Sekulow

Will Haynes: Today on Seculo, just when you thought the fake polling scandal couldn't get any stranger, another firm adds chaos to the midterms.
Announcer: Keeping you informed and engaged now more than ever. This is Seculo. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host.
Will Haynes: Welcome to Seculo. It's Friday, folks. We made it. I am live today. This is not a re-air of earlier in the week, even though the the content you may think it would be. This is now the third firm that has been called out for let's say less than reliable information when it comes to polling. We talked earlier in this week about median strategies that was back in August that got caught and admitted that they were putting out fake polls as an experiment. Then earlier this week, we talked about Wedgwood polls, which was featured by the New York Times. It was featured by Nate Silver, MS Now. They got caught and they put out a large statement about their experiment. And now we find out that a third firm, SoCal Strategies, which has been around longer than the previous two, is having some interesting things happen with them. 50 + 1, the outlet that is an aggregator, they do election forecasting, aggregation of polls, and political analysis as a part of the post Wedgwood scandal, started looking into SoCal Strategies about some of their polls that they had questions about. And they were told by someone at the company that they were talking to, give me until Friday and I'll give you all the underlying data. I'll get it. We're really busy. It's midterm season, but yeah, these questions you have, I'll get you all the cross tabs. I'll get all the data you need to show the legitimacy of the poll in question. That was Wednesday night. Yesterday, SoCal Strategies took down their website, their X account, their Substack. They disappeared from the internet after being questioned by 50 + 1 about a couple of polls. Not all the polls. Even it says that 50 + 1 says a lot of their surveys we actually are kind of leaving in our model because we still have confidence that the poll was real. Something strange is going on right now with this midterm election and this polling. We're going to get to the heart of it in the next segment. So I want you to give me a call, though. Is this surprising to you that it's this blatant and brazen, this close to an election that we're seeing multiple firms that are are admitting they were fraudulent, that they were fake polls and they their their motives they say were were pure at heart trying to show that there's a problem in the polling industry and the media vetting of that. Now the those companies that say they vet them are pushing back on that narrative. We'll talk about that as well. But this now takes a what seems to be almost a more bizarre sinister turn when it wasn't that they were caught by 50 + 1 and then they tried to put out a statement very similar to Wedgwood of saying, look, we're trying to test the controls here. We're trying to test to see what can get through and what can't and how you know how how scrutinizing the media is over the polls that are getting out there. No, they just ghosted the world. They said we're done here. Take down our website, take down our Twitter account, our X account, take down our Substack. So something is going on. And and I know that things get interesting and weird around elections that there are people that try to use election time for their own financial benefit, for their own notoriety. But this seems very very strange. And we're going to get to it more in the next segment as I go over what 50 + 1 found about SoCal Strategies and how that relates to Wedgwood polling that we talked about earlier in the week, as well as all of this just 11 days from election day. Give me a call, 1-800-684-3110 to talk to me on air about this and so much more. Jordan Seculo joining me in a few segments from Washington D.C. as well as Mike Pompeo joining me later in the broadcast. It's a packed show for a Friday and I want to hear from you. 1-800-684-3110. We'll be right back on Seculo.
Jay Sekulow: The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, and our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. For decades now, the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms, defending your rights in courts, in Congress, and in the public arena. And we have an exceptional track record of success. But here's the bottom line. We could not do our work without your support. We remain committed to protecting your religious and constitutional freedoms. That remains our top priority, especially now during these challenging times. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side. If you're already a member, thank you. And if you're not, well, this is the perfect time to stand with us at aclj.org where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today. aclj.org
Announcer: Welcome to the all-new ACLJ app. Expert analysis and insight big tech can't censor. Customize your news and get real-time alerts on the issues you care about. Advocacy is now at your fingertips. Take action, make a difference, support the causes you care about with just one tap. Be the first to know. Breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox. Everything you need all in one place. Stay informed, stay empowered. Download today. We are so excited to announce the ACLJ's brand new app, completely redesigned to provide you with the best tools available to partner with us at the ACLJ. You can watch the daily Seculo program, sign the petitions, customize your ACLJ membership experience, donate with a click of a button, and receive up-to-the-minute critical updates that the mainstream media can't censor. Just scan the QR code on your screen or go to your phone's App Store, search ACLJ, and click install. It's that simple.
