Following the arrest of music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs for sex trafficking and other charges, social media users — including former President Donald Trump — shared a digitally altered photo that purports to show Combs with Vice President Kamala Harris. The original image actually shows Harris with then-talk show host Montel Williams in 2001.
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Rapper and record producer Sean Combs, also known by his stage name P. Diddy, was arrested in New York on Sept. 16 and charged with “racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution,” according to the indictment unsealed the following day.
Damian Williams, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a Sept. 17 press conference, “The indictment alleges that between at least 2008 and the present, Combs abused, threatened, and coerced victims to fulfill his sexual desires, protect his reputation, and conceal his conduct.”
On Sept. 17, Combs pleaded not guilty to the charges. The following day, U.S. District Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr. denied Combs’ petition for bail.
Since his arrest, social media users have spread an altered photo to baselessly claim a relationship between Combs and Vice President Kamala Harris.
A Sept. 21 Facebook post shared a photo which appears to show Combs and Harris posing together, along with the caption, “P. DIDDY & KAMALA ‘hanging out’ back in the day. Wonder if any ‘Crazy Stuff’ was going on then?”
The photo was also shared to Instagram with the caption, “Could this be our next president. A picture speaks 1000 words.”
Former President Donald Trump reposted the photo on Truth Social on Sept. 20, where it was captioned, “Madam Vice President, have you ever been involved with or engaged in one of Puff Daddies freak offs?” The post was later deleted.
But the photo shared on social media has been digitally altered. The original photo, taken May 18, 2001, shows Harris with then-talk show host Montel Williams at that year’s Race to Erase Multiple Sclerosis gala. The photo appears in a file of images taken by photographer Ron Galella for Getty Images. In the altered image shared to social media, Williams’ face has been replaced with Combs’ face.
The original image on the right shows Montel Williams with his daughter, Ashley (left), and Kamala Harris in 2001. Photo by Ron Galella/Getty Images.
Williams tweeted in 2019 that he and Harris had dated 20 years earlier.
This is not the first time Harris has been falsely linked to an accused sex-trafficker. In December 2023, social media users shared a digitally altered photo that appears to show Harris with Jeffrey Epstein, as we wrote. The original photo shows Harris with her husband, Doug Emhoff.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Sen. JD Vance introduced his dog during a recent interview with Tucker Carlson in an effort to debunk rumors that the family pet was rented to enhance the Republican vice presidential nominee’s image. But social media posts are highlighting a brief clip of the interview to falsely claim Vance “admits he has a ‘rent-a-dog.’”
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Sen. JD Vance, the Republican vice presidential nominee, has made comments that have drawn him into a vortex of controversies involving pets.
In a 2021 interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson when he was running for a Senate seat in Ohio, Vance called prominent Democrats, including then-Vice President Kamala Harris, “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made.” Those comments were revived and went viral in July.
More recently, Vance come under fire for spreading the unfounded claim that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating their neighbors’ pets, as we wrote. In a post on X on Sept. 9, Vance said, “Reports now show that people have had their pets abducted and eaten by people who shouldn’t be in this country. Where is our border czar?”
Former President Donald Trump repeated the falsehood during the presidential debate held on Sept. 10.
Now, Vance has become the target of misinformation about his own pet.
Vance appeared in a Sept. 18 video on Rumble, again with Tucker Carlson, and joked with the host about online rumors that his campaign had rented a German Shepherd in order to enhance Vance’s image.
Social media users then shared a snippet of the interview to amplify the rumors. A Threads post on Sept. 21 shows a clip from the video in which Vance is heard saying, “a rent-a-dog that was given to me by the campaign to make me seem like I’m a dog fan.” Carlson replies: “How weird.” The caption on the Threads post reads: “The campaign got JD a dog to make him appear more human. We must rescue that dog.”
Another post on Threads claims, “JD Vance admits he has a ‘rent-a-dog’ and the dog is to ‘ …make me seem like I’m a dog fan.’ Where is the ASPCA when you need them to step in and remove the poor dog?”
A longer clip from the interview, which shares the complete quote from Vance, was posted by the Tucker Carlson Network on Instagram with the caption, “JD Vance introduces us to his supposed ‘rent-a-dog’ as the Left likes to claim.”
On the Instagram post, Vance introduces his dog, Atlas, and laughingly says, “I found out on the internet a few weeks ago that he’s actually a rent-a-dog that was given to me by the campaign to make me seem like I’m a dog fan.”
Vance then tells Carlson that his family “got him when he was an eight-week-old puppy.” Vance adds, “It’s like shocking to me that anybody would think that he’s not our puppy.”
Vance also mentions that the dog accompanies him on the campaign trail. “He’s on the road with us,” he tells Carlson.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Vice President Kamala Harris supports a ban on the sale of so-called assault weapons, but no longer supports a mandatory buyback program for such guns. The National Rifle Association misleadingly claims that Harris will “ban law-abiding Americans from owning” guns and “seize your legally owned guns.” Her proposal would not ban all guns or seize any guns.
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During the 2020 presidential race, then-Sen. Kamala Harris came out in support of a mandatory buyback program for so-called assault weapons. At a gun safety forum in Las Vegas, Harris said, “we have to have a buyback program, and I support a mandatory buyback program.”
Harris also said that such weapons “should not be on the streets of a civil society” in a November 2019 NBC News interview.
As the current Democratic nominee for president, Harris continues to support a ban on purchasing certain semiautomatic weapons. But her campaign told us she is no longer advocating that Americans be required to give up weapons that they had legally purchased.
Harris was questioned about her policy changes on guns and other issues during the Sept. 10 debate with former President Donald Trump. She said that her “values have not changed,” but did not comment more specifically on her position. Later in the debate, Harris said, “We’re not taking anybody’s guns away.”
But a Sept. 17 Instagram post by the National Rifle Association falsely claims, “All Kamala Harris knows about guns is that she wants to ban them.” In the video, Harris can be heard calling for universal background checks and closing the so-called gun-show loophole that allows unlicensed individuals to sell firearms without performing background checks.
The post claims that Harris wants to “ban law-abiding Americans from owning [guns].” Another Instagram post by the NRA on Sept. 18 claims, “Kamala Harris will seize your legally owned guns.”
But the claims misrepresent the vice president’s position on firearms. While Harris supports a ban on so-called assault weapons, her plan would not apply to such weapons purchased before the proposed ban would take effect. The U.S. had a similar ban in place for 10 years, from 1994 to 2004, on the sale of certain semiautomatic weapons, as we have written before.
When asked for comment about the claim that Harris wants to “ban law-abiding Americans from owning” guns, an NRA spokesperson directed us to a recent post on X by Harris’ official vice presidential account that reads, “Congress must renew the assault weapons ban.”
At a Sept. 19 campaign event with former talk show host Oprah Winfrey, Harris told families of school shooting victims that “for far too long on the issue of gun violence, some people have been pushing a really false choice to suggest you’re either in favor of the Second Amendment or you want to take everyone’s guns away. I’m in favor of the Second Amendment, and I’m in favor of assault weapons bans, universal background checks, red flag laws, and these are just common sense.”
The policy section of Harris’ campaign website also reflects this position, stating that, “She’ll ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, require universal background checks, and support red flag laws that keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people.”
On the campaign trail in 2019, Harris said that she owned a gun for “personal safety.” During the presidential debate, she said, “Tim Walz and I are both gun owners.” And she told Winfrey, “If somebody breaks in my house, they’re getting shot.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Rumors about Ryan Wesley Routh, who staked out Trump International Golf Club in Florida on Sept. 15, have been flying on social media. Some claim he “is a registered democrat.” Others claim he “is a Republican.” Routh was once registered as a Democrat, but said he voted for Donald Trump in 2016. He is not currently registered with any party.
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Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, is facing two federal gun charges after authorities say he may have been planning to assassinate former President Donald Trump. The investigation is continuing and more charges may be filed.
Routh didn’t fire any shots, but cell phone data collected by police showed that he had situated himself in a wooded area near the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, for about 12 hours before a Secret Service agent noticed a rifle “poking out of the tree line” on Sept. 15, while Trump was there playing golf. Routh fled after the agent fired in the direction of the rifle, according to the criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Ryan Wesley Routh, a suspect in an apparent assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump in Florida on Sept. 15, is placed under arrest. Photo by Martin County Sheriff’s Office / Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images.
Police arrested Routh on I-95 and found a loaded semiautomatic rifle with a scope near where he allegedly had been by the golf course.
Routh has been charged in federal court with possession of a firearm by a felon and possession and receipt of a firearm with an obliterated serial number.
Following Routh’s arrest, Trump wrote a series of posts on his social media platform, Truth Social. He first thanked law enforcement officers for their work that day. The next day he sought campaign donations with the message, “FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT!!!!!” and blamed Democratic politicians and “Communist Left Rhetoric” for getting “bullets … flying.”
Other socialmedia users took the political associations further, posting claims that Routh “looks like a MAGA republican but is a registered democrat” and that he “is intimately connected to the highest echelons of the Democratic Party.” The only evidence offered to support the claim of Routh’s connection to Democratic leaders was a photo of Routh with chef José Andrés, whom President Joe Biden appointed as the co-chair of the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness & Nutrition.
Those on the left made claims emphasizing parts of Routh’s background that make him seem conservative. One post, for example, said that Routh “voted for Trump in 2016, was a huge anti-vaxx conspiracy nut,” and “showed support for Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy.” Another went even further and falsely claimed that Routh is a registered Republican. “MAGA’s can try to spin this all they want, but Ryan Wesley Routh (today’s shooter) is a Republican and voted for Trump in 2016,” one post on Threads claimed.
Here’s what we know about Routh and his political affiliations:
Routh first registered to vote in North Carolina in 1988 as a Democrat, according to records provided to FactCheck.org by the North Carolina State Board of Elections. He changed his party affiliation to “unaffiliated” in 2002 and was removed from the voter rolls the following year due to a felony conviction.
Routh had pleaded guilty to possession of a weapon of mass destruction in December 2002 for an incident involving an explosive device described in court records as a binary explosive (which means there were two components that would be mixed together to cause an explosion) with a blasting cap, or detonator. Publicly available records do not explain the circumstances of the arrest. We reached out to the lawyer who defended Routh in the case and the prosecutor who handled it, but we didn’t hear back from either one.
In North Carolina, felons can register to vote again after they have served their sentence. Routh re-registered in 2005 and remained unaffiliated with a party, according to the records provided by the state board of elections.
Routh was again removed from the voter rolls in 2010 following another felony conviction.
According to the application for a search warrant included in the court records, Routh, who owned a roofing company, had kept the stolen items in a trailer on his property and in a warehouse associated with his business.
Routh re-registered to vote again in 2012 and was, again, unaffiliated with a political party.
Voting records aren’t public in Hawaii, but Vaughn Cotham, a senior elections clerk in Honolulu’s election division, confirmed to us in a phone interview that Routh is actively registered to vote. He is not registered with a party, Cotham said, explaining that Hawaii doesn’t keep party affiliation on record. Hawaii has open primaries, which means that voters can cast ballots in either party’s primary elections. Cotham was unable to provide the date when Routh registered or in which elections Routh had voted.
According to public records, Routh voted in the Democratic primary in North Carolina in March. North Carolina allows unaffiliated voters to choose which party’s primary to vote in, but those voters can participate in only one primary election.
For most of the time Routh was registered to vote, he didn’t make contributions to federal campaigns, according to Federal Election Commission records. But, starting in 2019, Routh began making modest donations — totaling about $140 — to support Democrats.
The political views that Routh expressed on social media were varied. He reportedly wrote on his now-suspended X account in 2020 that he had voted for Trump in 2016, but had become disappointed with the former president. He also expressed support at the time for independent Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, both of whom had sought the Democratic nomination for president that year. Gabbard has since left the Democratic Party to become an independent.
In January, Routh reportedly expressed support for Vivek Ramaswamy, who was seeking the Republican nomination for president.
Routh had also developed strong views about the Russian invasion of Ukraine and, in February 2023, published an e-book on Amazon that is generally supportive of Ukraine.
So, Routh has a mixed political history. What we do know is that he has not been a registered member of a political party since 2002.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
The arrest of Ryan Wesley Routh in an apparent assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump has sparked unfounded claims online that Routh had “inside” knowledge of Trump’s plans. Public reports about Trump’s schedule indicated his likely whereabouts, and evidence shows Routh staked out the site for about 12 hours.
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Former President Donald Trump was golfing at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sept. 15, when authorities fired shots at Ryan Wesley Routh, who is now under investigation for an apparent assassination attempt on Trump’s life.
Routh, 58, was apprehended after a Secret Service agent spotted what appeared to be a rifle poking out of shrubbery several hundred yards from where Trump was playing. The agent discharged his firearm when he saw the rifle but, the gunman fled the scene in a sport utility vehicle. He was later captured by local sheriffs’ officers, according to the criminal complaint.
Agents who searched the area on the golf course perimeter recovered a digital camera, a backpack, a loaded SKS-style semiautomatic rifle with a scope and a black plastic bag containing food. Routh was charged with possessing a firearm by a convicted felon and possessing a firearm with an obliterated serial number, the criminal complaint said.
The FBI is leading the ongoing investigation into the incident, and more charges could be filed.
The former president was unharmed, and he later posted on social media, thanking the Secret Service and law enforcement for their work. He wrote, “It was certainly an interesting day!”
“The president wasn’t even really supposed to go there,” Ronald L. Rowe Jr., acting director of the Secret Service, said at a news conference on Sept. 16, referring to the golf course. “It was not on his official schedule.”
This marked the apparent second assassination attempt on Trump in recent months. The first occurred on July 13 during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a gunman gained a clear sight line to fire several shots, one of which grazed Trump’s ear. The gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old resident of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, was killed by Secret Service agents at the scene. We’ve previously written about misinformation that followed the shooting, in which one rally attendee was killed and two others were wounded.
The recent incident in Florida has fueled unfounded claims that Routh must have had inside knowledge of Trump’s whereabouts and schedule.
A Sept. 16 post on Threads read, “How does someone who’s from North Carolina and lives in Hawaii know where to be in Florida, at the exact location, at the exact golf course, where 45 made a last minute decision to play golf?”
Conservative commentator Graham Allen posted a video on Instagram on Sept. 16 saying, “How did the shooter know the location of the President when it was a NON public/LAST minute decision?! INSIDE JOB!!!!”
However, there is no evidence to support the claims that Routh had “inside” information about Trump. Deducing where Trump would be on Sept. 15, a Sunday, was not difficult, even without notice on an official schedule.
