The Associated Press on Monday released a news making story with a glaring headline claiming that “Most young Americans don’t see Trump as a legitimate leader.”
A closer look at the survey finds it was conducted by a group financed by billionaire George Soros whose activist arm demands reparations for slavery and “mass incarceration,” and has engaged in anti-police activism.
In addition, the survey was not representative of the racial and ethnic profiles of young adults. Instead it focused heavily on demographic samples of populations that voted overwhelmingly against Donald Trump.
The AP story, which was published in major news media outlets, claimed a “majority of young adults — 57 percent — see Trump’s presidency as illegitimate, including about three-quarters of blacks and large majorities of Latinos and Asians, the GenForward poll found.”
“A slim majority of young whites in the poll, 53 percent, consider Trump a legitimate president, but even among that group 55 percent disapprove of the job he’s doing, according to the survey,” the AP article claimed.
AP reports that the poll, titled GenForward, was conducted “by the Black Youth Project at the University of Chicago with The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.”
A note at the bottom of the article states that the survey “was paid for by the Black Youth Project at the University of Chicago, using grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Ford Foundation.”
Unreported by AP is that the Black Youth Project is financed by Soros’s Open Society Foundations.
The Black Youth Project’s website states that it “work[s] closely with our activist organization, BYP 100, to bring light to efforts to better our communities through direct engagement.”
BYP 100, or Black Youth Project 100, describes itself as an “activist member-based organization of Black 18-35 year-olds, dedicated to creating justice and freedom for all Black people.” It says its mission includes “transformative leadership development, direct action organizing, advocacy and education using a Black queer feminist lens.”
The group demands “reparations for chattel slavery, Jim Crow and mass incarceration.”
The Black Youth Project 100 has engaged in anti-police activism. Last July, the group stormed the lower Manhattan headquarters of the New York Police Department’s largest union, with some activists reportedly chaining themselves to a turnstile while chanting anti-cop slogans in an effort to lock down the building.
Rahel Mekdim Teka, BYP100 NYC’s Organizing Chair, charged in a press release announcing the attempted lock down that “the police are trying to manipulate the conversation.”
Teka continued:
They are trying to manipulate all of us into believing that they are at risk. They are not at risk. Police officers are the threat. Police do not keep us safe. Police do not protect us. They are the danger that keeps Black people unsafe. We must divest from institutions that do not value us and instead invest in Black communities.
The Black Youth Project’s parent organization behind the survey reported by AP was founded by Cathy J. Cohen, who serves as the organization’s Principal Investigator. She is the David and Mary Winton Green Professor of Political Science and former Director of the Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago.
Her bio relates she served as an “active member” of the Black Radical Congress, and is the recipient of “two major research grants from the Ford Foundation for her work as principal investigator of the Black Youth Project and the Mobilization, Change and Political and Civic Engagement Project.”
Young adults?
The AP repeatedly billed the poll as being representative of “young Americans,” using the terms “young Americans,” “young people” and “young adults” a combined total of eleven times if one includes the title of the article and a graphic inside the piece.
The article says the survey represented a “poll of adults age 18 to 30.”
AP states: “The poll of 1,833 adults age 18-30 was conducted Feb. 16 through March 6 using a sample drawn from the probability-based GenForward panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. young adult population.”
AP notes that some “young Americans” were particularly incensed about Trump’s previous comments about Mexicans during the campaign.
A closer look at the methodology of the poll posted at GenForwardSurvey.com finds the survey was conducted in both English and Spanish, and the breakdown of those polled includes a majority of minorities, many of whom tend to hold views more closely aligned with the Democratic party.
The GenForwardSurvey.com website reveals that 49% of the completed interviews for the survey come from the Black Youth Project’s own “panel of young adults,” recruited by the NORC at the University of Chicago, which describes itself as “an independent research institution that delivers reliable data and rigorous analysis to guide critical programmatic, business, and policy decisions.”
The website reveals the racial breakdown on the survey:
A total of 1,833 interviews were conducted between February 16 and March 6, 2017 with adults ages 18-30 representing the 50 states and the District of Columbia, including completed interviews with 516 African American young adults, 277 Asian American young adults, 504 Latino young adults, 505 white young adults, and 31 young adults with other racial and ethnic backgrounds.
That breakdown stresses constituents who voted overwhelmingly against Trump. Hillary Clinton reportedly received some 88% of African-American vote and 65% of the Latino vote. According to exit polling, Clinton garnered 65% of the Asian-American vote.
The breakdown is not representative of demographic trends among the millennial population, 55.8% of whom are white, according to 2015 U.S. Census data.
The GenForwardSurvey.com site itself notes the millennial racial breakdown numbers, which are not consistent with its own survey breakdown. “About 19 percent of millennials identify as Latino or Hispanic, 13 percent as Black or African American, and 6 percent as Asian American,” it states.
Yet the website contends that “to fully understand how young adults think about elections and politicians, issues such as terrorism or gun violence, as well as their economic futures and race relations, we have to apply an intersectional lens and pay attention to characteristics such as race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality.”
The AP article failed to note the racial and ethnic breakdown of the poll.
However, the article related: “Views of the Democratic Party are most favorable among young people of color. Roughly 6 in 10 blacks, Asians and Latinos hold positive views of the party. Young whites are somewhat more likely to have unfavorable than favorable views, 47 percent to 39 percent.”
Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio.” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook.
With research by Joshua Klein.
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