You will recall that I caught Preserve Marriage Washington buying fake Facebook page “likes” from Bangkok, Thailand.  As it turns out, that wasn’t the half of it.

In their apparent effort to create a falsely enlarged image of their grassroots base, Preserve Marriage Washington, the campaign opposing Referendum 74 and Washington state’s freedom to marry law, bought fake likes in Germany, Philippines, Thailand and Lithuania as well as New York City, according to research conducted by Washington United for Marriage.

Between mid-August and last week, PMW added 16,000 “likes”, all generated in a few, multi-day bursts, which coincided with the days the site was most popular in the Germany, Philippines, Thailand and Lithuania. Before PMW’s globetrotting began, their Facebook page had a sleepy 2,500 likes.

Here’s the timeline:

“It’s probably not surprising that the same group that distorts the truth and tries to confuse voters would go so far as to buy their supposed ‘grassroots’ fan base and violate the terms of Facebook,” said Washington United for Marriage’s campaign manager Zach Silk. “Clearly, our opponents don’t give a hoot about the truth. It’s just hard to believe that people in Southeast Asia or Northern Europe care all that much about Referendum 74 in Washington.”

In contrast, the fan base of Washington United for Marriage’s Facebook page has climbed steadily to almost 53,000 as the campaign grew authentically and organically (see: bottom, left):

Voters must mark “Approved” on Referendum 74 and return their ballots by Tuesday, November 6th to keep Washington’s freedom to marry law on the books.