On Sept. 12, Trump posted on X about a planned livestreaming event from his residence and golf club at Mar-a-Lago at 8 p.m. on Sept. 16 to introduce the crypto platform World Liberty Financial. World Liberty Financial also publicized Trump’s involvement in the livestream, making his likely location public knowledge.
There are also online accounts that track the movement of Trump’s planes. This kind of public tracking adds to the available information about Trump’s location and activities.
In addition, news reports have noted that Trump frequently plays golf at his course when he’s in Florida. A BBC article from West Palm Beach reported, “Residents say Trump spends almost every Sunday at the West Palm Beach golf club when he is not on the campaign trail.”
The criminal complaint against Routh suggests that he arrived at the tree-lined fence of the golf course’s southern perimeter at 1:59 a.m. on Sept. 15, based on the location data from his cell phone.
“Agents requested T-Mobile, on an emergency basis, to provide law enforcement with information pertaining to Routh’s mobile phone usage. Those records indicated that Routh’s mobile phone was located in the vicinity of the area along the tree line described above from approximately 1:59 am until approximately 1:31 pm on September 15,” the complaint says. Routh apparently didn’t know the exact time Trump would be there since he staked out the golf course for nearly 12 hours.
The Secret Service has had concerns about Trump’s vulnerability while golfing, particularly at his own clubs, because they are near public roads. According to the Washington Post, Secret Service agents presented Trump with photos taken by news photographers with long-range lenses to capture images of Trump golfing at his club in Sterling, Virginia. Officials told Trump that if photographers could get clear shots of the president, potential gunmen could do the same.
“He selects locations to golf — his own clubs — that are particularly difficult to secure. And then he follows a highly predictable routine on any given weekend,” the Post reported.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Pop star Taylor Swift endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president on Sept. 10. Social media posts falsely claim that, as a result, Swift’s ticket sales have plummeted and some of her concerts and a major endorsement deal have been canceled. The remaining U.S. shows on Swift’s Eras tour are all sold out, and she has not lost her partnership with Coca-Cola.
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In October 2020, just hours before the 2020 vice presidential debate, singer-songwriter Taylor Swift announced her support for the Democratic presidential ticket of then-Vice President Joe Biden and then-Sen. Kamala Harris in an issue of V Magazine.
Swift shared the magazine cover to Instagram, writing, “So apt that it’s come out on the night of the VP debate. Gonna be watching and supporting @KamalaHarris by yelling at the tv a lot.”
Swift’s endorsement for the 2024 presidential election was much anticipated by both sides. Swift was among the rumored special guests for the Democratic National Convention. On the eve of the DNC, former President Donald Trump shared an AI-generated image of the singer endorsing him to Truth Social, writing, “I accept!”
But on Sept. 10, minutes after the presidential debate between Harris and Trump concluded, Swift took to Instagram to announce her support for the Democratic presidential ticket.
“I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in the 2024 Presidential Election,” she wrote in her post, which has received more than 11 million likes.
Swift, who often has been the subject of political misinformation, as we’vewritten, said in her post that she was inspired to make a public endorsement after Trump shared the AI image of her. “The simplest way to combat misinformation is with the truth,” she wrote.
But, once again, Swift has become the target of misinformation. Several social media posts have falsely claimed that backlash from Swift’s endorsement has caused her ticket sales to plummet and cost her a major sponsor.
A Sept. 16 Facebook post, which has received more than 25,000 interactions, shared an article headline claiming Swift has canceled tour dates due to low ticket sales: “Taylor Swift Forced to Cancel Eras Tour Dates Following Endorsement Backlash: ‘Only 2,300 Tickets Sold.’”
The headline was originally published on Esspots, a self-described “fake news” site, on Sept. 14, where it was tagged as satire. But other websites and social media posts have published the same or similar headlines without labeling it as satire.
A Facebook post from Sept. 16, for example, shared an article headline saying, “Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour Faces Devastating Blow: A Mere 2,000 Tickets Sold Amid Backlash Over Controversial Endorsement.” And a Sept. 18 Facebook post, which received 6,700 interactions, shared the headline: “SHOCK SHOWDOWN: Taylor Swift Cancels Eras Tour Dates Amid Backlash – Only 2,300 Tickets Sold!”
But none of Swift’s scheduled tour dates have been canceled, according to herwebsite, which lists concerts planned in Miami, New Orleans and Indianapolis in October and November. All of those dates are sold out.
We reached out to Swift’s representatives for comment on the social media posts, but we didn’t get a response.
Other social media posts have shared headlines claiming Coca-Cola has ended the company’s long-term partnership with Swift, a claim which also originated on Esspots, where it was tagged as satire. A Sept. 16 Instagram post shared an article headline saying, “Coca-Cola Cuts Ties, Deal Worth $625 Million cut off From Taylor Swift Over Harris Endorsement, ‘We Don’t Support Her Endorsement.’”
A representative for Coca-Cola told us in a Sept. 20 email that this claim is false.
Swift did face some criticism from Trump and conservative media personalities following her endorsement. On Sept. 11, conservative commentator Megyn Kelly reacted to the endorsement, posting on X, “You can kiss your sales to the Republican audience goodbye, Taylor.” On Sept. 15, Trump posted to Truth Social, “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Sources
Coca-Cola. Email sent to FactCheck.org. 20 Sep 2024.
Former President Donald Trump has been the target of two assassination attempts over the past three months. Viral posts are now spreading the false claim that police discovered explosives in a vehicle near a Trump campaign rally in New York on Sept. 18. Police said the claim is “unfounded.”
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Two assassination attempts have been aimed at former President Donald Trump during the 2024 presidential race.
The first attempt occurred July 13 during a campaign rally in western Pennsylvania, when 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks fired shots from the roof of a nearby building, grazing Trump in the right ear. Crooks was killed by Secret Service agents at the scene. One rally attendee died in the shooting and two others were injured.
Another apparent assassination attempt occurred Sept. 15, when a Secret Service agent saw the barrel of a gun and opened fire in the direction of Ryan Wesley Routh, who was reportedly hiding in trees with a loaded, SKS-style semiautomatic rifle with a scope near Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, where the former president was playing a round of golf. Routh fled the scene and was later arrested on gun charges, pending a further investigation that could result in more serious charges.
But a recent claim of a possible third attempt on Trump’s life has been debunked by police and the Secret Service following a campaign rally at the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale, New York, on Sept. 18.
A Sept. 18 post on Instagram shared a screenshot of an X post by James Lalino, a journalist formerly associated with Project Veritas. Lalino’s post said, in part, “Sources in the Nassau County Police Department just told me that ‘the perimeter was breached and a blue barrel was removed’ from the area surrounding tonight’s Trump rally sight. Source said, ‘During K9, doing their checks, they found an explosive device in one of the vehicles and that driver ended up running into the woods.”
A Sept. 19 Instagram post by the website Valuetainment claimed, “Police Reportedly Find Explosives in Vehicle Near Long Island Trump Rally.” The caption on the post, which received nearly 14,000 likes, said, “According to unconfirmed reports, Nassau County Police allegedly discovered explosives in a car parked near the site of former President Donald Trump’s rally in Long Island, New York ahead of his scheduled Wednesday night speech.”
But a Nassau County Police Department public information officer told us on Sept. 19 that claims that explosives were found near the Trump rally were “unfounded.”
A Sept. 18 statement from the Nassau County police said: “The Public Information Office reports a suspicious incident that occurred in Uniondale. Reports of explosives being found at the site are unfounded. There is a person who is being questioned who may have been training a bomb detection dog near the site. The individual with the bomb dog falsely reported explosives being found and that individual is currently being detained by police.”
Nate Herring, a spokesperson with the Secret Service, told us in a phone interview that the incident reported by the Nassau County police was “unrelated” to the Trump rally and had “no protective nexus to the Trump rally that occurred in New York.”
Since the assassination attempt on Sept. 15, a number of Republican lawmakers have called for a higher level of security around Trump leading up to the Nov. 5 election. President Joe Biden also has stressed the importance of giving the Secret Service additional support.
At a news conference on Sept. 16, Ronald Rowe, acting director of the Secret Service, said Trump has the “highest levels of protection” and that the elements put in place following the attack in July “are working.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
A viral video showing President Joe Biden briefly donning a campaign hat for Donald Trump has been used to suggest that Biden is endorsing Trump. He isn’t. He had exchanged hats with a Trump supporter at a 9/11 memorial in an effort to show unity.
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On the 23rd anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, President Joe Biden participated in memorials at the three locations where planes had crashed.
One exchange he had at the fire station has now become fodder for misinformation spreaders online.
In a now viral video, Biden is shown talking to a man wearing a hat supporting Donald Trump for president. Biden, who dropped his bid for reelection on July 21 and endorsed Harris, offered the man a hat with the presidential seal in exchange for the Trump hat.
Then, with encouragement from the crowd, Biden put on the Trump hat for a moment and smiled. White House spokesman Andrew Bates later described the move as a gesture of unity.
Bates said: “At the Shanksville Fire Station, @POTUS spoke about the country’s bipartisan unity after 9/11 and said we needed to get back to that. As a gesture, he gave a hat to a Trump supporter who then said that in the same spirit, POTUS should put on his Trump cap. He briefly wore it.”
But some social media posts have used clips or screenshots of the video to suggest that Biden has switched his support to the Republican candidate for president.
Trump’s campaign, for example, posted a two-second clip from the video on X, and said, “BREAKING: Kamala did so bad in last night’s debate, Joe Biden just put on a Trump hat.”
Another X account called Breaking911, which we’ve writtenaboutbefore, referred to the video and posted, “IT’S OFFICIAL! BIDEN ENDORSES TRUMP! After wearing a MAGA hat today, the old man posed with kids in Pennsylvania sporting TRUMP SHIRTS!”
And on Facebook, Peggy Hubbard — who ran unsuccessfully in 2022 to be the Republican Senate candidate from Illinois — posted a screenshot from the video and said, “HEY KAMALA! LIKE TRUMP SAID, ‘BIDEN DOESN’T LIKE YOU!’ I GUESS HE’S NOT WITH HER?”
For weeks, Trump has been baselessly claiming that Biden “hates” Harris for forcing Biden to end his campaign. At a rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on Aug. 18, he said, “Joe Biden hates her. This was an overthrow of a president.” And, during the Sept. 10 debate, Trump said, “I’ll give you a little secret — he hates her, he can’t stand her.”
But Biden has praised Harris, saying during his speech at the Democratic National Convention in August, “Selecting Kamala was the very first decision I made when I became our nominee, and it was the best decision I made my whole career. We’ve not only gotten to know each other. We’ve become close friends. She’s tough. She’s experienced, and she has enormous integrity.”
Biden continues to support Harris’ campaign for president, with plans to make appearances on her behalf in several key states. Any suggestion that his brief donning of a Trump hat means that he’s switched his allegiance is false.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Social media posts baselessly claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris wore earrings equipped with audio devices in order to cheat during her debate with former President Donald Trump. Similar unfounded claims circulated before or after debates in 2016 and 2020 with Trump’s past political opponents.
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Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump clashed in their first presidential debate on Sept. 10 in Philadelphia. Before the debate, the candidates agreed to a set of rules, including no prewritten notes or props and no interaction with their staff members during the two commercial breaks.
But viral posts on social media baselessly claimed that Harris cheated by wearing earrings that contained earphones and suggested that her remarks and responses were fed to her during the debate.
A Sept. 10 Instagram post, which received more than 39,000 likes, said, “The earphone earring that Kamala was apparently wearing was created in early 2023.” The post shows an image of an article touting “Nova H1 audio earrings.”
Another Instagram post reads: “BUSTED! SHE’S WEARING EARPHONE EARRINGS.” The post shows photos of Harris’ pearl earring and a similar but not identical earring identified in an ad as a Nova H1 audio earring.
The posts are echoes of unfounded claims made about Trump’s previous political adversaries before or after debates.
Vice President Kamala Harris at the presidential debate in Philadelphia on Sept. 10. Photo by Saul Loeb / AFP via Getty Images.
In September 2016, after the first debate between Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the website Charisma News falsely claimed that closeup photos of Clinton’s ear showed she was wearing an earpiece or hearing aid. PolitiFact examined photos of her ear on the night of the debate that did not show any hearing device, and a Clinton spokesperson told PolitiFact she “was not wearing an earpiece.”
In September 2020, the Trump campaign claimed that former Vice President Joe Biden had refused to agree to a pre-debate inspection for electronic earpieces, as we wrote then. Biden’s deputy campaign manager, Kate Bedingfield, reportedly called the claim “absurd” and said, “Of course, he is not wearing an earpiece.”
After the debate on Sept. 29, 2020, social media posts made baseless claims that images of Biden showed he was “wearing a wire” to an earpiece. As we wrote, higher-quality video of the debate showed that what had been described as a “wire” on the posts was just a crease in Biden’s shirt.
The New York Times wrote in 2020 about what it called “The Long History of ‘Hidden Earpiece’ Conspiracy Theories.” The report described unfounded claims that tend to recur every election cycle about hidden electronic devices used by presidential candidates, dating to 2000 when conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh said Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore used an earpiece to receive coaching on NBC’s “Meet the Press” in 2000.
The Harris campaign declined to comment on the claim that the vice president wore earrings equipped with an audio device at the Sept. 10 debate.
Some social media users have responded to the unfounded claims about Harris’ earrings. In the community notes to a Sept. 10 post on X, a reader wrote, “Rumors are unfounded, Harris wore earrings by Tiffany & Co. that she has worn many times before,” not Nova H1 Audio Earrings.
In addition, the website “What Kamala Wore,” which covers Harris’ “fashion and style choices,” said on Sept. 11 that the vice president wore “her South Sea Pearl Earrings from the Tiffany Hardwear collection” at the debate. The article shows photos of the earrings Harris wore at the debate, which have an open setting below the pearls, as opposed to the design of the Nova H1 audio earrings as shown on the website of the company that makes the product.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Social media posts have misrepresented a tax proposed in President Joe Biden’s fiscal year 2025 budget. The 25% tax on unrealized capital gains would apply only to those who have a net worth of more than $100 million, not to all taxpayers as the online posts misleadingly claim.
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President Joe Biden’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2025 calls for collecting taxes on unrealizedcapital gains for those who have a net worth of more than $100 million. Unrealized capital gains are earnings on investments that haven’t been sold yet.
The proposal would impose a minimum 25% income tax, including on unrealizedcapital gains, for people in that high-wealth group.
