A polling firm watched by many ahead of the August primary now says they fabricated data as part of what they're calling a social experiment.
The organizers behind Wedgewood Polling say they wanted to demonstrate why the way polling data is "vetted, aggregated and reported must change."
The admission came after an investigation from FiftyPlusOne.
State Senator Mallory McMorrow says a poll from the firm in part led to the suspension of her campaign for U.S. Senate. At the time, other polling firms had listed her trailing in the race, but maybe not quite as behind.
As one of the candidates featured in these polls - the infamous one in late June that showed me plummeting into single digits (which was at odds with our internals) - here's the impact of this "experiment"
— Mallory McMorrow (@MalloryMcMorrow) October 21, 2026
- Donations dried up
- Volunteers were devastated and pleading for… https://t.co/kJL9N7o7X3
Later on in the race, a majority of polls predicted a wide margin of victory for candidate Abdul El-Sayed over Congressman Haley Stevens. After the primary, the results were much closer than expected.
Michigan State University political scientist Corwin Smidt says he's dubious that Wedgewood put out its numbers just as a way to call out the polling ecosystem.
"I don't want to trust that, given that the degree to which they were advertising their results."
He says beyond a potential impact on the race itself, there's also an opportunity for money to be made in increasingly popular prediction markets, like Polymarket or Kalshi where users put money down on the likelihood of future events.
"Releasing a poll allows someone to trade, even insider trading, just within a day and make a lot of money based on sort of claiming to be a polling organization that is viewed as credible by outside outside observers," he said.
When it comes to McMorrow's claims that the fraudulent poll caused donors to pull out and volunteers to get cold feet, Smidt is also not completely convinced. There's much more at play than just one poll, and he thinks there's more important questions about the value we put into polling.
"I think a lot of people are now in our current political environment are looking to the public and polls for validation that in many cases is not what they are meant for," Smidt said.
"And if you are, outside of sort of insider trading and sort of financial, if you need to follow these polls to pay attention to politics, you know, I think you need to question not only sort of whether they might be entirely fake, but even then, how accurate they are, or whether certain events could change in the near future that would then make them irrelevant."
Looking ahead to the general election where polling might be a little more straightforward because people are generally more consistent when it comes to which party they vote for, Smidt still urges caution. Races are tight, and not everyone responds to polling surveys and calls that shape the data.
"There's a lot of room for error, and those swings don't necessarily indicate a swing in support," he said. "We are within the margin of error is a simple way of looking at it."
As of Thursday morning, nearly a million Michiganders have already cast their ballots for the November election, at a turnout rate of 12.4% so far.
Interview Transcript
Sophia Saliby: A polling firm watched by many ahead of the August primary now says they fabricated data as part of what they're calling a social experiment.
The organizers behind Wedgewood Polling say they wanted to demonstrate why the way polling data is vetted aggregated and reported must change.
State Senator Mallory McMorrow says a poll from the firm in part led to the suspension of her campaign for U.S. Senate.
We talked to Michigan State University political scientist Corwin Smidt right after the primary to talk about why pollsters got the results of the Senate primary so wrong. He joins us now to talk about this latest development. Hello.
Corwin Smidt: Hi Sophia. How are you?
Saliby: I'm doing good, thanks. So, what happened here? Do you buy this story of of Wedgwood being a a social experiment?
Smidt: No, I don't. I don't want to trust that, given that the degree to which they were advertising their results. It seems to me that they have some press release that they're trying to just sort of shoot out to cover themselves for a little bit.
It sounds to me something like, you know, legally, they can try to claim and not be accused of a crime as of now, but who knows? Maybe they could still be accused of a crime with this excuse.
Saliby: Are bad actors like this common in polling? I think you mentioned offline that this has happened before. Was it the same kind of impetus?
Smidt: Yeah, there's been notable cases of this before. Leading up to the 2008 presidential election, there were some polling firms, a polling firm that was releasing a lot of information, and it seemingly didn't have any data to it, and that was sort of audited and sort of claimed by people, online sleuths, incredible academics as sort of being fake, and it came out that they were using that to sort of sell business and sort of opportunities. And whether they were actually performing polling services from anyone is unclear, but as a way of them getting advertising, essentially.
Now, in this case, the concern we have, or the concern many people have is that not only is polling sort of influencing the race or a way of advertising, but it could also influence, there's a lot of money to be made on these prediction markets with micro-movements and volatility.
And releasing a poll allows someone to trade even insider trading just within a day and make a lot of money based on sort of claiming to be a polling organization that is viewed as credible by outside outside observers.
Saliby: Senator McMorrow and others associated with her Senate bid are blaming this kind of polling for her losing momentum and funding in the race.
And I've seen others say it can't be the only factor in a failed campaign. You can't just chalk it up to bad polling. You know, can it tank a campaign if your numbers aren't good?
Smidt: I'm sympathetic to that sort of claim, although I find it somewhat, I don't find that the most sort of important thing to consider for us. I can imagine a poll getting released publicly that shows bad things, and that sort of influencing supporters, who then talk to that candidate and say, "Why are you still running? So, that would be added work for the candidate to sort of engage with.
However, the candidates usually have, you know, you're in it not to necessarily win. I tell my students this all the time, politics is not about winning in a lot of cases, it's about ideas. And if it is about winning, you shouldn't vote. And so, in many cases, I think the question we have with this is I think a lot of people are now in our current political environment are looking to the public and polls for validation that in many cases is not what they are meant for.
And if you are, outside of sort of insider trading and sort of financial, if you need to follow these polls to pay attention to politics, you know, I think you need to question not only sort of whether they might be entirely fake, but even then, how accurate they are, or whether certain events could change in the near future that would then make them irrelevant.
Saliby: To end our conversation, when we last talked, you mentioned how people are a lot more consistent when it comes to voting in general elections compared to primaries, so polling is kind of easier to do. It's easier to predict how people will will cast their ballot.
What should voters watch out for when it comes to polls this close to an election when voting has already started?
Smidt: I mean that's a good question. One, don't look at it as to some idea of some late break. Right now, the election is very, we have a, we're in a purple state, a closely divided state with at least one closely contested election statewide. There is significant room for error right now in terms of asking people if they voted, have they already voted, do they intend to vote, who's early voting.
There's a lot of people who vote. My parents have voted and left the state. They're not even here. They can't take a poll right now to say who they're voting for. So, there's a lot of room for error, and those swings don't necessarily indicate a swing in support. We are within the margin of error is a simple way of looking at it. And while you might, depending on certain things that might happen, it might be interesting to see how people react in the contents of the poll.
The overall outcome or the overall indication about who might be in the lead or behind is something that, at this point, it's so close. They've been fairly stable. There's no real value in trying to eke out maybe sort of seeing one percentage point gain to some effect.
Saliby: Corwin Smidt is an MSU political scientist. Thank you for joining us.
Smidt: You're welcome. Thank you.
This conversation has been edited for clarity and conciseness.
