Wedgewood Polls admits fabricating US polling data — Al Jazeera
In the United States, Wedgewood Polls admitted that its data on electoral races in Texas, Ohio, Michigan, Kansas and Maine had been fabricated. The firm, which began operating in June, described its work as an “experimental project” intended to demonstrate the vulnerability of the political polling industry and its low barrier to entry.
As Al Jazeera reports, the admission came after Wedgewood’s results had already circulated among political commentators, campaigns and services that aggregate polling data. The company said it wanted to test how easily invented results could gain the trust of voters and the media, concluding that this happened “too easily.”
Data appeared in The New York Times tracker
The New York Times reported that from June through October, its polling tracker included 15 Wedgewood surveys. After the exposure, the newspaper removed those results. The publication noted that before including the data, the company answered questions about its staff, methodology and funding sources. At the same time, these polls were not used in the newspaper’s own averages for presidential approval or nationwide congressional elections.
The FiftyPlusOne website, which studies polls and election forecasts, drew attention to inconsistencies in the raw data and technical response identifiers. After that, Wedgewood admitted that most of its results had been invented. Data journalist G. Elliott Morris, who took part in the verification, questioned the company’s explanation that it was a “social experiment.”
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Impact on campaigns and the election debate
This is already the second similar case in the 2026 election cycle. In August, Median Strategies also admitted to fabricating results, calling it a short-term social experiment.
Former Democratic Party primary candidate for the US Senate in Michigan Mallory McMorrow said that Wedgewood’s polls, which showed her support in the single digits, harmed her campaign. According to her, volunteers were demoralized, journalists asked whether she should withdraw from the race, and donations declined. In July, she suspended her campaign.
Researchers at the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public recorded that after Wedgewood’s admission, the story spread from polling specialists to influential political commentators and party accounts. Some posts used the scandal to cast doubt on polling in general, including polls that showed Democrats in competitive positions.
Dispute over media responsibility
There is no separate law in the United States that directly criminalizes fake polls. Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr called on broadcasters not to air such data, saying that failure to meet their obligations could jeopardize their licenses. At the same time, Commissioner Anna Gomez stressed that broadcasters should not be punished for good-faith reporting on publicly available results if a poll later proves to be false.