“Billionaires make their money in ways that are often taxed at lower rates than ordinary wage income, or sometimes not taxed at all, thanks to giant loopholes and tax preferences that disproportionately benefit the wealthiest taxpayers,” a fact sheet on Biden’s budget says. “To finally address this glaring inequity, the President’s Budget includes a 25 percent minimum tax on the wealthiest 0.01 percent, those with wealth of more than $100 million.”
We’ve written about Biden’s proposal before, which he refers to when claiming that some billionaires pay lower tax rates than schoolteachers or firefighters.
Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, alsosupports what Biden and otherDemocrats have called a “billionaire minimum tax.” That support has prompted social media posts and some politicians to misrepresent what it would do.
Former President Donald Trump, for example, referred to the proposal during a campaign stop in Las Vegas on Aug. 23. “And now she’s even pushing a tax on unrealized capital gains,” he said, going on to suggest that such a tax would result in the closure of the restaurant where he was speaking.
Conspiracy theorist and conservative commentator Mike Cernovich wrote on X, “If you own a house, subtract what you paid for it from the Zillow estimate. Be prepared to pay 25% of that in a check to the IRS. That’s your unrealized capital gains taxed owed under the Kamala Harris proposal.”
That post and a related one have each been viewed more than 11 million times, according to the platform. They’ve also been shared as screenshot memes on Facebook and Instagram.
Other posts have made similar claims, often including the example of home values, or making a broader suggestion that all investments would be subject to the unrealized capital gains tax.
None of those posts includes the key context that the 25% tax on unrealized capital gains would apply only to those who already have more than $100 million in assets.
In its annual analysis of the president’s proposed budget, the Penn Wharton Budget Model described the proposal as “a minimum income tax—where taxable income is redefined to be closer to financial statement income that includes unrealized gains—on households with more than $100 million in net worth.” (The emphasis is PWBM’s.)
The analysis also said that the budget proposal “lacks sufficient details—including basic definitions, how unrealized gains are valued, and the treatment of losses and credits across years—needed to provide meaningful analysis.”
“The tax would apply to unrealized capital gains for households with net wealth above $100 million, so it would not, as currently specified, directly affect middle class taxpayers,” Erica York, a senior economist at the Tax Foundation who criticized the plan as “highly unworkable,” told us by email.
“For the narrow group of taxpayers with net wealth above $100 million, they would have to pay an average tax rate on their regular income plus their unrealized capital gains of 25 percent,” she said.
John Buhl, spokesman for the Tax Policy Center, agreed. “The tax increases in the Biden budget related to capital gains that Harris supports would impact a very small percentage of taxpayers,” he told us by email.
According to the most recent wealth report from Henley & Partners, a British consultancy firm that specializes in migration based on wealth and investment, there are about 9,850 people in the U.S. who have assets worth $100 million or more. Henley & Partners specializes in “citizenship by investment,” which allows wealthy individuals to become residents of some countries if they invest enough money in that country.
The White House has said the reason for the proposed change is that wealthy individuals can avoid taxes on unrealized capital gains forever if they don’t sell the assets and when they die, pass the assets on to heirs.
Currently, investment gains are taxed only when assets are sold. But when an asset is passed on to the next generation, the value is adjusted to the fair market value at that time. So, if the new owner of the asset sells it, there would be no tax on the unrealized gains that accrued between the time the original investor bought it and the inheritance.
“In contrast,” according to the Treasury Department, “less-wealthy individuals who must spend down their assets during retirement pay income tax on their realized capital gains.”
The Treasury Department said that the proposal would moderate the concentration of wealth and raise revenue for the federal government, which is facing a growing national debt. According to a 2022 report from the Congressional Budget Office, the share of wealth held by the top 10% of families increased from 63% in 1989 to 72% in 2019, while the share held by the bottom half decreased from 4% to 2% in the same time period.
“[T]he distribution of wealth among Americans has grown increasingly unequal, concentrating economic resources in a steadily shrinking percentage of individuals,” the Treasury Department wrote in its general explanation of Biden’s proposed budget. “Coinciding with this period of growing inequality, the long-term fiscal shortfall of the United States has significantly increased. Reforms to the taxation of capital gains and qualified dividends will reduce economic disparities among Americans and raise needed revenue.”
Biden has included the “billionaire minimum income tax” in his budgetproposals since 2022 — and it has yet to become law. So, it could be unlikely to pass under a future administration. What is clear, though, is that the proposed 25% tax on unrealized capital gains would apply only to those who have a net worth of more than $100 million, not to middle-income taxpayers.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Vice President Kamala Harris has referred to participants in the Democratic presidential campaign as “joyful warriors,” and “joy” has been a theme at the party’s rallies and convention. Instagram posts, however, have falsely claimed the phrase “strength through joy,” which echoes a Nazi-era program, has become a Harris campaign slogan.
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Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, embraced a theme of “joy” and optimism early in their campaign.
At the Aug. 6 rally in Philadelphia where Harris introduced Walz as her vice presidential choice, Walz said to Harris, “Thank you for bringing back the joy.” The next day, at a rally in Detroit, Walz used the word repeatedly: “Our next president brings the joy. She emanates the joy.” Harris herself said in Detroit, “And understand, in this fight, we are joyful warriors — because while fighting for a brighter future may take hard work, we all here know hard work is good work.”
The word “joy” also seemed to capture the mood of many participants at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, where Oprah Winfrey told the delegates, “Let us choose truth, let us choose honor, and let us choose joy.” The word “joy” was used dozens of times by DNC speakers.
But some social media posts have distorted the Democrats’ “joyful” message and falsely linked it to a Nazi-era program in Germany.
An Aug. 25 Instagram reel begins with a narrator saying, “I’m sure by now you’re heard Kamala Harris running around the country. Joy! We’re gonna bring back joy! Strength through joy! I want you to Google ‘strength through joy.’” The reel then displays a Wikipedia page and a webpage on German history that describe “Strength Through Joy” as an organization in Nazi Germany that was a division of the national labor organization.
An Instagram post on Aug. 27 reads, “Homework assignment. I need everyone to Google; Kamalas slogan, ‘Strength through joy.’ After you’ve done this let me know. You won’t believe it. You’ve got to see it.”
But the social media posts do not cite any specific example of when the phrase from the 1930s Nazi organization was used by Harris or her campaign.
We could find no use of the phrase “strength through joy” as a slogan or message in the vice president’s remarks or rallies. The prominent slogan on the Harris campaign homepage is, “Let’s win this.” The official campaign merchandise includes a variety of phrases, including, “Yes she can” and “When we fight, we win.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
The Trump campaign showed a video of Celine Dion singing the theme from “Titanic” at a rally in Montana, sparking a rebuke from Dion for unauthorized use of the video. A post on Threads then shared a fake quote from Lara Trump responding to Dion saying, “We don’t give a damn” and “I’ll sing the song myself.” The quote originated on a satirical X account.
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Former President Donald Trump held a campaign rally on Aug. 9 to boost support for himself and Republican Senate candidate Tim Sheehy in Bozeman, Montana. During the rally, a video was shown of Canadian performer Celine Dion singing “My Heart Will Go On,” the theme of the film “Titanic.”
The next day, a post on Dion’s X account said: “Today, Celine Dion’s management team and her record label, Sony Music Entertainment Canada Inc., became aware of the unauthorized usage of the video, recording, musical performance, and likeness of Celine Dion singing ‘My Heart Will Go On’ at a Donald Trump / JD Vance campaign rally in Montana. In no way is this use authorized, and Celine Dion does not endorse this or any similar use.” The post ended with a dig at the musical choice: “And really, THAT song?”
The Trump campaign did not respond to Dion, the BBC reported.
But an Aug. 10 post on Threads falsely claimed that Lara Trump, co-chair of the Republican National Committee and Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law, issued a reply to Dion’s statement. According to the post, “A defiant Laura Trump” said, “We don’t give a damn about a letter from Non-American Celine Dion. I’ll sing the song myself. No one can stop this Titanic.” The post shows images of Lara Trump at a campaign rally, with a sinking ship labeled “Trump” in the background.
An RNC spokesperson told USA Today that Lara Trump, who has released a couple of songs on Spotify and other music streaming platforms, did not say any of that. The quote originated on an X account called @NotHoodlum, which describes its content as “Commentary” and “Satirical Emeritus” and is often critical of Donald Trump. The Threads post that shared the content did not include a satire label.
The former president’s unauthorized use of songs at his rallies has upset some musicians. The Rolling Stones and R.E.M., among other musicians or their estates, have threatened to sue Trump for using their songs at his 2016 or 2020 election campaign events. More recently, the family of Isaac Hayes demanded Trump pay $3 million in licensing fees for his use of the song “Hold On, I’m Coming,” which was co-written by Hayes, at his rallies and to stop playing the song at future events.
Alexandra Roberts, a professor of law and media at Northeastern University, explains in an article on the school’s news site that political campaigns are generally required to obtain the right to use specific songs at rallies. “They do need to pay for it; they do need to get those permissions,” according to Roberts. “Usually, the event organizers secure a license from the rights holders, and they have to make sure the license covers the songs that they want and that it doesn’t exclude political use.”
“The idea is that the political use of a song is going to create the impression among consumers that the artist actually endorses that politician, is on board with that use, is a fan of that message,” Roberts says in the article. “If a politician is really tying a song to their image or to their message, like they use it as their walk-on music all the time … then I think false endorsement claims might be possible.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
U.S. Trademark Law. Federal Statues. Section 43 (15 U.S.C. Section 1125). False designations of origin; false description or representation. Accessed 15 Aug 2024.
Vice President Kamala Harris drew a large crowd at a campaign rally near Detroit, according to photos, videos and press reports. But posts circulating online make the baseless claim — amplified by former President Donald Trump — that an image of the event was fabricated or manipulated by artificial intelligence to inflate the crowd size.
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Former President Donald Trump has often focused on the size of crowds at various events. Infact, he started his term in office with false claims that inflated the number of people who attended his inauguration.
People cheer and hold signs at a campaign rally for Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz, at the Detroit Metro Airport on Aug. 7. Photo by Katie McTiernan/Anadolu via Getty Images.
Now, facing Vice President Kamala Harris in this year’s presidential election, Trump has amplified false claims diminishing the attendance at Harris’ recent events, which have drawn arena–fillingcrowds since she took over the top of the Democratic ticket in July.
When Harris, and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, held a rally at a Detroit Metro Airport hangar on Aug. 7, they drew a crowd of 15,000, according to media reports — one of which attributed the number to Harris’ campaign.
Despite that, social media accounts supportive of the former president quickly began spreading the baseless claim that a photo from the rally was created or manipulated using artificial intelligence to manufacture a crowd. Trump himself amplified the claim, posting on his own platform, Truth Social, “There was nobody at the plane, and she ‘A.I.’d’ it, and showed a massive ‘crowd’ of so-called followers, BUT THEY DIDN’T EXIST!”
Some of those who claimed that the photo was digitally created or altered — including the self-described “social media strategist” Chuck Callesto, whom Trump cited in his post — pointed to the lack of the crowd’s reflection in Harris’ plane, which parked near the hangar.
But Hany Farid, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who specializes in digital forensics, explained in a post on LinkedIn that the crowd wouldn’t be reflected in the belly of the plane, providing a 3D rendering of the location of the plane, crowd and camera. “[E]ven the large ‘crowd’ in my rendering manifests as only a tiny sliver in the reflective surface,” he said.
It’s also worth noting that the crowd wasn’t reflected in the belly of the plane in photos taken of someTrumprallies that have been held at similar venues.
Also, Farid analyzed the photo image with two computer models that can detect patterns associated with AI-generated images. “Both of these models reveal no evidence of AI-generation,” he wrote. “In addition, the text on the signs and plane show none of the usual signs of generative AI,” which can often garble the details in images.
So, the crowd was clearly present at Harris’ Detroit-area rally, and there’s no evidence to suggest that the image shown on social media was created or altered with AI. It was actually taken by a Harris campaign worker.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg and his husband adopted two infants in 2021. Social media posts use an altered photo to imply Buttigieg is “weird” and that he used a strap-on device developed so men can breastfeed babies. The original photo is from a 2019 article about the device.
The Democrats latched on to the word first. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, whom Vice President Kamala Harris has chosen as her running mate, started referring to former President Donald Trump and other Republicans as “just weird” in July, the Associated Press reported. Walz used the word again at the Aug. 6 rally in Philadelphia, where Harris introduced him as her vice presidential pick. Their Republican opponents are “creepy and yes, just weird as hell,” Walz said.
Trump has responded by denying that he and Sen. JD Vance, his vice presidential running mate, are weird. “They’re the weird ones,” he said of the Democrats.
The “weird” war of words has expanded to a manipulated image on social media.
A July 29 post on X shows an altered photo of Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg using a device to simulate breastfeeding a baby. “JD Vance is just weird,” the post reads, with the quote attributed to Buttigieg. (We couldn’t find a report of Buttigieg saying those exact words attributed to him in the posts. In a July 29 interview on MSNBC, however, Buttigieg did say Vance has “said a lot of things that are weird.”)
The post received more than 13,000 views, according to the platform, and the manipulated image has spread to Instagram.
But the original photo used in the posts comes from a Japanese company that makes a wearable, breast-shaped device that allows a man to feed a baby through a tank containing milk or formula. Images of the product provided by the company have appeared in American media, includingan article that appeared in 2019 on the website Mother after the company showed its device at the annual SXSW festival in Austin that year. The photo shows an unidentified man using the device.
Buttigieg and his husband, Chasten, adopted two infants, a boy and a girl, in 2021.
But the photo shared in the social media posts was digitally altered to add Buttigieg’s face.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Vice President Kamala Harris had a romantic relationship with powerful California politician Willie Brown in the 1990s. But claims on social media that she broke up his marriage misrepresent the facts. Brown had separated from his wife years before he and Harris had dated.
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False and misleading claims targeting Vice President Kamala Harris intensified as she drew closer to formally becoming the Democratic nominee for president on Aug. 5.
We’ve written about the false narrative that Harris only recently began identifying as Black.
Another viral claim circulating on social media rehashes old rumors about Harris’ relationship with the influential California Democrat Willie Brown in the 1990s while Harris was working as an assistant district attorney. These posts misleadingly claimed that Harris “started her career” by sleeping with a married man or that she “stole a black womans husband.”
Here is what we know about Harris’ relationship with Brown.
Harris was 29 in March 1994 when a San Francisco Chronicle columnist described her as Brown’s “new steady,” going on to say that she was “something new in Willie’s love life. She’s a woman, not a girl.” At the time, Brown, who was then 60 years old and speaker of the California State Assembly, had been estranged from his wife for more than a decade.
