Median Strategies acknowledged on Monday that a widely circulated poll showing Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass leading City Council member Nithya Raman by nearly 12 percentage points in the November mayoral runoff was entirely fake, describing it instead as a “short-term social experiment” designed to test how unverified polling information spreads through the political information ecosystem.
The phony poll, released last week, claimed to be based on a survey of 560 Los Angeles voters conducted between July 30 and August 5, with a stated 4.1% margin of error. Bass herself amplified the results in a since-deleted X post from her campaign account, writing “Doing the work, showing up, and gaining momentum. Let’s do this, LA!” The post drew significant engagement before the company’s admission.
Median Strategies’ statement, provided to the Los Angeles Times in response to repeated inquiries, explained the company’s true purpose: “Median Strategies was created as a short term social experiment to examine how purported polling information could enter and spread through the political information ecosystem without independent verification.” The company declined to identify the individuals involved or grant interviews.
The fake poll contained specific claims designed to influence perception of the race. It stated that 16% of respondents had voted for Spencer Pratt, the reality television personality who was eliminated in June’s primary election, and alleged that 85% of those Pratt voters were planning to support Bass in the general election, while only 7% would back Raman. Median Strategies’ accompanying analysis characterized Bass as “the more familiar, more moderate option” compared to Raman, who is aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America.
This wasn’t Median Strategies’ first questionable release. The company had previously published a poll on the Wisconsin gubernatorial race showing Democratic socialist candidate Francesca Hong with a lead of more than 20 percentage points. Hong subsequently lost her election by a significant margin. On August 12, when that inaccuracy became apparent, Median posted: “We got Wisconsin wrong—and by quite a margin too.”
The company began posting on social media on August 9 and had accumulated only about 20 followers before releasing the LA mayor poll three days later. Its initial posts claimed to offer “trustworthy polling, rebuilt” with “no partisan clients, no campaign or party money, numbers that go wherever the data takes them even when it’s inconvenient.”
Bass’s campaign responded to the deception by calling for legal action. A campaign spokesperson stated: “This poll was reported on by a news outlet. Any bad faith attempts to influence elections should be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.” The post has since been deleted. City Controller Kenneth Mejia, who endorsed Raman in the race, had questioned the poll’s credibility when it first circulated, noting that he himself had been the subject of inaccurate polling before winning his own election by a wide margin in June.
Sources
- Los Angeles Times — reported Median Strategies’ admission that the poll was fake, the company’s statement about the social experiment, Bass’s deleted X post, the Wisconsin poll precedent, and the firm’s social media activity
- MyNewsLA — confirmed the fake poll details, the 560-voter sample claim, the 4.1% margin of error, the 16% Pratt voter claim, and Bass campaign’s statement demanding prosecution
- NOTUS — reported Bass’s campaign response, the X post deletion, Spencer Pratt’s social media reaction, and Median’s statement about the social experiment
