(FiveNation.com)- Politico’s editor just admitted that it ran a hit-piece recently against former Missouri Governor Eric Greitens, a Republican running for the United States Senate, based on an anonymous poll that they didn’t believe was fair.
The political news website had reported on what they called a “recent survey done for a private third-party” which showed Greitens beating his Democratic opponent Lucas Kunce in the United States Senate race by four points. However, the news outlets tried to use the poll as a way of providing that there is a substantial divide within the Republican Party of Missouri.
Even though Greitens is by far the top Republican in the Senate race.
Steven Cheung, a former aide at the Trump White House who is working on Greitens’ campaign, slammed Politico for using bad data.
“This is an unnamed poll with no information about who commissioned it,” he said on Twitter.
This is an unnamed poll with no information about who commissioned it. Where are the crosstabs? Where did it come from? What was the sample size? What are the overall numbers? What are the results for the other candidates? https://t.co/wsfQo3NgjP
— Steven Cheung (@CaliforniaPanda) February 16, 2022
He asked where the crosstabs are, where the poll came from, what its sample size was, and where the results for the other candidates were.
None of that information was divulged, which is typically expected when mainstream news outlets reveal polling data.
In a follow-up tweet, Cheung noted how Politico simply wants people to “believe them,” even though the poll “reads more like a poorly written press release” and smells like it’s from a “SWAMPY DC group who knows @EricGreitens is the clear front runner.”
This "poll," which reads more like a poorly written press release, smells like a SWAMPY DC group who knows @EricGreitens is the clear front runner (public and internal polls show that).
— Steven Cheung (@CaliforniaPanda) February 16, 2022
Charlie Mahtesian responded to a request for comment by conservative news outlet Breitbart and admitted that it was unfair.
“It’s true that we typically won’t write about an unnamed poll or one commissioned by a campaign,” he said, adding that on some occasions they will share the information “depending on the circumstances.”
“We felt the circumstances warranted writing – the polling spoke to a key argument in the primary…But I can see why it might have felt unfair, or the application of a different standard,” he added.
Okay. So what’s he going to do about it? Apologize? Retract?
Or just wait until people forget about it?