As speaker, Brown appointed Harris to the California Medical Assistance Commission later that year, which provides the basis for claims that Brown helped Harris’ career that sometimes accompany the claims suggesting that she broke up his marriage. (Brown left the Assembly in 1995, and became mayor of San Francisco until 2004.)
Brown had married Blanche Vitero in 1957 and the couple had three children. But by the early 1970s, Brown was frequently seen around town with young women and his marriage collapsed, according to a 1996 biography written by James Richardson, a senior writer at the Sacramento Bee. It was at this time that Brown got the first of a “series of apartments” of his own, while his “relationship with his wife settled into a mutually beneficial friendship,” Richardson wrote.
A 1984 profile published in the New York Times described Brown as an “escort for attractive women” and “good friend of his former wife,” from whom it says he “separated amicably” two years earlier.
“I don’t know whether the marriage failed and the relationship survived or vice versa, but something very valuable lasted,” Brown wrote in his own 2008 autobiography, explaining that he and his wife had celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2007, although they hadn’t lived together in 25 years.
“Although Blanche and I led very different lives, there was never a breakup,” he wrote. “The two of us kept the family circle going. We’ve always been in each other’s lives. We’re friends.”
Indeed, as we said, Brown had developed a reputation for dating around and, in 2001, he welcomed a fourth child, a daughter, with his then-girlfriend Carolyn Carpeneti.
Brown and Harris had ended their relationship by the beginning of 1996. But it has come up repeatedly since Harris first sought public office as San Francisco district attorney, which she won in 2003. During that campaign, Harris was trying to distance herself from Brown, telling SF Weekly, “His career is over; I will be alive and kicking for the next 40 years. I do not owe him a thing.” She called him an “albatross hanging around my neck.”
But, 20 years later, claims about that relationship continue to shadow Harris as she seeks higher office.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Netflix Co-founder and Executive Chairman Reed Hastings reportedly made a $7 million donation to a super PAC supporting Vice President Kamala Harris for president. But some social media posts inaccurately claim that “Netflix just donated 7 million to Kamala.” The contribution was from Hastings, not the company.
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Reed Hastings, the co-founder and executive chairman of Netflix, reportedly told technology news publication the Information that he contributed $7 million in July to a super PAC supporting Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign.
But a viral social media post calling for the streaming service’s customers to cancel their subscriptions suggests that the company donated to Harris.
“Netflix just donated 7 million to Kamala. Bye bye Netflix! They need to feel this people! Cancel today!” reads the post that has been sharedbynumerousaccounts on multiple platforms.
That post is inaccurate. The news article — which requires a subscription to read in full — said Hastings personally donated to a group working to elect Harris. There is a difference.
Hastings speaking at TED2018 from Vancouver in April 2018. Photo by Ryan Lash/TED via Flickr.
Corporations like Netflix are generally prohibited from directly donating to federal candidates, according to the Federal Election Commission.
“Campaigns may not accept contributions from the treasury funds of corporations, labor organizations or national banks,” the FEC says on its website. “This prohibition applies to any incorporated organization, including a nonstock corporation, a trade association, an incorporated membership organization and an incorporated cooperative.”
Netflix does have a corporate political action committee, Netflix Inc PAC (FLIXPAC), that is allowed to raise money and make contributions to candidates and other PACs. But it has not given money to a candidate since the 2018 election cycle, when it donated $5,000 to Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, its latest FEC filings show. During the 2016 election cycle, it contributed about $30,000, split almostevenly between Democratic and Republican candidates and groups.
If the PAC contributes to federal candidates, it can contribute only thousands of dollars per candidate because of election contribution limits.
No one can donate millions of dollars to a federal candidate’s campaign committee. For example, individual contributions to candidates are limited to $3,300 per election for this election cycle.
Instead, the Information said Hastings donated to the Republican Accountability PAC, an anti-Donald Trump super PAC now trying to increase Harris’ support among conservative voters in swing states, such as Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Super PACs cannot donate to a candidate’s campaign, but they “may raise unlimited sums of money from corporations, unions, associations and individuals, then spend unlimited sums to overtly advocate for or against political candidates,” according to OpenSecrets, a nonpartisan group that tracks money in politics.
Hastings, who has long made political donations to Democrats, and a few Republicans, told the publication that $7 million is his largest contribution in support of a single candidate. He said he was encouraged to donate by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, a venture capitalist and major Democratic donor, who has given at least $6 million this election cycle to the political committee opposing the former president.
The Republican Accountability PAC’s most recent FEC filing submitted in July covers donations only through June 30, so Hastings does not appear on its list of contributors. The group files required financial reports quarterly, so it may be three months before his contribution appears in the FEC database.
We contacted a spokesperson for the Republican Accountability PAC to confirm his July donation, but we have not received a response. A Netflix official also did not reply to an inquiry.
Earlier this month, in a statement to the New York Times, Hastings called on President Joe Biden to end his reelection campaign “to allow a vigorous Democratic leader” to go up against Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, in the general election. After Biden exited the race on July 21, and Harris secured enough support from Democratic delegates to become the presumptive nominee on July 22, Hastings posted on X: “Congrats to Kamala Harris — now it is time to win.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
When Vice President Kamala Harris was the attorney general of California in 2014, she announced a program to help young people transitioning out of the criminal justice system. She glibly referred to the 18-24 age group as “stupid,” saying people that age “make really bad decisions.” But social media posts have taken her words out of context.
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Now that Vice President Kamala Harris is the presumptiveDemocraticnominee for president, online posts have begun to focus on comments she has made in various settings over the years.
One popular video clip that’s been circulating came from a 2014 speech Harris gave at a symposium hosted by the Ford Foundation. At the time, Harris was California’s attorney general, and she was announcing a new program, “Back on Track,” aimed at reducing recidivism among young, nonviolent offenders.
Harris described it as “a new approach to criminal justice policy.” The program was based, in part, on an initiative she had implemented in 2005 as the district attorney in San Francisco. In explaining that initiative, she pointed out the difference in how young people who go to college are characterized compared with how young people in the criminal justice system are characterized.
“When I was at Howard University,” Harris said, “we were 18 through 24 and you know what we were called? College kids. But when you turn 18 and you’re in the [criminal justice] system, you are considered an adult — period — without any regard to the fact that that is the very phase of life in which we have invested billions of dollars in colleges and universities knowing that is the prime phase of life during which we mold and shape and direct someone to become a productive adult.”
Harris continued, “What’s the other thing we know about this population? And it’s a specific phase of life — remember, age is more than a chronological fact. What else do we know about this population, 18 through 24? They are stupid.” The audience laughed, and Harris continued, “That is why we put them in dormitories and they have a resident assistant! They make really bad decisions.”
She then explained how the San Francisco initiative had worked — bringing in social workers and financial literacy teachers to help direct young offenders who were leaving prison toward jobs as a way to keep them from reoffending.
But socialmediaposts have used clips of Harris’ speech that include only the last paragraph above and highlight the phrase, “They are stupid,” suggesting that she was insulting the intelligence of that age group as a whole.
Not only do those posts take her words out of context, but they also ignore an underlying issue reflected in Harris’ remarks — brain development isn’t complete until around age 24. Young people may continue to need some guidance until then.
“The brain finishes developing and maturing in the mid-to-late 20s,” according to the National Institute of Mental Health. “The part of the brain behind the forehead, called the prefrontal cortex, is one of the last parts to mature. This area is responsible for skills like planning, prioritizing, and making good decisions.”
So, Harris may have been a little glib in her 2014 speech. But she was addressing the fact that young people who are in the criminal justice system are still developing, and she was advocating programs that would help them develop responsible skills. The posts circulating online take her words out of context and miss the larger point she was making.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Oklahoma’s state superintendent ordered public schools to incorporate the Bible as “an instructional support into the curriculum.” But social media posts have shared the inaccurate claim that “Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana all ordered that the Bible be taught in public schools.” Louisiana and Texas haven’t issued such an order.
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Ryan Walters, Oklahoma’s superintendent of public instruction, issued a directive on June 27 that all the state’s public schools “incorporate the Bible … as an instructional support into the curriculum,” the New York Times reported.
Walters said the Bible is “a necessary historical document to teach our kids about the history of this country, to have a complete understanding of Western civilization, to have an understanding of the basis of our legal system,” the Times reported. “Every teacher, every classroom in the state will have a Bible in the classroom, and will be teaching from the Bible in the classroom,” Walters said.
Walters’ directive and other recent efforts by conservative-led states to introduce religion into public schools — which are facing legal challenges — have generated attention on social media. But some posts mischaracterize what changes have been made to public school curricula and where these changes have taken place.
A July 11 Threads post misleadingly claimed, “States of Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana all ordered that the Bible be taught in public schools.” Similar posts have been shared on Facebook, including a post that shows a group of students praying in a classroom.
Conservative leaders in Oklahoma, Louisiana and Texas have all sought to expand the role of religion in public education, but only Oklahoma’s education department has ordered that the Bible be taught in classrooms.
Ten Commandments in Louisiana
Two weeks before Walters’ order in Oklahoma, Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signed into law a requirement that classrooms in every public school and state-funded university display the text of the Ten Commandments by Jan. 1, 2025.
The law requires that the posters be at least 11 inches by 14 inches and that “the text of the Ten Commandments shall be the central focus of the poster.” The posters will also include a lengthy statement intended to provide context for the display, stating, “The Ten Commandments were a prominent part of American public education for almost three centuries.” The posters will be purchased with donations, and public schools are not required to spend money on the displays.
A suit challenging the law has been filed by some Louisiana parents represented by the ACLU and other civil liberties groups on the grounds that it is unconstitutional and a violation of the separation of church and state.
They argue that the law violates U.S. Supreme Court precedent. A Kentucky statute similar to the one passed in Louisiana was the subject of the 1980 Supreme Court case, Stone v. Graham. The superintendent of Kentucky schools, James Graham, was sued by parents for an order that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public school classroom. The high court decided against Graham, ruling that the poster violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution — which says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion” — and that displays of the Ten Commandments in classrooms were “plainly religious in nature.”
In an interview with NewsNation at the Republican National Convention on July 18, Landry said, “I think this is one of the cases where the court has it wrong. And so here is the question: If the Supreme Court has something wrong, why would you not want that to be corrected?”
Landry also said, “I would submit that maybe if the Ten Commandments were hanging on [would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks’] wall in the school that he was in, maybe he wouldn’t have taken a shot” at former President Donald Trump.
While Landry wants to display the Ten Commandments in Louisiana’s classrooms, the state of Louisiana has not “ordered that the Bible be taught in public schools,” as the social media posts claim.
Proposed Curriculum in Texas
In May, the Texas Education Agency introduced elementary school materials that include biblical and other religious references for public review and comment. The proposed materials include lessons on biblical stories and discussions about how early American political figures were shaped by their religious beliefs. The materials contain references to several religions, though Judeo-Christian religious material appears most frequently. The Texas Tribune reported that “districts will have the option of whether to use the materials, but will be incentivized to do so with up to $60 per student in additional funding.”
The 2024 platform of the Texas Republican Party, adopted days before the new educational materials were unveiled, includes a call for the state board of education to mandate teaching of the Bible. But no such guidelines have been put in place in Texas, contrary to the claim in the social media posts.
The state education board will vote on the proposed elementary school materials in November. If approved, the changes would be implemented in August 2025.
Last year, the Texas State Senate approved legislation that would place copies of the Ten Commandments in classrooms — similar to the order in Louisiana — but the measure didn’t receive a final vote before the end of the legislative session.
Challenges to the Oklahoma Directive
Before the Oklahoma superintendent’s recent directive ordering that public schools incorporate the Bible into curricula, Walters was a proponent of state funding for the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, which supporters hoped would be the first religious charter school in the U.S.
However, the state Supreme Court ruled that the state’s charter school contract with the online Catholic school violated “Oklahoma statutes, the Oklahoma Constitution, and the Establishment Clause.” Justice James Winchester wrote that public schools must be nonsectarian, but “St. Isidore will evangelize the Catholic faith as part of its school curriculum while sponsored by the State,” which violates the Establishment Clause.
The Establishment Clause has been at the center of many of the most significant Supreme Court decisions regulating the role of religion in schools. The 1962 caseEngel v. Vitale banned school prayer for violating the Establishment Clause, even if the prayer was optional and nondenominational. In 1963, the court upheld Engel inAbington School District v. Schempp, when it decided that mandatory Bible readings in public schools are unconstitutional.
Michael Klarman, a professor of American legal history at Harvard Law School, told us in an email, “It’s pretty clear to me that these states are presenting the current [Supreme Court], dominated by conservative Catholics, with an opportunity to reconsider” the Engel and Schempp decisions.
Walters’ recent order for schools to incorporate the Bible calls for “immediate and strict compliance.” But a spokesperson for the Oklahoma attorney general’s office said that the superintendent does not have the power to issue a memo mandating that content must be included in the curriculum, NBC News reported.
Under current law, “public schools can include the Bible in discussions of secular subjects like history or literature,” but the Bible cannot be used “as a form of religious instruction” in the classroom, Rachel F. Moran, a law professor at Texas A&M University School of Law, told us in an email.
According to Oklahoma law, individual school districts can determine what instructional material is used in the classroom. “School districts shall exclusively determine the instruction, curriculum, reading lists and instructional materials and textbooks, subject to any applicable provisions or requirements as set forth in law, to be used in meeting the subject matter standards,” the law states.
Andrew Spiropoulos, a professor of constitutional law at Oklahoma City University School of Law, told us in an email, “Some public school districts will likely allege that the state department of education does not possess sufficient statutory authority over school curricula to issue these particular directives.”
As of July 19, none of Oklahoma’s schools had agreed to follow the state superintendent’s directive, saying instead that they would follow “the current regulations for academic standards which include not having a Bible in every class,” Oklahoma City news station KFOR reported.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
A shooter attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump at a rally in the western Pennsylvania town of Butler on July 13.
Former President Donald Trump is assisted offstage after shots were fired during a campaign rally on July 13, in Butler, Pennsylvania. Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images.
A bullet grazed Trump’s ear, and three rally attendees were shot — Corey Comperatore, 50, died, and David Dutch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74, were injured.
Secret Service agents killed the suspect at the scene, and the FBI later identified him as Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old resident of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania.
Investigators said that it appears Crooks acted alone.
But conspiracy theories and misinformation on social media began clouding coverage of the incident almost immediately after it happened.
These are some of the claims we’ve addressed:
Viral online posts made the unfounded claim that a woman at the rally acted “suspicious,” suggesting that she might have been involved in a plot to assassinate Trump, and that a QAnon-related character may have also been involved. But the FBI has said that the “investigation to date indicates the shooter acted alone.”