Will Haynes: Welcome back to Seculo as we dig deeper into this polling scandal that is really running rampant through the national media, the election cycle, the campaigns of both Democrats and Republicans right now. I mean, we we talked about how some of these polls they they encouraged the national parties and candidates and things of that nature to spend money places they wouldn't have spent because of of the polling data that started coming out of this. And you're also starting to see a mea culpa from a lot of the pollsters and news organizations. You're starting to see that they're saying, no, no, no, we do actually scrutinize these polls. Like Nate Silver, whom has made his entire business model on polling data and statistical analysis, he he put out a long multi-post thread on X about how, you know, what's going on with Wedgwood, that they they are lying when they say there isn't vetting going on. Well, certainly there's vetting. Like I don't think they said there's zero vetting, but clearly the scrutiny that are being given to these companies are in some cases not enough to get over what's happening here. And his whole point is that, you know, the New York Times extensively vets new pollsters. Well, the New York Times included 15 different polls from Wedgwood and said that, you know, 50 + 1 caught them. So therefore they they were caught and exposed. Right, but after a lot of damage was done depending on who you are talking about. But the other situation here is that he says and I want to get to this is that how a lot of I think direct quote was that a lot of attention or or there's a tendency to overstate the influence of Wedgwood. Now these are people trying to get on the defensive. Instead of, you know what, I think a lot of these people should be like, let do a full audit of what we're looking at here. Even the legacy pollsters that we have a relationship with, let's do a full audit of what's going on here. If you really want polling to be reliable and to continue in this and and not have unfortunately like the government tried to step in and regulate it, which I think could be a big mistake, then you know what, maybe you shouldn't say I think there's a tendency to overstate the influence of Wedgwood. He said they're pretty obscure and though though fairly prolific. It's almost always best not to give any individual pollster undue attention, especially if they have no track record. That's fine if he had rated their influence in his own methodology very low. But in some cases, it was the most influential poll in his model. So I think this should be a reckoning for the media and for those in in the in the political prognosticating business to start to really do some soul searching instead of saying no, I do it right and I get it right. And even though I may be off sometimes, that's the natural variance of statistical analysis and I have done everything right. Instead say, yeah, this got its way into my model and I weighted it heavily in some places. Some places it was the most influential poll. I don't see how this industry is going to regain credibility by not admitting what happened here is a big disaster because it at this point we know of three sketchy situations. We know that Median Strategies during the primaries admitted that they were not an actual polling firm. And those were polls that were touted by candidates on the campaign trail to raise money to prove that they were rising in the polls. And and it worked to some degree. On the flip side, you have then Wedgwood polling which this week admitted that they were not real and that they were doing this as an experiment. And what happens? What you saw that it caused the national party to spend in Mississippi. You saw different strategies based off this data and and it really also start to shift other pollsters. Once this poll came out, there are patterns people are pointing out of of more quote-unquote reliable pollsters starting to coalesce around those polls. So there is a lot to be unfolding here, but you look at this also. This is from 50 + 1 that is bringing out this now third firm, SoCal Strategies, that when they were suspicious, they started doing an investigation on suspected data fabrications by individuals claiming to work for Wedgwood polls. And so they started a parallel investigation with an associated pollster, they say, known as SoCal SoCal Strategies. The reason for this is because a lot of names were popping up that were in parallel with who Wedgwood claimed to be and who SoCal Strategies claimed to be. So on Tuesday of this week, they contacted and didn't interview with a person affiliated with SoCal Strategies. And then they were waiting for additional information, that underlying data that was promised to them that was going to be given to them by Friday. Then yesterday morning, they took dark their website, their previously active Twitter/X account which was at SoCal Strategies and as well their Substack page where they posted poll results and underlying data. All of them taken offline. And and they're even saying 50 + 1 is that they don't believe that their polls were fake per se, that there were some three specifically that they had questions about. And as soon as they started questioning it, the response from the firm was to disappear. Disinformation, misinformation was something that, you know, the Democrats tried to push so much upon us about being careful what you read online. And then we were supposed to trust the Washington Post and New York Times, you know, democracy dies in the darkness. Where is the outrage about misinformation and disinformation? In reality, though, you don't need a disinformation tsar like the Biden administration tried to put in place to police conservative speech because that's what it would end up doing. It would police your political opponent's speech, their First Amendment right. What we need in this country is a press that we can trust to use their freedom and their influence that they have under the Constitution to to at least try and get it right. And I think most of us know that we haven't been