Facts Check

Constitutional experts say President Donald Trump is wrong that he, not governors, has the power to “open up the states” where businesses were closed or residents were ordered to stay at home as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. On April 10, Trump said he would “love to open” the […]

The Democratic super PAC Priorities USA Action has been running an ad falsely suggesting President Donald Trump called the coronavirus outbreak a “hoax.” At the beginning, the ad splices together two quotes to have Trump saying, “The coronavirus, this is their new hoax.” It is obvious in listening to the […]

In a weekend tweet, President Donald Trump erroneously described a New York Times article, falsely stating that it said the coronavirus originated in Europe and suggesting that it had no named sources. The story, which reported on new genomic analyses of some of the first coronavirus cases in the New […]

Quick Take A TV station’s report on a Michigan fine for those violating the state’s social distancing orders showed Gov. Gretchen Whitmer at a signing ceremony with an intimate crowd of people — prompting accusations of hypocrisy on social media. But the footage used was from January 2019. Full Story  […]

Quick Take Social media posts falsely claim the news media is spreading “prop[a]ganda” and “twisting words” about Sen. Bernie Sanders’ decision to suspend his presidential campaign. They claim he is “still in the race.” While he remains on Democratic primary ballots, Sanders has said winning is “virtually impossible” and “the […]

Editor’s Note: This update reflects only a small part of the huge economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused millions of layoffs and shut down much of the economy before many of these statistics were collected. Summary Since Donald Trump took office as president, but mostly before the COVID-19 […]

The Trump campaign has launched a misleading attack ad that misrepresents Joe Biden’s statements on the Trump administration’s travel restrictions, and leaves the false impression that former U.S. Ambassador to China Gary Locke, a Chinese-American, is a Chinese official. The ad says that Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, was […]

In early March, President Donald Trump said that restrictions he placed on travel to and from China “saved a lot of lives,” a claim that grew to “probably tens of thousands” and “hundreds of thousands” by early April. But we found no support for such figures. The few studies that […]

Quick Take Posts across social media are falsely claiming that a vaccine trial for the novel coronavirus in Senegal resulted in the death of seven children. The video behind those claims does not show that. And there is no clinical trial for a potential vaccine currently taking place in Senegal. […]

President Donald Trump continues to add false and exaggerated statements to his already lengthy list of bogus voter fraud claims. There is no evidence to back up Trump’s blanket claim that “mailed ballots are corrupt.” Voting experts say the president is exaggerating when he says mail ballots are “fraudulent in […]