Extensive media coverage of the attempted assassination of Trump at the rally has shown his injury and the immediate response of Secret Service agents. But social media posts made the unsupported claims that Trump wasn’t shot and the agents’ response indicated the incident was “staged.”
In the days following the assassination attempt, social media swirled with misinformation about the shooter. Crooks was a registered Republican, and there is no evidence he had a criminal record, contrary to popular claims online.
Posts from the anonymous online forum 4Chan spread the false claim that Secret Service officials prevented an agent named “Jonathan Willis” from shooting Trump’s attempted assassin. The Secret Service has no employee by that name, and the claim is “categorically false,” the agency said.
The actions of the Secret Service at the Pennsylvania rally are under review. But social media posts showed an altered photo to falsely claim agents were smiling while moving Trump to safety. The original Associated Press photo shows the agents weren’t smiling.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Viral online posts make the unfounded claim that a woman at former President Donald Trump’s July 13 rally acted “suspicious,” suggesting that she might have been involved in a plot to assassinate Trump, and that a QAnon-related character may have also been involved. The FBI has said that the “investigation to date indicates the shooter acted alone.”
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The shooter who tried to assassinate former President Donald Trump at a rally in western Pennsylvania on July 13 was killed by Secret Service agents at the scene.
“While the investigation to date indicates the shooter acted alone, the FBI continues to conduct logical investigative activity to determine if there were any co-conspirators associated with this attack,” the bureau said in a statement the day after the shooting.
The FBI has not changed that statement. Instead, it has added that agents have searched Crooks’ home and vehicle and are analyzing his electronic devices. The bureau continues to investigate the shooting as an assassination attempt and as “potential domestic terrorism.”
One of the shots fired by Crooks struck Trump’s right ear before the former president was rushed offstage by Secret Service agents. Three people in the crowd also were shot: Corey Comperatore, 50, died, and David Dutch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74, were injured.
Despite the public statements from law enforcement, conspiracy theories have been developing online suggesting that the attack was part of a larger plot involving other people in the crowd. (We’ve written about many other unsupported and false claims surrounding the attempted assassination of the former president.)
Some of the most viral claims making this suggestion focus on a woman in the crowd who was seated behind Trump’s podium and was visible just to the right of the former president as he spoke. She appeared to be wearing a black hat that said, “Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president,” and she was recording the rally on her mobile phone. A person seated in front of her periodically held up a sign that said, “JOE BIDEN, YOU’RE FIRED!” The sign sometimes obscured part of the woman’s face.
After the first shots were fired, the woman appeared to duck down — as did many of the other attendees near her — and she continued recording with her phone.
Nothing about her behavior seemed out of the ordinary. But online posts have seized on a close-up video clip of her as she pulled out a mobile phone to tape the chaotic scene after the shooting — as if her filming was unusual, even though she had been taping earlier.
In one TikTok post, the clip has text above it that says, “This video of a woman located behind Donald Trump during his attempted assassination is HIGHLY suspicious.” An X post that shared the video added text that said, “Her body language & behavior seem to indicate she knew that something was coming.” The original version of that post, which has been copied and shared on other platforms, has amassed more than 12 million views on X.
The voices of two people narrating the clip say, “She sits down — watch this — puts the sign up. Shots go off. She’s completely normal — and then watch — what the f***? What the f***? People are freaking out and she… She’s filming.”
Comments on these posts say, “BECAUSE IT WAS STAAAAAAAAAAGED!!!!!!!!!” and, “This was the first person that caught my attention and I knew it was staged.”
But the full video shows the woman’s reaction is similar to the dozens of people around her, and there’s no evidence to support the claim that the shooting was staged.
A similar, but more niche, claim has also been circulating in some conspiracy groups online. This one features VincentFusca, whom some adherents to the QAnon conspiracy theory believe is actually John F. Kennedy Jr. (who died in a plane crash in 1999).
Fusca, who was at the July 13 rally, regularly attends Trumprallies and events. Like the woman featured in the viral clip, Fusca was seated behind Trump’s podium. He could be seen just to the left of the former president, wearing a black fedora and dark blue blazer.
One post on Instagram said, “Look who it is front and center at what will likely be known as one of the biggest false flags – Vincent Fusca.”
Users have responded with posts such as, “As soon as i saw Vincent i knew something was up.”
Another post, this one on Facebook, noted Fusca’s appearance and suggested that “Trump and the military white hats staged this event to help people wake up to the dangers of the deep state who want to annihilate Trump.”
But, as we said, there’s been no evidence to suggest that the assassination attempt was staged or part of a larger plot.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
A chart widely shared on social media comparing macroeconomic indicators purports to show the country fared better under former President Donald Trump than President Joe Biden. However, the chart cites some figures that are inaccurate, outdated or misleading.
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The state of the economy is a key campaign issue for both candidates in the 2024 presidential election. The majority of likely voters in the key battleground states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania said the economy will be a “major factor” in their vote for president, a CBS News/YouGov poll found in April.
Reflecting that concern, a June 25 Facebook post purports to show how Americans fared under former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden by comparing measurements of seven macroeconomic indicators under each administration. The title of the graphic reads, “In Case You’re Undecided.” Multiple othersocial media accounts reposted the graphic. We received numerous emailed questions from readers asking us to evaluate the data presented in the posts.
We cover many macroeconomic indicators in our quarterly reports of Biden’s Numbers and Trump’s Numbers, and we provide our sources for all of the data we use. We don’t know how all the statistics in the graphic were calculated, because the posts do not include any supporting information. However, we determined that many of the comparisons use misleading statistical methodologies, outdated time frames or dubious sources.
Additionally, reading a list of numbers and percentages alone does not provide a full explanation of how the economy’s health differed under Trump as compared with Biden. As we describe below, factors outside of any president’s control heavily influence many of the statistics cited in the graphic.
Using the most recently available data, we analyzed each of the seven macroeconomic metrics under both the Trump and Biden administrations. Here’s what we found.
Inflation Rate
Claim: 1.9% for Trump and 17% for Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic overstates inflation under Biden relative to Trump by using different methodologies to measure consumer prices.
The graphic appears to use different methodologies to measure inflation under Biden and Trump, but misleadingly reports the two figures as if they were calculated in the same way. This makes the numbers look much worse for Biden than an equivalent comparison would.
It’s true that the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers, or CPI-U, increased an average of 1.9% in each of Trump’s four years in office (measured as the 12-month year-over-yearchange ending each January), according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Using that methodology, the average annual inflation rate in Biden’s first three years, through January 2024, was 5.7% — not 17%. Over the last six months ending June 2024, prices have increased by an additional 1.4%.
Looking at total increases in consumer prices under both presidents, the CPI-U for all items increased by 7.8% over Trump’s four years in office. By comparison, the total increase in consumer prices thus far under Biden is 19.2%.
However, as we’ve written before, economists we’ve interviewed say that while Biden’s policies bear some responsibility for rising inflation under his administration, other external factors played a larger role in raising prices. Economists primarily blame rising inflation on the disruptions inflicted by the COVID-19 pandemic, such as supply shortages, labor market distortions and increased consumer spending on goods, as well as the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Because of these disruptions, rising inflation was a global phenomenon in the aftermath of the pandemic.
Gas Prices
Claim: $2.17 for Trump and $3.96 for Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic both understates average gas prices under Trump and overstates average prices under Biden.
The gas prices cited in this graphic do not reflect the reality under both presidencies. Using data from the Energy Information Administration, we identified the national average price of regular gasoline at the pump averaged $2.48 under Trump. The highest recorded figure was $2.96 on May 28, 2018, and the lowest was $1.77 in April 2020, when the global economy nearly shut down because of the pandemic. Overall, the average nationwide gas price increased by 2.3% over the course of the Trump presidency.
Under Biden, the average nationwide price of regular gas throughout his presidency thus far is $3.50. The highest recorded price was $5.01 on June 13, 2022, and the lowest recorded price was $2.39 at the start of his presidency on Jan. 25, 2021. Overall, the average nationwide gas price has increased by 46.2% under Biden’s presidency.
Instead of citing the average price of gas over the two presidencies, the graphic apparently reported gas prices from a single month of Trump’s and Biden’s administrations. For example, the average nationwide price of regular gas was $2.18 in July 2020 and $3.98 in August 2022. However, the EIA explains that gas prices frequently fluctuate, making average prices over multiple months a more representative statistic than a single snapshot.
Similar to inflation, many factors outside of the president’s control play a significant role in altering gas prices. As we’ve written before, gas prices are primarily dictated by global crude oil markets, which fluctuate due to a myriad of international supply and demand factors. In particular, economists told us that the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the U.S.’s subsequent sanctions against Russian oil exports played a significant role in increasing gas prices under Biden.
Average Rent
Claim: $1,096 for Trump and $2,395 for Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic overstates average rent prices under Biden.
No government source tracks nationwide average rent prices in current dollars, so we used data from private sector sources. First, Apartmentlist.com identified that the average overall rent price for apartments under Trump was $1,130. Under Biden, the average overall rent price was $1,360. The highest nationwide monthly average rent price for apartments recorded under Biden’s presidency so far was $1,442 in August 2022. Over their respective terms, overall apartment rent prices increased by 7.1% under Trump and by 23% under Biden, according to Apartmentlist.com.
We also looked at Zillow’s Observed Rent Index, which tracks changes in nationwide average rent prices of all single-family homes. Zillow’s index identified that the average home rent price under the Trump administration was $1,488, as compared with $1,884 under Biden. According to Zillow’s index, home rent prices increased by 15% over the entire Trump administration, and by 30% thus far during the Biden administration.
Finally, the BLS also tracks changes in rent prices for urban consumers as an indexed value within the CPI. The index determines the percentage change in nominal rent prices in each month relative to the average price in 1982-1984 dollars. According to this index, rent prices increased by 13.6% over the entire Trump administration, and by 21.5% thus far during the Biden administration.
Nasdaq Stock Index
Claim: Up 62% under Trump, and up 13.8% under Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic understates total increases in the Nasdaq for both Trump and Biden.
As described by Motley Fool, “The Nasdaq Composite is one of the most widely followed stock indexes in the U.S. and is usually one of the three ‘headline’ indexes that market commentators often cite — along with the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500.” The Nasdaq is focused on the technology sector.
Using data from Yahoo Finance, we identified that the Nasdaq Composite increased by 138% throughout the Trump presidency. By comparison, the Nasdaq has increased by 37.3% between the start of Biden’s presidency and July 15. Aggregated over a daily basis, the Nasdaq increased by about 0.14% per day under Trump, as compared with 0.04% per day thus far under Biden. The Nasdaq figures cited in the graphic are outdated and identical to information published by Axios on Jan. 1.
Whether the president’s actions significantly alter stock market outcomes remains a contested debate among economists. While Federal Reserve Board economists Sean Campbell and Canlin Liargue that “neither risk nor return varies significantly across the presidential cycle,” Utrecht University Associate Professor of Economics Maurizio Montonefound that “large net disapproval over the U.S. president’s job is followed by low stock returns.”
Grocery Prices
Claim: Up 3.5% under Trump and up 25% under Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic both understates total grocery price increases under Trump and slightly overstates total grocery price increases under Biden.
To measure increases in grocery prices, we once again turn to the BLS, evaluating changes in the CPI for food at home. Aggregating over each president’s entire tenure, the indexed price of groceries increased by 6.5% in total under the Trump administration and 20.9% in total under the Biden administration. The inflation rate has slowed in recent months, with grocery prices increasing by only 1.1% over the last year.
Electricity Prices
Claim: No change under Trump, up 21.43% under Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic overstates electricity price increases under Biden relative to Trump by using different methodologies to measure price changes.
We used the BLS index of electricity prices for all urban consumers to evaluate this statistic. In total, electricity prices increased by 4% under the Trump administration, compared with 28.3% thus far under the Biden administration.
Similar to total inflation, it appears this graphic misleadingly attempted to compare average year-over-year price changes under Trump to total price changes under Biden. The BLS index shows that the annual year-over-year inflation rate for electricity costs was 1% under the Trump administration. By comparison, the average annual inflation rate for electricity costs was 8.6% under the Biden administration through January 2024. Over the last six months, electricity prices have increased by an additional 1.6%.
As we’ve written previously, economists told us that utility costs are primarily dictated by global markets for “feeder fuels” such as natural gas and coal, and are not controlled by the president.
Real Average Hourly Earnings
Claim: Increased 7.1% under Trump and decreased 3.5% under Biden.
Our analysis: The graphic overstates decreases in real average hourly earnings under Biden by citing outdated information.
Using BLS data for nominal average hourly earnings adjusted for inflation using the CPI for all items, we calculated real (inflation-adjusted) average hourly earnings under both presidents. We found that real average hourly earnings have decreased by 1.9% in total thus far under the Biden administration, meaning inflation has outpaced wage gains for the average worker since the beginning of 2021. The 3.5% decrease reported by the graphic appears to cite outdated information evaluating changes in real hourly wages between January 2021 and February 2023. Under Trump’s presidency, real average hourly wages increased by 6.8% in total.
Just as with inflation, we’ve identified in a previous article that multiple factors outside of the president’s control affect measurements of real average hourly wages. In particular, the rapid exit and subsequent reentry of low-wage workers from the labor force during the COVID-19 pandemic significantly distorted measurements of average wages, leading some economists to argue that 2021 is an unreliable starting point for evaluating changes in real wages under Biden.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Extensive media coverage of the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania campaign rally shows his injury and the immediate response of Secret Service agents. But social media posts make the unsupported claims that Trump wasn’t shot and the agents’ response indicates the incident was “staged.”
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The attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13 is being investigated as a possible act of domestic terrorism, though authorities said the gunman’s motive remains unknown.
Law enforcement officials identified the shooter as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, who was fatally shot by Secret Service snipers. One spectator at the rally, Corey Comperatore, a volunteer firefighter, was killed. The former president was hit in the right ear by a bullet and two rally attendees, David Dutch and James Copenhaver, were injured.
An FBI statement updated on July 15 said, “While the investigation to date indicates the shooter acted alone, the FBI continues to conduct logical investigative activity to determine if there were any co-conspirators associated with this attack.”
In the wake of the shooting, misinformation about the shooting has flooded social media, as we’ve written. Recent posts make unsupported claims that Trump’s injuries were faked and that the actions of the Secret Service indicate the incident was “staged.”
A July 14 Threads post shows a screenshot of Trump with a bloodied ear and misleadingly suggests that injuries sustained by the former president are inconsistent with those from a bullet. Text on the post says, in part, “if this was a gun shot graze wouldn’t there be streaks of blood in his hair behind his ear?”