able to fully trust the press for a long time. Many of you are probably laughing at me and saying when could we ever? That's a that is a crisis, a constitutional crisis in this country. We don't need the government to fix it, but we need this is why we need outlets like this where we will tell you the truth even if it's inconvenient or or is something that you may not want to hear. That is not what we've been seeing out of the media in this country for a very long time, especially when it comes to the polling data. I think this is like the most easily digestible example of this. Why? Because what we're starting to see is that they are doing what we said they've been doing all along. They're publishing what they want to hear. They're have that's why these polls are able to get out there. It's the confirmation bias for these journalists and these reporters and these data analysts is saying, oh yeah, that that that rings true to quote a former Biden and Obama official. It just rings true. So let's run with it. And no matter how much they sit here and say, no, we vet them, we vet them, we vet them, the fact of the matter is you said you vet them and 15 polls from Wedgwood were then taken as as gospel, as solid, as good work product. I think there is something here as well that we're going to find out. And I I hope that that true journalists, true investigations will be done here at what actually went on because what we are starting to see also in this report from 50 + 1 is these strange connections between individuals and whether they're it's their real names or not between Wedgwood and SoCal Strategies. So when we talked about it on I believe it was Wednesday of this week, we said we we like to see this experiment at face value. We liked what they at least said they were doing at Wedgwood. But I don't know if we can trust that statement at this point either because of these strange connections. There's also some interesting lines in this about how some of the polls were released after only 3 hours after certain positions were taken on some of the the betting markets on politics, some of the prediction markets. So is there 50 + 1 caught them. So therefore they they were caught and exposed. Right, but after a lot of damage was done depending on who you are talking about. But the other situation here is that he says and I want to get to this is that how a lot of I think direct quote was that a lot of attention or or there's a tendency to overstate the influence of Wedgwood. Now these are people trying to get on the defensive. Instead of you know what, I think a lot of these people should be like, let do a full audit of what we're looking at here. Even the legacy pollsters that we have a relationship with, let's do a full audit of what going on here. If you really want polling to be reliable and to continue in this and and not have unfortunately like the government tried to step in and regulate it, which I think could be a big mistake, then you know what, maybe you shouldn't say I think there's a tendency to overstate the influence of Wedgwood. He said they're pretty obscure and though though fairly prolific. It 's almost always best not to give any individual pollster undue attention, especially if they have no track record. That 's fine if he had rated their influence in his own methodology very low. But in some cases, it was the most influential poll in his model. So I think this should be a reckoning for the media and for those in in the in the political prognosticating business to start to really do some soul searching instead of saying no, I do it right and I get it right. And even though I may be off sometimes, that 's the natural variance of statistical analysis and I have done everything right. Instead say, yeah, this got its way into my model and I weighted it heavily in some places. Some places it was the most influential poll. I don't see how this industry is going to regain credibility by not admitting what happened here is a big disaster because it at this point we know of three sketchy situations. We know that Median Strategies during the primaries admitted that they were not an actual polling firm. And those were polls that were touted by candidates on the campaign trail to raise money to prove that they were rising in the polls. And and it worked to some degree. On the flip side, you have then Wedgwood polling which this week admitted that they were not real and that they were doing this as an experiment. And what happens? What you saw that it caused the national party to spend in Mississippi. You saw different strategies based off this data and and it really also start to shift other pollsters. Once this poll came out, there are patterns people are pointing out of of more quote-unquote reliable pollsters starting to coalesce around those polls. So there is a lot to be unfolding here, but you look at this also. This is from 50 + 1 that is bringing out this now third firm, SoCal Strategies, that when they were suspicious, they started doing an investigation on suspected data fabrications by individual claiming to work for Wedgwood polls. And so they started a parallel investigation with an associated pollster, they say, known as SoCal SoCal Strategies. The reason for this is because a lot of names were popping up that were in parallel with who Wedgwood claimed to be and who SoCal Strategies claimed to be. So on Tuesday of this week, they contacted and didn't interview with a person affiliated with SoCal Strategies. And then they were waiting for additional information, that underlying data that was promised to them that was going to be given to them by Friday. Then e yesterday morning, they took dark their website, their previously active Twitter/X account which was at SoCal Strategies and as well their Substack page where they posted poll results and underlying data. All of them taken offline. And and they're even saying 50 + 1 is that they don't believe that their polls were fake per se, that there were some three specifically that they had questions about. And as soon as they started questioning it, the response