The L.A. mayoral poll was a fake. But was it illegal?

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Set us as preferred A bogus opinion poll showing Mayor Karen Bass with a wide lead over City Councilmember Nithya Raman in the L.A.mayor’s race fooled some people — including the mayor herself apparently.

But were any laws broken? The survey by a group calling itself Median Strategies was reported on last week by the California Post and others, and the results were touted by Bass’ account on X.But after inquiries by The Times, Median Strategies admitted it was all a fake, claiming it was a “social experiment to examine how purported polling information could enter and spread through the political information ecosystem.”A campaign spokesperson for Bass subsequently issued a statement saying that “bad faith attempts to influence elections should be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.” Quinn Yeargain, a professor of the law of democracy at Michigan State University College of Law, said Median’s intent would be a decisive factor in determining whether any laws were broken.

If the fake poll was truly a social experiment meant to test the poll literacy of media outlets and campaigns, Yeargain said, there would likely be nothing to prosecute.But if the goal was to affect markets — some have speculated that the aim was to influence prediction markets such as Kalshi and Polymarket to affect the odds on bets in the mayoral race — then that could be considered fraud, Yeargain said.“At a high level what we’re talking about is a lie that is meant to get people to act to their detriment.

… We would classically describe that as fraud,” Yeargain said.Justin Levitt, a professor of law at Loyola Marymount University, said both the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office and the U.S.Department of Justice would have a potential interest in investigating whether the fake poll was cr...