In a July 13 post on Truth Social, Trump described his wound: “I was shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear. I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin. Much bleeding took place, so I realized then what was happening.”
Images published by the New York Times appear to show a bullet passing by Trump’s head. Following the shooting, he was taken to Butler Medical Center for treatment, according to a report by Pittsburgh-area news station KDKA.
In addition, in an interview with the New York Times, Rep. Ronny Jackson, the former White House physician, said he changed the dressing on Trump’s wound a day after the attempted assassination. “The bullet took a little bit off the top of his ear in an area that, just by nature, bleeds like crazy,” Jackson said.
Other posts on social media cite the behavior of security personnel during the attempted assassination to make the unsupported claim the shooting was “staged.”
A July 15 Threads post inaccurately claims, “IT WAS STAGED. Nobody ran, he wasn’t hustled off.”
Another Threads post misleadingly claims, “[S]taged? When Secret Service went to move him to safety, they paused for him, head completely exposed, to fist pump and say ‘Fight!’ three times to the camera. There is zero chance Secret Service pauses for that unless it was scripted especially leaving his head exposed.”
But video of the incident shows people in the crowd ducking quickly toward the ground and Secret Service agents running up to Trump — and hustling to move him from the stage after the shooting.
At least four Secret Service agents can be seen rushing to Trump’s side and shielding the former president behind the podium within seconds of the gunshots being fired. Agents and other security personnel continued to surround the stage in the moments following the attempted assassination.
Before moving Trump offstage, one agent can be heard asking, “Are we good to move?” The agents confirmed that the area was clear. An agent told the former president that they should move to the motorcade, and Trump can be heard saying, “Let me get my shoes,” and asking them to wait. When Trump stood, several agents can be seen attempting to shield his head with their arms while escorting him to a waiting vehicle.
Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, who has been criticized for security failures at the event, said in a July 15 statement, “Secret Service personnel on the ground moved quickly during the incident, with our counter sniper team neutralizing the shooter and our agents implementing protective measures to ensure the safety of former president Donald Trump.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
In the days following an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, social media swirled with misinformation about the shooter. The 20-year-old gunman was a registered Republican and there is no evidence he had a criminal record, contrary to popular claims online.
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On July 13, a gunman fired shots at Donald Trump during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, a small city north of Pittsburgh, injuring the former president. One spectator at the rally was killed and two others were critically injured.
The FBI, which is investigating the incident as an assassination attempt and potential domestic terrorism, identified the shooter as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, a suburb south of Pittsburgh. Crooks was killed on the scene by the Secret Service.
As of July 15, the FBI had not identified a motive for the shooting and believed the shooter had acted alone.
“At present we have not identified an ideology associated with the subject, but I want to remind everyone that we’re still very early in this investigation,” Kevin Rojek, FBI special agent in charge, said in a call with reporters on July 14, according to the Washington Post. Rojek added that there was “no indication of any mental health issues,” according to the Wall Street Journal.
As information about the gunman trickles out, social media has been flooded with false claims about the shooter.
Severalposts include photos or video of a man who is not Crooks, but rather a similar-looking X user who pretendedto be Crooks on social media.
“ANTIFA SCUM,” proclaims one Facebook Post, which features two such images. “He was a registered Democrat who voted for Clinton and Biden,” referring to the Democratic presidential nominees in 2016 and 2020, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, respectively, who ran against Trump.
Other posts have made similar false or unsupported claims, with and without inaccurate photos.
Yet another post alleged media bias by baselessly claiming that Crooks had been previously arrested.
“Look at the pictures they chose to share of this deplorable. High school pictures where he looks innocent,” reads one popular post on Threads. “The man was problematic, arrested more than once, why aren’t they sharing his mug shots?”
Crooks, in fact, was a registered Republican. A Pennsylvania voter registration record matching Crooks’ name, age and address lists his voting status as “active” and his party affiliation as Republican.
Crooks, however, did make a small donation to a Democratic-aligned political action committee before he could vote. Federal campaign finance filings show a person with Crooks’ name and address made a$15 donation to the Progressive Turnout Project on Inauguration Day in January 2021. The aim of that group is to rally Democrats to vote.
A spokesperson for the Progressive Turnout Project told CNN that the donation came in response to an inauguration-themed email, and that “the email address associated with the contribution only made the one contribution and was unsubscribed from our lists 2 years ago.”
Being just 20 years old at the time of the shooting, Crooks was not old enough to vote in the 2016 or 2020 elections, and could not have voted for Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden. An Allegheny County spokesperson told CNN that Crooks had voted just one time, in the 2022 midterm general election.
There is no evidence that Crooks participated in any protests or was part of the anti-fascist movement called antifa. On the contrary, the FBI has not readily been able to identify a motive or ideology. The individual whose image has appeared in many posts is an X user who goes by the handle @jewgazing who has since said that his posts were a joke, otherfact-checking organizations have reported.
As for the claim about media bias, there are no mug shots because there’s no evidence Crooks had a criminal record. Per multiplenewsoutlets, a search of Pennsylvania’s public court records for Crooks yields no results. USA Today also found no record of Crooks in federal databases. The FBI has similarly said that the suspect was not previously known to the agency. And the administrator of the skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility where Crooks worked noted in a statement that “his background check was clean.”
What’s Known About the Gunman
Crooks worked as a dietary aide at Bethel Park Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation, where he “performed his job without concern,” according to a statement releasedtonumerousnews outlets.
In May, Crooks earned an associate degree in engineering science from the Community College of Allegheny County. He also was a 2022 graduate of Bethel Park High School.
Former classmates and other acquaintances generally recall Crooks as a quiet, smart kid, per interviewswithvariousnewsoutlets, with some noting that he was bullied in school.
According to reporting by the Washington Post, Crooks lived at home with his parents, both of whom are licensed counselors, and he was a member of the Clairton Sportsmen’s Club, a nearby shooting range. The AR-style gun that Crooks used in the shooting had been legally purchased by his father in 2013. Crooks purchased 50 rounds of ammunition on the morning of July 13, the Post also reported.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Posts from the anonymous online forum 4Chan have been spreading the false claim that Secret Service officials prevented an agent named “Jonathan Willis” from shooting former President Donald Trump’s attempted assassin. The Secret Service has no employee by that name, and the claim is “categorically false,” the agency said.
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Nobody by the name of Jonathan Willis is employed by the U.S. Secret Service, agency spokesman Nate Herring told us via email.
But in the chaotic hours following the shooting at former President Donald Trump’s July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, an online post by an anonymous user who claimed to be “Jonathan Willis” began fueling nascent conspiracies about the shooting.
It said, “My name is Jonathan Willis, I’m the officer in the famous photo of the two snipers on the roof at Trump’s rally. I came here to inform the public that I had the assassin in my sights for at least 3 minutes, but the head of the secret service refused to give the order to take out the perp. 100% the top brass prevented me from killing the assassin before he took the shots at president Trump.”
The post, which originated on 4Chan — the anonymous forum best known for incubating the QAnon conspiracy theory — went up about eight hours after the shooting, when concrete information about the incident was scarce.
About 20 minutes later, the same anonymous user posted this message: “I didn’t follow the orders though, as soon as the shooter opened on Trump I returned fire despite strict orders to not engage. I had eyes on the shooter for three minutes watching him fiddle with his rifle and adjust the scope, it was obvious he was a shooter yet I wasn’t allowed to engage. After I killed the shooter I was arrested, questioned by the FBI, and just released an hour ago. Already lost my job for not following orders, but I’m glad I took the shots anyway.”
Screenshots of those posts quickly migrated to other social media platforms. One such post that has garnered more than 11 million views on X, for example, shared the 4Chan post with the message, “Big if true.” The same X account shared a video from conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and quoted Jones as saying of the Secret Service response to the shooting, “That is not a failure of security; that is a stand down.”
Similar posts have spread across other major social media platforms, too, including Facebook, TikTok and Instagram.
Commenters on those posts have said things such as, “I smell a government cover up that failed and is out in the open!!!” Another called for the director of the Secret Service to be “charged for Treason.”
But, as we said, the claims made on 4Chan were posted by an anonymous user, and the Secret Service doesn’t have any employees by the name of Jonathan Willis.
Herring, the Secret Service spokesman, told us, “This claim is categorically false.”
Secret Service snipers killed the shooter at the scene, and the FBI later identified him as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. Three attendees were also shot — Corey Comperatore, 50, died, and David Dutch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74, were injured.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
Sources
Herring, Nate. Spokesman, U.S. Secret Service. Email response to FactCheck.org. 15 Jul 2024.
The actions of the Secret Service at the Pennsylvania rally where former President Donald Trump was wounded in an assassination attempt are under review. But social media posts show an altered photo to falsely claim agents were smiling while moving Trump to safety. The original Associated Press photo shows the agents weren’t smiling.
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President Joe Biden has called for an independent review and members of Congress plan an investigation into security measures taken — particularly by the Secret Service — at the July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where former President Donald Trump was wounded in an attempted assassination.
The Secret Service, whose duties include the protection of the president, is being questioned regarding preparations for the event, the size of the security perimeter and how the shooter, identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, was able to get access to a rooftop near the rally stage. Crooks, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, was killed by Secret Service snipers at the scene. One man attending the rally was killed, and two others were injured during the shooting, Pennsylvania State Police said.
Video of the assassination attempt shows Trump addressing the crowd and reacting as a bullet strikes him in the ear, followed by Secret Service agents surrounding him and slowly helping him up and off the stage. Before being moved off the stage, Trump can be seen raising a fist in the air.
That image of Trump’s gesture has been altered, however, in social media posts to falsely show two of the agents smiling as they assisted Trump and to claim the incident was “STAGED.”
A July 14 Threads post shows the altered image with a caption that says, “Why are the secret service smiling? STAGED.”
A video in a July 14 Instagram post shows several photos from the shooting — including two versions of the image of Trump with his fist raised as the agents help him. One accurately shows the agents with concerned expressions on their faces, and the other, altered image shows them smiling. The narrator of the video claims, “Something doesn’t look right. … Is it fake?”
What is fake is the altered image of the Secret Service agents smiling.
The original image showing Trump raising his fist as the agents move him off the stage was taken by Associated Press photographer Evan Vucci, whose photos in the immediate aftermath of the shooting were published by the AP on July 14. The caption on the original photo reads: “Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is surrounded by U.S. Secret Service agents at a campaign rally, Saturday, July 13, 2024, in Butler, Pa. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci).”
The social media posts use a doctored version of that AP photo to make the false claim about the agents. The original photo shows the agents with concerned looks on their faces.
Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle issued a statement on July 15 about the actions of agents on the scene in Butler and the investigation of the incident. Cheatle said, in part: “Secret Service personnel on the ground moved quickly during the incident, with our counter sniper team neutralizing the shooter and our agents implementing protective measures to ensure the safety of former president Donald Trump.”
“The Secret Service is working with all involved Federal, state and local agencies to understand what happened, how it happened, and how we can prevent an incident like this from ever taking place again. We understand the importance of the independent review announced by President Biden yesterday and will participate fully. We will also work with the appropriate Congressional committees on any oversight action,” Cheatle also said.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
The judge in the criminal trial of former President Donald Trump denied a defense request to ask jurors about their party registration, so their political affiliation is not known. But conservative commentator Tucker Carlson made the unsupported claim in a Facebook post that the jury was “stacked with Biden voters.” Both sides had the opportunity to reject jurors.
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On May 30, former President Donald Trump was convicted in Manhattan on 34 felony counts of business fraud. (For more about the conviction, read our article “Q&A on Trump’s Criminal Conviction.”) As with all criminal prosecutions, the jury had to be unanimous in its verdict to find Trump guilty on each count.
Close to 300 people were initially screened as potential jurors and alternates, according to NPR. Dozens were dismissed after telling the court they could not be impartial, as the BBC reported, and those who remained were “grilled on 42 questions in the jury questionnaire, including on their news-reading habits, whether they had attended any Trump rallies or read any of the former president’s books.” A panel of 12 jurors and six alternates was finalized on April 19 after four days of selection.
In a letter attached to the questionnaire, acting Justice Juan Merchan of the New York Supreme Court told lawyers for both sides that the jurors could not be asked about their party affiliations.
Merchan, April 8: Please note, there are no questions asking prospective jurors whom they voted for or intend to vote for, or whom they have made political contributions to. Nor are jurors asked about their specific political party registration, though the answer to that question may easily be gleaned from the responses to the other questions. Counsel is forewarned not to seek to expand the degree of intrusion beyond what is relevant and has already been approved.
“Contrary to defense counsel’s arguments,” Merchan went on to say, “the purpose of jury selection is not to determine whether a prospective juror likes or does not like one of the parties. Such questions are irrelevant because they do not go to the issue of the prospective juror’s qualifications.”
Former President Donald Trump and his attorney Todd Blanche attend his criminal trial during jury selection at Manhattan Criminal Court on April 18. Photo by Brendan McDermid-Pool via Getty Images.
But conservative political commentator Tucker Carlson posted an unsupported claim on social media that the jury was “stacked” with people who voted for President Joe Biden.
In a June 13 Facebook post, Carlson claimed, without evidence, that “Trump was found guilty by a jury stacked with Biden voters…” The post received more than 98,000 likes as of July 10.
In the midst of jury selection, conservative political activist Laura Loomer made a similar claim. She posted on X, “Today, on day 2 of jury selection, six jurors were chosen for Trump’s trial. Several are open Biden supporters. RIGGED TRIAL!” Her post, uploaded on April 16, received more than 15,000 likes.
The claims about the jurors’ political leanings are unsupported, however. As we explained, the judge did not allow jurors to be questioned about political affiliation, so that information was not made public, and they were screened in an attempt to ensure their impartiality.
How Jurors Were Selected
Jurors were selected from Manhattan, where the Trump Organization is located, the business fraud occurred and the indictment was filed. Trump argued that it would be impossible for him to get a fair trial in the heavily Democratic borough, but his lawyers failed to convince a federal judge to move the case to federal court – which could have given Trump “a broader, more politically diverse jury pool,” as the Associated Press explained.
During the jury selection process, potential jurors were “grilled on their social media posts, personal lives and political views as the lawyers and judge search for any bias that would prevent them from being impartial,” the Associated Press reported.
Furthermore, Trump’s legal team had the ability to challenge jurors who they felt were unfit to provide impartial judgment and reject up to 10 jurors without cause.