from the firm was to disappear. Disinformation, misinformation was something that you know the Democrats tried to push so much upon us about being careful what you read online. And then we were supposed to trust the Washington Post and New York Times, you know, democracy dies in the darkness. Where is the outrage about misinformation and disinformation? In reality, though, you don't need a disinformation tsar like the Biden administration tried to put in place to police conservative speech because that's what it would end up doing. It would police your political opponent's speech, their First Amendment right. What we need in this country is a press that we can trust to use their freedom and their influence that they have under the Constitution to to at least try and get it right. And I think most of us know that we haven't been able to fully trust the press for a long time. Many of you are probably laughing at me and saying when could we ever? That's a that is a crisis, a constitutional crisis in this country. We don't need the government to fix it, but we need this is why we need outlets like this where we will tell you the truth even if it's inconvenient or or is something that you may not want to hear. That is not what we've been seeing out of the media in this country for a very long time, especially when it comes to the polling data. I think this is like the most easily digestible example of this. Why? Because what we're starting to see is that they are doing what we said they've been doing all along. They're publishing what they want to hear. They're have that's why these polls are able to get out there. It is the confirmation bias for these journalists and these reporters and these data analysts is saying, oh yeah, that that that rings true to quote a former Biden and Obama official. It just rings true. So let's run with it. And no matter how much they sit here and say, no, we vet them, we vet them, we vet them, the fact of the matter is you said you vet them and 15 polls from Wedgwood were then taken as as gospel, as solid, as good work product. I think there is something here as well that we're going to find out. And I I hope that that true journalists, true investigations will be done here at what actually went on because what we are starting to see also in this report from 50 + 1 is these strange connections between individuals and whether they're it's their real names or not between Wedgwood and SoCal Strategies. So when we talked about it on I believe it was Wednesday of this week, we said we we like to see this experiment at face value. e We liked what they at least said they were doing at Wedgwood. But I don't know if we can trust that statement at this point either because of these strange connections. There's also some interesting lines in this about how some of the polls were released after only 3 hours after certain positions were taken on some of the the betting markets on politics, some of the prediction markets. So is there other things going on that are at the detriment of our our confidence in our elections, our confidence in our media that are continued to drag this down that are a little bit more nefarious than they appear. I mean, I think we can always agree that there are forces at work behind the scenes that are trying to destroy your confidence in our elections system. We talk about that all the time. That's why we fight for election integrity. I think this is part of it too. And we're going to continue to look at ways that we can get to the bottom of this and try to figure out what's going on, whether it be through different tools at our at our disposal here at the ACLJ because I think this is a key part of election integrity as well. When you have something like this and then you also have the media that are saying my bad, but no, we actually did our job. You clearly didn't. You clearly didn't. And And if you say you can verify this data, maybe your tools are outdated as well. We'll be back with Jordan from Washington D.C. to give us an update there. We'll be right back. Welcome to the all-new ACLJ app. Expert analysis and insight big tech can't censor. Customize your news and get real-time alerts on the issues you care about. Advocacy is now at your fingertips. Take action, make a difference, support the causes you care about with just one tap. Be the first to know. Breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox. Everything you need all in one place. Stay informed, stay empowered. Download today. We are so excited to announce the ACLJ's brand new app, completely redesigned to provide you with the best tools available to partner with us at the ACLJ. You can watch the daily Seculo program, sign the petitions, customize your ACLJ membership experience, donate with a click of a button, and receive up-to-the-minute critical updates that the mainstream media can't censor. Just scan the QR code on your screen or go to your phone's App Store, search ACLJ, and click install. It's that simple. The challenges facing Americans are substantial. At a time when our values, our freedoms, and our constitutional rights are under attack, it's more important than ever to stand with the American Center for Law and Justice. For decades now, the ACLJ has been on the front lines protecting your freedoms, defending your rights in courts, in Congress, and in the public arena. And we have an exceptional track record of success. But here's the bottom line. We could not do our work without your support. We remain committed to protecting your religious and constitutional freedoms. That remains our top priority, especially now during these challenging times. The American Center for Law and Justice is on your side. If you're already a member, thank you. And if you're not, well, this is the perfect time to stand with us at aclj.org where you can learn more about our life-changing work. Become a member today. aclj.org Welcome back to Seculo. Will Haynes here in studio at our media center. And joining us now from our Washington D.C. office, Jordan Seculo is there meeting with our attorneys and our our Capitol