In a post last August called ‘Fake polling as a “short term social experiment”’, I discussed how a company called Median Strategies deliberately released fake polling data that put progressive Francesca Hong ahead in the primary to find the Democratic nominee for governor of Wisconsin. In that post I said, “Polls are frequently wrong, they are sometimes skewed by the political biases of the people who set the questions and interpret the answers, but they are not generally made up.”
I stand by that “not generally”, but I, um, might have to downgrade my estimate of the notgenerallyness. There’s been another one. Via a tweet from Geiger Capital:
Absolutely incredible…
"Wedgewood Polls" just admitted they are a fake polling firm and made up their polls.
Their fake polls have been posted in both the NYT and Nate Silver’s averages. pic.twitter.com/ceZU2NdpK5
— Geiger Capital (@Geiger_Capital) October 21, 2026
“WEDGEWOOD POLLING, an experimental project to demonstrate the vulnerabilities, lack of oversight and overall low barrier to entry in the modern political polling industry, makes this public statement.
Why We Did This
Having previously worked in the polling and research sector, we watched as the public’s trust in polling eroded alongside a rise in unverified, low-quality methodology. We wanted to test a simple hypothesis:How easy is it for an entirely fabricated polling firm to gain traction, be taken seriously, and expose how little scrutinization exists in media and public commentary?
The short answer: Far too easy.”
UPDATE: The plot thickens. G. Elliot Morris of the polling aggregation site Fifty Plus One tweets, ‘We were investigating Wedgewood for faking their data and emailed them for comment this morning, ahead of publishing the findings tomorrow. They are trying to cover up their fraud with the “we were doing a social experiment” excuse.’
Fifty Plus One’s statement begins:
On Tuesday, Oct. 20, FiftyPlusOne reached out to Wedgewood Polls, a self-professed polling firm, with a request for comment on an investigation we had conducted into their alleged survey research. They did not respond to our request, but instead posted a public statement on social media admitting that they had been fabricating data. They also reached out directly in social media DMs minutes before publishing their memo with an official comment: “Fuck you,” plus the name of an individual not affiliated with FiftyPlusOne.
Their statement alleges that FiftyPlusOne, the New York Times, and other poll aggregators did not conduct appropriate vetting of their firm prior to aggregating their polls; this is false. We reached out to them to ask who they were and confirm the methodology statement on their website. We were given two names, Jack Sims and Andrew Prater. We were able to independently confirm that Sims had previous experience in the polling industry and reviewed their methodology statement in detail. It is not atypical for a pollster to leave an existing firm, form their own, and self-fund some surveys to build reputation; we had no reason at the time to believe this case was any different. Wedgewood operated as if it were a legitimate polling firm, including collecting money from donors to conduct crowd-funded polls, and sharing raw survey data (which we now have confirmed was fraudulent) with FiftyPlusOne on Oct. 15, 2026.
Below is the article that we intended to publish tomorrow, Oct. 21, 2026. We had given Wedgewood until midnight to respond to our questions. We have lightly edited the piece to acknowledge Wedgewood Polls’ admission of guilt.
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