“Prospective jurors can be dismissed by the judge for cause if he finds they shouldn’t serve on the panel,” as CNN reported. “Prosecutors and Trump’s defense team will also get 10 peremptory strikes they can use to remove a juror from the pool, no questions asked.”
Trump claimed that 10 strikes were not enough to ensure a fair jury.
During the selection process, Vox reported, “Potential jurors have been asked to read out or explain posts or memes they’ve shared, and at least one was dismissed for sharing a post that included the words ‘lock him up,’ in reference to Trump.”
Two jurors were dismissed after expressing that they could not provide a fair judgment. The New York Times reported, “One seated juror said she had developed concerns her identity could be revealed. The second was dismissed after prosecutors raised concerns about his credibility.”
What We Know About the Jurors
The decision not to disclose the jurors’ names was made by both prosecutors and Trump’s defense team. In March, Merchan accepted prosecutors’ argument that most information about the jurors should be sealed, and Trump’s lawyers largely agreed.
And, as we said earlier, jurors could not be asked about their party affiliations and voting habits during the jury selection process.
But information about their jobs and thoughts about the trial have been published in news articles, including in the New York Times and the Guardian. Information made public included their sources of news, levels of education, marital statuses and areas of residence. All jurors pledged to remain fair and impartial.
Cynthia Godsoe, a professor at Brooklyn Law School, told us in an email that there is “no validity at all to the claim that [the jurors] were biased. The defense had ample opportunity to question the jurors, research their social media (in fact several were dismissed for things they said there) and exercise the usual amount of challenges (peremptory and for cause) to get rid of jurors they didn’t want.”
“No jury can be totally free of opinions, [especially] in a high-profile case like this, and the question really is, can the juror be fair and impartial,” Godsoe said. “Those left on the jury passed this test for the judge and, more importantly to Trump’s after-the-fact complaints, to HIS own lawyers.”
Lawyers are typically barred from asking jurors about their political party and religion, Godsoe explained, stating thatballots cast in U.S. elections are always anonymous and no voting in the U.S. is public. In this case, Trump’s lawyers “were not allowed to ask which party they voted for, but were allowed to ask about voting generally, i.e. did they vote,” Godsoe said.
In the Times article, some jurors did express feelings of antipathy toward Trump but said that they felt able to remain impartial. Juror 11, for example, a product manager who lives in Upper Manhattan, said, “I don’t like his persona, how he presents himself in public.” She then added, “I don’t like some of my co-workers, but I don’t try to sabotage their work.”
Juror 5, on the other hand, had more positive feelings about Trump. “President Trump speaks his mind,” the New York Times quoted her as saying.
Juror 2, who works in finance and lives in Hell’s Kitchen, said he believed “Trump had done some good for the country,” the New York Times reported.
So, some of the jurors did express positive feelings about Trump. Their political affiliations and voting records — and those of the other jurors — remain unknown.
Merchan had scheduled sentencing for July 11, but delayed it until Sept. 18 following the U.S. Supreme Court’s July 1 ruling that grants Trump some immunity from criminal prosecution. The court ruled that presidents have a “presumption of immunity” when carrying out “official acts,” but “no immunity for his unofficial acts.”
Although it’s unclear what impact the Supreme Court ruling might have on Trump’s conviction, the federal judge who last year rejected Trump’s attempt to move the trial to federal court wrote in his decision that Trump’s actions in this case were “not related to a President’s official acts.”
“The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the matter was a purely a personal item of the President — a cover-up of an embarrassing event,” U.S. District Court Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein wrote in a July 19, 2023, opinion. “Hush money paid to an adult film star is not related to a President’s official acts. It does not reflect in any way the color of the President’s official duties.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
A photo of independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. likely shows him holding the carcass of a goat, lamb or other ruminant animal in Patagonia. Social media posts, citing a Vanity Fair article, make the unsupported claim the photo shows a dog carcass in South Korea. The magazine deleted remarks by a veterinarian who said it was a dog.
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In a Vanity Fair article published on July 2, special correspondent Joe Hagan raises questions about the character and credibility of independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and highlights his controversial past, including allegations that he sexually assaulted his then-23-year-old babysitter in 1999 and texted images of nude women to his friends.
In response, Kennedy told the Breaking Points podcast on July 2, “The article is a lot of garbage.” Kennedy told the host of the podcast that he is “not a church boy” and has “many skeletons in my closet,” but he declined to comment when asked about the assault allegation. “I’m not going to comment on it,” Kennedy said.
Hagan’s article also published an image of Kennedy posing with an animal carcass. In the original article, Hagan described the photo as Kennedy “posing, alongside an unidentified woman, with the barbecued remains of what appears to be a dog” in 2010. Kennedy sent the photo to a friend last year. The friend told Vanity Fair that Kennedy “sent me the picture with a recommendation to visit the best dog restaurant in Seoul.”
In the original version of the article, Hagan supported the assertion that Kennedy posed with a canine by stating, “A veterinarian who examined the photograph says the carcass is a canine, pointing to the 13 pairs of ribs, which include the tell-tale ‘floating rib’ found in dogs.”
Kennedy responded to this allegation with a post on X on July 2, stating, “Hey @VanityFair, you know when your veterinary experts call a goat a dog, and your forensic experts say a photo taken in Patagonia was taken in Korea, that you’ve joined the ranks of supermarket tabloids.”
In an interview with Fox News on July 3, Kennedy said that the image is “a real photo,” but told the interviewer, “It’s me in a campfire in Patagonia on the Futaleufu River eating a goat, which is what we eat down there.” In a 2013 interview in Patagon Journal, Kennedy said that he has visited the Futaleufu River at least five times.
On July 7, Kennedy also posted a video on X responding to the magazine’s claim. In the video, which features his three pet dogs, he refers to the allegation that he posed with a dog carcass as “the height of irresponsible journalism” and calls the article “fake news.”
After Kennedy’s initial response, Vanity Fair revised the article on July 3, replacing the phrase “appears to be a dog” with “what he suggested to the friend was a dog.” Vanity Fair also added Kennedy’s initial response and removed the opinion of the veterinarian who claimed the carcass was a canine.
A representative from Vanity Fair’s parent company, Condé Nast, told us in an email on July 5, “The context for reporting this exchange, as we state in the story, was that this apparent attempt at a joke disturbed Kennedy’s friend, and as such, is part of a larger picture of Kennedy’s recent behavior distressing his friends and family.”
The Condé Nast representative told us that “we did not definitively ID the pictured animal as a dog” in the article. “We reported the date from the metadata — 2010 — but not a location, though Kennedy has incorrectly stated otherwise.” Their response also notes, “Kennedy has not disputed what he told his friend,” and that “the friend was disgusted by the picture and felt this episode illustrated poor judgment.”
By the time Vanity Fair made the changes in the article, other news networks had picked up the story. The New York Post,Newsweek and the New York Daily News published articles citing information from the original version of Vanity Fair’s story that said Kennedy posed with what “appears to be” a dog carcass.
Multipleviral posts on social media continue to circulate the unsupported claim that Kennedy posed with a dog carcass despite Vanity Fair’s subsequent retraction. The text above the photo on a July 2 Threads post said, “Here’s a photo of RFK Jr posing with a barbecued dog. How can anyone even think about voting for this guy?”
Photo Likely Displays a Patagonian Dish
The preparation style of the carcass and roasting spit displayed in the photo of Kennedy all match closely with images of the popular Patagonian dish “asado al palo” or “cordero al palo,” which roughly translates as “lamb to the post.” The culinary guide Pick Up the Fork explains that while lamb is the favored barbecued meat in Patagonia, goat is more popularly used in Mendoza, Argentina.
We found numerous pictures of carcasses of other ruminants — which refers to hoofed, cud-chewing mammals — prepared on an iron cross in Patagonia that appear extremely similar to the photo published by Vanity Fair.
National Geographic photographer Michael George published a photo of “a lamb that is being smoked” in a 2017 article titled, “11 Breathtaking Photos from Torres del Paine National Park,” which is located in Chile’s Patagonia region. The lamb in the photo is held by an iron cross that appears nearly identical in structure to the one displayed in the photo with Kennedy.
Tourist cruise company Australis published a 2019 blog post with photos describing asado al palo as “Patagonia’s signature dish.” The article explains the dish is prepared by cutting a lamb “vertically down the torso and splayed across an iron cross or rack,” just as it appears in the image with Kennedy.
The travel guide TasteAtlas describes cordero al palo as a “traditional lamb specialty that involves roasting a whole lamb on a spit.” The article displays another image with a close similarity to the carcass held by Kennedy in the photograph published by Vanity Fair.
We found no similar examples of this cooking technique or the iron cross in South Korean cuisine.
Opinions of Other Veterinarians
As we noted, in the original version of the Vanity Fair article, the writer cited a veterinarian who said the photo shows a canine based on the “13 pairs of ribs, which include the tell-tale ‘floating rib’ found in dogs.”
However, both dogs and ruminants possess 13 total pairs of ribs as well as some “floating ribs,” meaning that they do not attach to the sternum.
Dr. Patty Scharko, professor of animal and veterinary sciences at Clemson University and former president of the American Association of Small Ruminant Practitioners, disagreed with the findings of the veterinarian originally cited by Vanity Fair. She told us in an email that “without a head and feet (hooves), it is difficult to determine what species [the carcass] is.”
In a post on X, veterinarianDr. Crystal Heath offered a different opinion than the veterinarian cited in the original Vanity Fair article. Heath claimed that “the triangular scapula and flattened ribs all point to goat.”
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
A: Like all energy sources, wind farms have some negative environmental impacts. But getting energy from wind farms results in dramatically lower greenhouse gas emissions than getting it from fossil fuels.
FULL QUESTION
I received this post on Facebook today. I know it contains a lot of claims [challenging the eco-friendliness of wind turbines] and I don’t know where to start in terms of validating them (for myself). Can you help out?
FULL ANSWER
A genre of lengthy posts on social media claims to poke holes in measures designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate climate change. The posts throw out numerous statistics without citations, making it difficult to quickly sort fact from fiction.
A reader recently contacted us asking for help evaluating one such post, which cast doubt on the eco-friendliness of wind energy. The post has been circulating on Facebook since March 2021, racking up more than 135,000 shares. Other versions of the post have also been spreading on social media.
Some statistics and statements in the post are arguably accurate, while others are misleading or flat-out wrong. But perhaps more important is what the post left out. It referenced the petroleum products used while building, operating, maintaining and decommissioning wind turbines without ever stating that over its entire life cycle, a wind turbine produces among the lowest greenhouse gas emissions of the main electricity sources in the U.S.
The post also misleadingly said that the land for wind farms “would have to be clear-cut land” and referenced the need to cut down “all those trees.” But in the U.S., wind farms are largely located on land that is already not forested, and this is likely to remain the case as wind energy expands.
The post discussed the landfill space needed for decommissioned wind turbine blades without providing the context that, even as wind power increases, they will make up a small percentage of all waste, and without mentioning efforts to recycle them. And it referenced bird deaths from wind farms without putting them in the context of far greater threats to birds, such as collisions with glass buildings and vehicles.
We consulted experts on wind energy to get to the bottom of the claims made in the post, and to provide context on the challenges associated with this source of renewable energy.
Wind Turbines Generate Low Emissions Over Their Lifetimes
The major advantage of wind turbines is that, taking into account their entire lifespan, they generate very low emissions compared with fossil fuels.
Researchers often calculate greenhouse gas emissions associated with methods of electricity generation using a technique called life cycle assessment. In the case of wind energy, this includes emissions generated in the course of “extraction and processing of materials, fabrication of components, transportation, installation, operations and maintenance … decommissioning, and disposal or recycling,” Aubryn Cooperman, an engineering analyst at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, told us via email.
“Each of these processes may have emissions associated with the equipment used, such as trucks, cranes, ships, etc.,” she said. “Petroleum-based fuels are used for most types of transportation and portable equipment, and the related emissions are accounted for in the wind energy lifecycle assessment.”
In the case of fossil fuels, a life cycle assessment of greenhouse gas emissions also includes emissions caused by burning the fuel, such as coal or natural gas.
A report from NREL reviewed studies of life cycle greenhouse gas emissions for various sources of electricity. The median published estimates of emissions associated with wind were more than 37 times lower than those from natural gas and 77 times lower than those from coal.
Over their lifetimes, wind farms also are associated with very little generation of air pollutants such as particulate matter and ground-level ozone.
Despite this, the Facebook post misleadingly implied that because petroleum products can be used in various ways in building, operating, maintaining and removing wind turbines, this means that they do not qualify as clean energy.
First, the post presented various statistics on the lubricant oil in wind turbines, used in varying amounts depending on the turbine. To be clear, this oil is used to lubricate the moving parts in wind turbines and is distinct from fuels such as gasoline that are combusted and produce greenhouse gas emissions.
“Now you have to calculate every city across the nation, large and small, to find the grand total of yearly oil consumption from ‘clean’ energy,” the post said. “Where do you think all that oil is going to come from, the fricken oil fairies?”
The post went on to describe the use of petroleum products by “the large equipment needed to build these wind farms,” as well as service, maintain and remove them.
As we’ve said, emissions from petroleum product-powered equipment associated with wind farms are included in life cycle emissions calculations, and these indicate that wind farms are far cleaner sources of energy than fossil fuels.
“It’s also worth noting that as the transportation sector decarbonizes, that will reduce emissions in the wind energy lifecycle as well,” Cooperman said.
As for the lubricant oil used in wind turbines, this oil does need to be changed from time to time, which can be challenging given the locations and height of the turbines. However, it does not necessarily need to be changed annually, contrary to what the post said.
“Oil change interval on wind turbines has been extended over the years and nowadays, it is typical to do every 5 or 7 years,” Shawn Sheng, a senior research engineer at NREL, told us in an email. “Some research is being done by extending this even further to ten years or longer, such as fill-for-life (~20 years) oil.”
Emissions associated with changing this oil are included in life cycle emissions calculations, Cooperman said.
Many machines require lubricant oil, and the wind industry makes up only a fraction of the market for these products. Furthermore, lubricants only make up 1% of petroleum products produced in U.S. refineries.
Post Distorts Wind Farm Land Use Impacts
Next, the Facebook post listed various statistics about wind farm land use, mixing somewhat plausible figures with estimates based on bad math and misleading statements about impacts on forests.
“And just exactly how eco-friendly is wind energy anyway?” the post said. “Each turbine requires a footprint of 1.5 acres, so a wind farm of 150 turbines needs 225 acres…” This estimate is roughly plausible if considering the direct footprint of a relatively new, average-sized land-based wind turbine, but it doesn’t acknowledge the wide variation in turbine size.