Hill team. And And I think this is an important segment. We'll talk about some of the other things as well in the news, but to show how the work of the ACLJ never stops. When we are now 11 days from the midterm election where especially with the chaos of these fake polls and no one really knowing what which way is up at this point, what do we do? We go and we work and we plan and we strategize. We've heard this week sitting senators say that they want to come after potential White House staffers so that people are afraid to work for the administration. This is the time when these important meetings happen. Jordan's in D.C. with our attorney and and attorneys on Capitol Hill and our our Capitol Hill team to talk about the very potential strategies that could be coming just 11 days from now. Yeah, well, it's we do this every couple of years. So every election cycle, whether it be a midterm or general election, but what we do is we sit down with our attorneys and our government affairs team, we say, okay, what changes what what could change based off this election for us here in Washington? So we start with Washington, right? We start with federal elections. So with the House, with the Senate, we know the White House is going to be the same. So we can we could keep that one there. But what would change if we see these election results that have been predicted in some of these where, you know, the House and the Senate flip? And And what do we need to then do to counter today start doing? And some of this we've already been doing. But what would be new strategies? What would be things we should be focusing on more and maybe pulling back on some less during these a couple of years? So where can we have the most effect with our attorneys all over the country? Where in what states can we have the most effect? We look at those as well. What's happening not just at the federal level, but at the state level. And you go through those scenarios. You go through the scenarios of, okay, you lose the house, you have a slim majority in the Senate, you've got the White House, what happens? What do we do? You look at the scenario of barely holding on to the house in the Senate, which is not so different than what we're in right now, but could be even tighter. Okay, what does that change? What can we do? Is there anything that can be done in a lame duck session? Who is going to need our help the most? And how do we make sure they know that they can come to us for that help? So we're working through that today in Washington with our team. They've had a couple weeks to think about it. They've already put their notes together. And this again, it's not something brand new for us. It's a it's a process we go through. So we there are things we do every time. But with this election being so uncertain, it's like you've got to have really all three three different plans ready to go will because as you said, it's we saw polls that are now either getting a lot tighter or they're just bogus polls. And so we might not really know where the American people are in a lot of these elections which are going to determine the outcome of the House, who controls the House of Representatives, and who controls the Senate, and even Congress if it's one party. Until, you know, the votes actually start being counted, which is usually the case, but but usually in midterm elections where a lot less people vote, you can kind of get a feel. And the problem is we've now been told that that the feel that we've been getting has been manipulated by a fake information. That's kind of one other angle I wanted to talk about because obviously at the ACLJ a big part of the practice of our incredible attorneys is fighting back against what is called lawfare. It is when people weaponize the legal system to achieve their political gains, advance. I mean, the most obvious example is the the legal persecution of President Trump post his first term. But it's something we've been fighting even on smaller levels and in different ways for a vast majority of the organization's existence as the law has been weaponized by those that want to exploit it in order to use their and and get their outcomes that they desire. We heard the senator from Michigan, Alyssa Slotkin, who obviously is a former CIA agent or analyst that said this week that she wants to make it so she wants to have key cases. So she did reference the legal system as well as their ability to subpoena people if they are to take back the house and Senate to make it so that people coming out of college don't want to go work for the administration. We also read that the Wall Street Journal said that people that are staffers, not just cabinet members, but staffers are lawyering up. They're calling law firms trying to get representation because of threats like that from Alyssa Slotkin, the senator. We know we're already fighting this battle because what did they do after the first Trump term? They went after John Eastman. They got him debarred disbarred in California and we're fighting that at the Supreme Court. And we have a deadline now. The Supreme Court just granted the state bar of California an extension because they at first said we're not even going to respond your merit your cert petition. Now they have until December 16th to respond and then we will reply later in December. So we know our attorneys are going to be working hard fighting lawfare during the Christmas holidays. Yeah, that's right. So lawfare is is very real. I think now what we've seen though is is the lawfare being coming not just at the politicians or the elected officials, but it's coming to their staff and their assistants. And whether it's John Eastman or you're talking about she's talking about, you know, 23 year olds coming out of college, 22 year olds coming out of college saying, I've got this opportunity to work for the U.S. government and it might be the Trump administration. I need to think twice about that because it could financially ruin me because of what Alyssa Slotkin and other Democrats would like to do to anyone who decides to work for this