(Francis Chung/POLITICO via AP Images)
The polling company SoCal Strategies appears to have been exposed as another fake outfit, as the company’s online presence went dark in the midst of a bombshell investigation.
Polling aggregator FiftyPlusOne dropped a lengthy report on Thursday bringing into question multiple surveys put out by SoCal Strategies, as well as who exactly is running the company.
FiftyPlusOne had also recently conducted an investigation into Wedgewood Polling. With that investigation set to expose them, Wedgewood admitted that their polling had been fake and was part of a social experiment and criticism of modern polling and reporting.
The same tipster who went to FiftyPlusOne about Wedgewood had also mentioned SoCal Strategies, which has some mysterious connections to Wedgewood.
Jack Sims, who was identified in the Wedgewood investigation, used to work at SoCal, and the polling firm was registered to him last year in Florida.
Things got weirder from there once FiftyPlusOne tried getting to the bottom of SoCal’s leader.
Researchers for FiftyPlusOne appeared to be talking to Wilson Rochford, who has worked as an intern with Probolsky Research, at one point, and who was identified as the lead pollster with SoCal.
According to the report, there have been allegations that “Rochford was not involved at all, and that other people, possibly Sims, were fraudulently using his name and profile in connection with Wedgewood.”
The report continues:
We shared a short clip of audio from our conversation with the person identifying himself as Rochford with a person who knows Jack Sims personally, and they told us that the voice on the call was not Sims. Another source who spoke with someone claiming to be Sims said the voice matched the person they spoke with, but they only had a phone conversation, so we cannot verify definitively whether the person they spoke to was Rochford or Sims. We attempted to contact a person named Wilson Rochford at his student email address and did not receive a reply.
It was hours after that attempt to confirm Rochford’s role that SoCal’s website and social media accounts went dark. FiftyPlusOne has been unable to reach anyone despite communicating with someone on October 20.
Making the situation even more bizarre, Sims in May dissolved the business entity he registered in 2025 and left the odd comment, “ITS [sic] TIME FOR THIS TO END AND FOR US TO MOVE ON. I JUST WANT TO PUT THIS ALL BEHIND.” Three more surveys have been released since then.
Two polls from SoCal are now being removed from FiftyPlusOne.
“The legitimacy of the data behind those polls has been disputed; Rochford explicitly denied any problems with the data in our call, but the poll releases are materially different than other releases on their page. For example, they do not include a link to a full set of crosstabs, as the firm typically publishes, and the format of the releases is different from their usual style,” the report reads.
The post Polling Company Goes Dark as Investigative Report Suggests They’re Yet Another Fake first appeared on Mediaite.
Polling Company Goes Dark as Investigative Report Suggests They’re Yet Another Fake 2026 THE NEWS FROM BULGARIA – NEWS AGENCY 2009-2025 2026-10-22 19:43:17 Latest news World news Country news Most important news latest news most important latest of the day Justice Petar Nizamov Feathers Petar Nizamov- Feathers Justice bg iustitia.bg iustitia iusticia usticia investigation Burgas Bulgaria news news of the last hour news of the day news of today Bulgaria news The news from Bulgaria blitz news top news most important most commented latest news Boyko Borisov news weather coronavirus news news weather facebook youtube facebook instagram news today news of the last minutes news today today news news bg news leading news hot news bg news site for news all news news bg news of the last hour latest latest news bg news of today news today news today news of the last hour latest news today news bg news news 24 hours news vesti bg novini news world bird bg bivol bg bivol trud bg novini latest news today novinite bg news hello bulgaria political party coat of arms delyan peevski scandalous Bulgarian National Television Free Europe Television scandal exclusive live tv live right now tv tv online tv program bg live now tv news online tv online live court Burgas court Burgas district court Burgas court Burgas district court Burgas district court Burgas appellate court Burgas prosecutor Burgas prosecutor’s office Burgas district prosecutor’s office Burgas district prosecutor’s office Burgas district prosecutor’s office Burgas district prosecutor’s office Burgas district prosecutor’s office Burgas district prosecutor’s office Prosecutor General Ivan Geshev Prosecutor Geshev Tsatsarov Ministry of Internal Affairs Burgas ODMR Burgas ODPR Burgas police Burgas district police Burgas prosecutor Tsatsarov SGS cases Varna court chairman of the SGS court decisions on civil cases decisions on cases Plovdiv court decision of the court decisions cases Varna court criminal cases district district court decisions work in the court SGS chairman of the SGS judges Sofia court post judges Plovdiv court Plovdiv judges Plovdiv Supreme Court Inspectorate Supreme Court Supreme Judicial Council lawyer lawyer criminal cases lawyer civil cases lawyer marriage cases lawyer administrative criminal law criminal process civil law civil process administrative law constitutional law
БЪЛГАРИЯ НОВИНИТЕ – ИНФОРМАЦИОННА АГЕНЦИЯ 2009-2026 2026-10-22 19:43:17