The bot calling the kettle black
Seymour cries bots - but evidence points to his own camp's history of seemingly manufactured support
Recently, David Seymour baselessly suggested that bots drove up fake submissions against his Regulatory Standards Bill. However, evidence suggests he’s the one with links to seemingly fake support.
While working for the Atlas Network think tank Frontier Centre for Public Policy, David Seymour received praise from apparently different individuals. However, this praise was questionable because, despite coming from people in different professions, the wording was identical. Both statements read:
“David Seymour, director of the Frontier Center for Public Policy (Saskatchewan office), has written an important paper that should help frame the debate on tax policy for all of Canada's provinces. ‘Five Single Rate Tax Thoughts’ presents a compelling case that Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, and the other provinces would benefit from enacting a low flat tax that has given Alberta the best investment and work climate in Canada.”
One statement was attributed to John Messer, the former Saskatchewan Agriculture and Transport Minister, while the other came from Alvin Rabushka, David and Joan Traitel, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University.¹ The fact that vastly different individuals in vastly different professions used the exact same copy-pasted praise raises serious doubts about its legitimacy.
The Taxpayers' Union, closely aligned with the ACT Party, had a long-standing partnership with Stuff for their Ratepayers' Report.² In one particular report, the Taxpayers' Union included a link that directed readers to a sign-up page under the false pretense that they needed to register to read the article.³ Unbeknownst to many, this was a tool to harvest email addresses, allowing the Taxpayers' Union to inflate the appearance of public support.
In 2021 former ACT staffer Grant McLachlan revealed that the ACT Party had created fake grassroots groups—a tactic known as astroturfing—to artificially manipulate public opinion for political gain.⁴
In 2022 David Seymour's instagram followers went up by 48,000 in one day,⁵ Seymour's followers increased from 23,800 to 72,600.
Eventually his number of followers dropped back down. Despite denying that he bought fake followers, Modash, which is regarded as being highly accurate,⁶ Fake Follower Checker Tool shows that David Seymour's fake followers on instagram continues to be 58.74% which is around 21,733 fake followers, with 40% (14,829) of his followers being bots. ⁷
This raises questions on which side of politics actually has the bots.
References:
¹ Frontier Centre for Public Policy Endorsements
² Taxpayers' Union Ratepayers Report connection with Stuff NZ
³ Stuff NZ Ratepayers Report hyperlink leads to a sign-up page
⁴ Grant McLachlan saying that ACT party created fake grassroots groups
⁵ David Seymour’s instagram followers went up by 48,000 in one day
⁷ David Seymour’s instagram follower percentages, including bots
This is hilarious.. all the bots are tied up friending him on social media! My god what a tosser, what a fake! How does this gizzard-lipped imbecile lie straight in bed at night?!
Yes. That's the question. But the constant attacks on their critics do wear us down. You do want it all just to go away. Is that a tactic? I think I've answered my own question.