratt, who was running as an independent in the Democrat-dominated city, coming in third. The mayor and Raman will face off in the general election.

The New York Times reports that "the Median Strategies results [in Wisconsin] were largely in line with the other public polls, all of which greatly underestimated Ms. Hong’s opponent, David Crowley, igniting a wave of criticism of the value of primary polling."

Who are these guys? Fox News reports "the organization was not affiliated with any candidate, political action committee or party." They have refused all requests for interviews and have dropped off the edge of the world, for all intents and purposes.

What did they hope to accomplish?

“It doesn’t make sense as a social experiment; what are you measuring?” said Mia Costa, a government professor at Dartmouth College. “How do you know who was exposed and who wasn’t? This is just wreaking havoc in an election with real stakes and no real interest in understanding the effects of what you are doing.”

Was it some kind of polling geek hoax? Not likely, since it took some real money to set it up.

“The bar to doing a poll has gotten so low that it’s easy to get through without adhering to typical industry standards,” said Josh Pasek, a political science professor at the University of Michigan. “As a result, these bad actors can quickly manipulate our understanding of a race.”

New York Times:

The fake polls, which were first reported on by The Los Angeles Times, also drew attention to the increasing reliance on low-quality polls and betting markets to inform the public’s understanding in races where little information is otherwise available. Additionally, it calls into question how information of varying quality might move the needle in betting markets like Kalshi and Polymarket.
“The ability to manipulate even a marginal amount of information can have a disproportionate impact on the markets,” Dr. Pasek said.
Ms. Bass’s election odds showed slight improvement in the betting markets after the Median Strategies poll was reported, while no changes were seen in Wisconsin. In its statement, Median Strategies claimed that no one involved received any compensation or financial benefit from the project, and that none of those involved held or traded any position in the various prediction or betting mechanisms.

“Thank you for your understanding," the Median Strategies explanation statement ended. Except no one understands, and almost everyone is mad. If the subtle message was to expose the polling game, it failed because most mainstream media outlets didn't run it or pay any attention to it.

Most, but not all. That's why responsible news outlets require new polling outfits to provide details on their methodology.

It should be a lesson to all media to trust nothing and verify everything.

Editor's Note: Do you enjoy PJ Media's conservative reporting exposing the radical left and woke media? Support our work so we can keep bringing you the truth.

Join PJ Media VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.