“Don’t question my integrity.”
Since the beginning of campaign season, RIFuture has taken the lead in exposing shenanigans of various political campaigns, such as the story about Anthony Gemma’s suspicious social media practices. The story would eventually be picked up locally by WPRO, the Associated Press and Politico, among others.
Interestingly, it seems that the Brendan “Uncommon Integrity” Doherty campaign has employed the same social media shenanigans as did Anthony Gemma. I couldn’t help noticing a spike in Doherty’s Twitter followers from around 800 to over 11,000 in a matter of days.
Upon seeing Brendan’s inexplicable boost, I began skimming over who some of his followers were. I noticed that many of them weren’t in the US – and that a lot of them who are in the US are apparently rap artists who aren’t in Rhode Island.
I then decided to use the same service, Status People, that WPRO used to show that Anthony Gemma’s Twitter followers were mostly fake. Here are the results:
In case Brendan needs help with the math, 8% of 11,000 is 880.
I just wanted to know if they could do something like this with facebook. I keep getting posts that my brother likes Mitt Romney and I know he doesn’t. Just wondering.
Yes, similar practices also occur on Facebook. Anthony Gemma purchased fake Facebook likes from a 3rd party vendor.
To bad RI Future avoid the shenanigans of Mr. Cicilline:
Lying to the electorate
Leaving Providence in financial ruins
Giving out PEDP loans to political insiders
Failing to report loan defaults to the feds
Failing maintain safe schools