On Jan. 3, the front page of The Washington Post claimed “More than 1,100 law school professors nationwide oppose [Sen. Jeff] Sessions' nomination as attorney general.” That number has since grown to 1,424. However, as researcher and author John Lott discovered, there is far less here than meets the eye.
“… with 17,080 faculty members nationwide, perhaps the real question is why there were so few signers. Only 8.3 percent of faculty members signed the letter,” Lott wrote on FoxNews.com. “Given that 82 percent of law professors identified themselves as Democrats in 2010, one can infer that only about 10 percent of Democrat professors signed the letter.”
We’ve written previously about how some organizations, such as medical groups and Everytown activists, use misleading numbers to inflate their support—a tactic that discredits their arguments in the public forum and erodes confidence in their leadership. It’s dead certain that these exaggerated claims of opposition to Sen. Sessions won’t be the last time we call them on it.
