San Francisco’s Prop K- How CNN Used a Phony Poll From a Sex Blog To Argue Against Prostitution Decrminalization

We here at Johnny California were late in the game on covering San Francisco’s Proposition K, which asked voters to order the San Francisco Police Department to stop enforcing California’s prostitution laws. The net effect would be a de-criminalization (which is almost like legalization) of prostitution in San Francisco.

Proposition K lost.  58% of voters chose “No.” This surprised us a bit since we heard a couple of weeks ago that CNN reported a poll showing “Yes” was leading by 71%.  We spoke with Yes-On-K campaign’s Patricia West and asked her if she was surprised by the outcome of the election considering how far ahead “Yes” was in that poll.

Ms. West told us that the “poll” CNN cited was not an an actual poll conducted by a professional polling firm. According to Ms. West, CNN legal contributor Sunny Hostin got the information from lefty news aggregator  Alternet.  The original source was one of those vote-as-many-times-as-you-want internet polls on a sex blog called The Frisky.

We checked into this.  Here’s the excerpt from the CNN Transcript from the October 23rd edition of “American Morning.”  Notice how Ms. Hostin, the “former prosecutor” uses the bogus poll number to bolster her argument that decriminalization of prostitution is an impending danger that would lead to a crime increase.

HOSTIN: Absolutely. Absolutely. Because if you think about it, if you decriminalize prostitution in San Francisco or look the other way, criminals and prostitutes and Johns and pimps from other jurisdictions where it is illegal will go into San Francisco. I think that’s a very, very strong argument.

Won’t it increase crime if you decriminalize prostitution in a particular area? But I have to say what’s interesting is, according to the polls, about 73 percent of San Francisco voters are supporting this proposition.

CHETRY: Wow. So it could pass?

HOSTIN: It very well could pass.

CHETRY: You, as a prosecutor, also know that oftentimes prostitution and drug use go hand-in-hand. A lot of the reasons why and partly women are on the streets is because of drug addiction.

HOSTIN: Certainly

We could no longer find the poll on the Alternet feed,  but here’s the excerpt from the still-live poll at The Frisky:

Would You Vote Yes Or No On Proposition K (if you were a registered voter in San Francisco)?
Total Votes: 477

Yes — prostitution should be decriminalized.
71% (337)

No — prostitution should not be decriminalized.
18% (85)

I’m not sure — I would need to read more about it.
12% (55)

How are we here at Johnny California sure that this is the poll that CNN referred to?  Three ways:
1)  Ms. Hostin quoted the poll on October 23 episode of American Morning.

2)  The Frisky Poll went up on October 22, we’re presuming Alternet posted it the same day.

3)  The only “real” Prop K poll was commissioned by San Francisco’s CBS 5/SurveyUSA. That poll was not released until October 30 and only showed that 35% were certain to vote “Yes” on Measure K.

As a former Assistant U.S. Attorney  and an adjunct professor of evidence at Pace University law school, surely Sunny Hostin knows the importance of credible testimony and reliable evidence, so we’re a bit confused as to how this could have happened.

Needing all the publicity they could get, the grassroots and underfunded Yes-On-K campaign ran with the CNN story and did not issue a clarification or correction (although we wonder if playing this report up was the best strategy in San-Fran-53%-turnout-Cisco).  But CNN and “America’s Most Trusted Political Team” running with this as a “poll” is laughable, especially when it is so obviously cherry-picked by Ms. Hostin to argue against Measure K.

Of course,  that this gives a whole new meaning to CNN’s “poll of polls.”

More of our interview with Patricia West later.