Grace Wu, who studies land use and climate change mitigation at UC Santa Barbara, told us via email that the science and engineering community would not calculate the space requirements of a wind farm per turbine, but rather per unit of energy the wind farm can produce.
“The larger the wind turbine the more spacing it required, so to generalize across wind turbines itself (treating the unit as the wind turbine) is inaccurate,” she said. Wind turbines can have one megawatt of capacity to over 10 megawatts of capacity, Wu explained. Offshore wind turbines can be greater than 20 megawatts.
A May 2024 U.S. Department of Agriculture report on utility-scale solar and wind installations in rural areas said that the typical direct footprint of a wind farm is approximately 0.74 acres per megawatt of capacity. The direct footprint of a wind farm includes “the relatively small area on which service roads, turbine pads, and other infrastructure are constructed,” the report said.
Wind turbine capacity has been increasing. The average land-based wind turbine installed in 2022 can generate 3.2 megawatts of electricity, according to a report from the U.S. Department of Energy. Based on this, the average land-based turbine installed in 2022 would have a direct footprint of more than two acres.
Wind farms also have an indirect footprint, the USDA report explained, since wind turbines need sufficient spacing between them to best take advantage of wind flow. However, the land between wind turbines often can still be used for other purposes — typically for growing crops or as rangeland.
Photo by mj0007 via iStock / Getty Images Plus
The post’s math and logic went more seriously awry as it discussed the broader impacts of wind farm land use. “In order to power a city the size of NYC you’d need 57,000 acres; and who knows the astronomical amount of land you would need to power the entire US,” the post said.
Here, the post did its own internal math incorrectly. The post previously had claimed it would take 3,800 turbines to power a city the size of New York, and 3,800 multiplied by the post’s estimated footprint of 1.5 acres per turbine is 5,700 acres, not 57,000 acres.
A spokesperson from the U.S. Energy Information Administration told us via email that it “would be impossible” to accurately calculate the number of turbines needed to power a city without knowing various other factors, including the height of the turbines, wind speed and generation capacity.
The USDA report found that in 2020, there were 88,000 acres in rural areas of the U.S. in the direct footprint of wind farms. As of 2023, 10% of U.S. electricity came from wind farms, according to the EIA. For context, the U.S. has 897 million acres of farmland.
The post’s suggestion that the entire U.S. would be solely powered by wind farms is unrealistic. According to EIA projections for 2050, even in a high-uptake scenario a minority of electricity in the U.S. would be generated by wind, with solar power showing a greater increase. “There is no scenario we have modeled in which there would be only one source of electricity generation in the United States,” the EIA spokesperson told us.
The post also did not put the land use requirements of wind farms in the context of land use requirements of other methods of generating electricity. A 2022 study published in PLOS One indicated that, when looking just at the direct footprint, natural gas and coal use more land per unit of energy generated than wind.
However, “the answer differs significantly depending on whether or not one considers spacing between turbines,” Wu said. Wind is more space-intensive than most other energy sources when taking into account the full area of wind farms.
The Facebook post misleadingly said that the land used by wind farms would all need to be clear cut. “Boy, cutting down all those trees is gonna piss off a lot of green-loving tree-huggers,” the post said.
Building wind farms does sometimes require trees to be cut down. But Wu explained that in the U.S., wind farms are largely located on existing agricultural land in the Midwest. “There are of course *some* cases of wind farms in forest land, but the vast majority of wind capacity has and will be sited in the ‘wind belt’ (midwest),” she said.
According to the USDA report, between 2012 and 2020 just around 3% of newly built wind farms were located on forest land.
Wind Turbine Blades Represent Small Proportion of All Waste
The Facebook post also painted a misleading picture of what happens to wind turbine blades at the end of their life.
“They cannot economically be reused, refurbished, reduced, repurposed, or recycled so guess what..? It’s off to special landfills they go,” the post said. “And guess what else..? They’re already running out of these special landfill spaces for the blades that have already exceeded their usefulness.”
Claire Barlow, a sustainability and materials engineer at the University of Cambridge, explained to us in an email that there are real challenges associated with the end of life of wind turbine blades. She said that the “normal lifetime” of a wind turbine is 20 to 25 years, and that the blades currently being decommissioned generally come from a time when wind energy was “starting to take off in a big way” — particularly in Europe and China. This means that “the number of end-of-life blades coming through will increase hugely in the next decade, and steadily after that.”
Putting them in landfills is the cheapest way to dispose of wind turbine blades, Barlow said. It is least expensive to simply bury the blades near the wind farms they came from, if there is space. “‘Special’ landfills yes, but not in the sense of meaning dangerous or difficult,” she said.
A Wind Energy End-of-Service Guide from the DOE explained that as of 2018, wind turbine blades sent to landfills represented 0.017% of “combined municipal solid waste and construction and demolition waste” in the U.S. The report said that by 2050 wind turbine blade waste would represent less than 0.15% of total waste, in a calculation using 2018 total waste levels.
Barlow went on to explain that in more densely populated areas, such as Northern Europe, there is less space to dispose of wind turbines via landfills and it is even banned in some areas. This means there’s an incentive to find alternate options.
“There is a great deal of work going on in finding economically (and environmentally) attractive solutions for end-of-life blade material, some of which are already commercially successful enterprises, and others that are busy scaling up from prototypes to full-scale,” she said.
The majority of wind turbine parts are readily recyclable, according to the DOE guide. “Blades are difficult to recycle because they are made from mixed materials which can’t easily be separated,” Barlow said.
The most basic recycling method, she said, “involves cutting up blades into small pieces (a few cm, or smaller for some applications) and using this material as filler in material used for road or playground surfaces, where it contributes useful strength.” There are companies using this approach, although “this recycled material isn’t high-value,” she said.
The DOE guide said that this and other recycling approaches are “increasingly being used in the United States,” although the majority of blades are still sent to landfills and the number of blades that are recycled “is difficult to determine.”
People are currently attempting to develop better processes for separating “potentially valuable fibres” out of the blades so they can be reused, Barlow said. There are challenges, but “real significant advances are being made,” she said.
The blades also “can safely be disposed of in modern well-controlled” waste-to-energy power plants, she said, although these are more common in Northern Europe than the U.S. There is also at least one operation in the U.S., she said, and others outside the country that are using wind turbine blades as fuel during the cement-making process.
Wind Turbine Impacts on Birds Need Context
Finally, the Facebook post brought up bird deaths caused by wind turbines. This, again, is a real problem, but the claims in the post are missing context, including that there are far greater causes of bird deaths.
“Oops, I almost forgot about the 500,000 birds that are killed each year from wind turbine blade collisions; most of which are endangered hawks, falcons, owls, geese, ducks, and eagles,” the post said. “Apparently smaller birds are more agile and able to dart and dodge out of the way of the spinning blades, whereas the larger soaring birds aren’t so lucky. I’m sure the wildlife conservationist folks are just ecstatic about that. I’m so glad the wind energy people are looking out for the world.”
Estimates vary for the total bird deaths from wind turbines. A 2020 report based on the American Wind Wildlife Information Center database, which compiles data from multiple studies, concluded that the median estimate for mortality was 1.3 bird deaths per megawatt of wind capacity per year.
Given that the total wind power capacity of the U.S. is more than 150,000 megawatts, this would represent around 200,000 bird deaths per year. Other work, done using data from 2012, estimated up to more than 500,000 bird deaths per year — and bird deaths would be expected to have risen as significantly more wind turbines have been built.
The Facebook post does not put wind turbine-related deaths in the context of other threats to birds. According to median estimates compiled in 2017 by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, bird deaths from wind turbine collisions are dwarfed by bird deaths from collisions with building glass, estimated to kill nearly 600 million birds annually, collisions with vehicles, estimated to kill more than 200 million birds a year, and encounters with cats, estimated to kill 2.4 billion birds a year.
The post’s claim that most bird deaths are among large birds is incorrect. According to the AWWIC report, median estimates were for 1.3 small bird deaths per megawatt of wind capacity per year, compared with 0.24 deaths for large birds and 0.06 deaths for raptors.
However, it is true that researchers have particular concerns about raptor deaths from wind turbine collisions, due to their relatively small populations and reproductive life histories. Raptor deaths from wind turbines may have an outsized impact on their population size.
A final piece of context: Birds facemajorthreats to their diversity and abundance from climate change. By providing an alternative form of energy with reduced greenhouse gas emissions, wind turbines may help mitigate climate change-related threats to birds.
Editor’s note: SciCheck’s articles providing accurate health information and correcting health misinformation are made possible by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The foundation has no control over FactCheck.org’s editorial decisions, and the views expressed in our articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the foundation.
Israel will send a delegation of about 85 athletes to the Olympic Games in Paris in July. Protesters opposed to the war in Gaza have called for limited participation by the Israelis, and a post on Threads falsely claimed Israel is “out” of the Games. The International Olympic Committee has said Israeli athletes will be allowed to compete.
Full Story
Israel plans to send about 85 athletes to compete in the Olympic Games in Paris next month, its second-largest delegation ever, according to the Times of Israel. But the war in Gaza presents security concerns for Israeli athletes and for the host country.
The fighting in Gaza began after the Palestinian militant group Hamas killed about 1,200 people in Israel and took 250 hostages on Oct. 7, sparking an ongoing assault by Israeli forces that has led to the deaths of more than 37,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza health ministry.
The Gaza death toll has sparked protests around the world, including an April 30 rally in Paris where pro-Palestinian demonstrators called for limited participation by Israel in the Olympics. The protesters compared Israel’s situation to the International Olympic Committee’s restrictions on Russian athletes’ participation in the Games since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Protesters stage a demonstration against Israel’s participation in the 2024 Paris Olympics in front of the International Olympic Committee headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, on June 12. Photo by Muhammet Ikbal Arslan/Anadolu via Getty Images.
A post on Threads on June 17 took the call for action against Israel a step further, claiming, “ISRAEL OUT OF THE PARIS OLYMPIC GAMES.” Comments on the post said that was “great news.”
But it’s not true that Israel is “out” of the Olympics. IOC President Thomas Bach said on March 6 that Israeli teams and individual athletes will be allowed to compete in the Paris Games, the Associated Press reported. “There is no question about this,” Bach said.
Since the attack on Israeli athletes during the 1972 Munich Olympics, Bach said that “there were always special measures” taken regarding the security of Israeli athletes, and “the same will be true” in Paris, which will include competitions outside stadiums and on the city’s streets, as well as venues in other French cities.
Eleven members of the Israeli delegation were killed in September 1972 during an assault in the Munich Olympic Village by the Palestinian militant group Black September and a failed rescue attempt by the German police. Among other things, the militants sought the release of 200 Palestinians being held at the time in Israeli prisons.
French officials have held rehearsals addressing security concerns for the July 26 opening ceremonies on the Seine River, the Washington Post reported. Security plans include deployment of 45,000 police officers, 18,000 soldiers and 22,000 private contractors, officials said.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.
A federal appeals court has revived a lawsuit against the Los Angeles Unified School District for its now-rescinded COVID-19 vaccine requirement. The court said the case should be allowed to develop beyond the preliminary arguments. But anti-vaccination activists have twisted the opinion to falsely claim the court had “declared that the mRNA covid jab is NOT a vaccine.”
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The Los Angeles Unified School District was among the employers that mandated COVID-19 vaccination in 2021, and then faced lawsuits over its requirement.
The first suit, filed on March 17, 2021, was brought by employees who didn’t want to get vaccinated. It was dismissed four months later because the school district had amended its policy to allow workers to instead submit to regular testing. (The district later reinstituted the vaccine requirement without the testing option, and then did away with the mandate altogether in September.)
A second suit was brought in November 2021 on behalf of the district employees by an Idaho-based nonprofit that started in 2020 and has pursued several lawsuits directed at public health measures meant to curb the spread of COVID-19, including mask and vaccine mandates.
The nonprofit organization, called the Health Freedom Defense Fund, argued that COVID-19 vaccines are not actually vaccines, but are instead “medical treatments,” and cannot be mandated. The group argued that the COVID-19 vaccines don’t prevent transmission of the disease, but rather just reduce its severity in those who are infected – making “the injection … a treatment, not a vaccine.”
As we’ve explainedbefore, since the virus changes as it spreads, the vaccines have become less effective in providing protection against symptomatic illness, but it is effective in preventing severe disease and death from COVID-19.
A study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published in February found that, for adults, the most recent formulation of the vaccines provided 54% increased protection against symptomatic infection. Expertssay that those vaccines should also be effective in preventing severe disease and death from the most common variants circulating since 2023.
Although the legal fight against the LA school district has been going on for about three years, it’s still in a relatively early legal stage, since both cases have been dismissed by trial courts. The Health Freedom Defense Fund suit was dismissed for several reasons in 2022, most importantly because the court found that the vaccine’s ability to reduce the severity of disease and death from COVID-19 met the district’s interest in protecting the health of students and employees.
However, on June 7, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit reversed that dismissal and sent the case back to the trial court to flesh out the arguments on both sides.
But conspiracy theorists and anti-vaccinationinfluencers on social media have misrepresented the opinion from the appeals court to falsely claim that it had “declared that the mRNA covid jab is NOT a vaccine.”
The court did no such thing.
Rather, the three-judge panel ruled 2-1 that the lower court was wrong to dismiss the case and that the school district’s “pattern of withdrawing and then reinstating its vaccination policies was enough to keep this case alive.”
As we said, the case is still in the early stages and neither side has presented much beyond their initial arguments. The appeals court wrote, “At this stage, we must accept Plaintiffs’ allegations that the vaccine does not prevent the spread of COVID-19 as true.” Letting the case continue will allow for each side to present evidence to support their arguments about the effectiveness of the vaccines.
“We note the preliminary nature of our holding,” the court said. “We do not prejudge whether, on a more developed factual record, Plaintiffs’ allegations will prove true.”
So, the court found that the case should continue. It has not “declared” whether or not the COVID-19 vaccines are actually vaccines.
Editor’s note: SciCheck’s articles providing accurate health information and correcting health misinformation are made possible by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The foundation has no control over FactCheck.org’s editorial decisions, and the views expressed in our articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the foundation.
California Educators for Medical Freedom v. Los Angeles Unified School District. No. 21-cv-02388. U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Complaint. 17 Mar 2021.
Health Freedom Defense Fund v. Megan K. Reilly. No. 2:21-cv-08688. U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Complaint. 3 Nov 2021.
California Educators for Medical Freedom v. Los Angeles Unified School District. No. 21-cv-02388. U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Order grants defendants’ motion to dismiss. 27 Jul 2021.
