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pomt-15271 | The number of illegal immigrants in the United States is "30 million, it could be 34 million." | pants on fire! | /florida/statements/2015/jul/28/donald-trump/donald-trump-says-number-illegal-immigrants-30-mil/ | The day after Donald Trump visited the border in Laredo, Texas, he was armed with some fresh claims about illegal immigration, including how many immigrants are actually here. "I don't think the 11 million -- which is a number you have been hearing for many many years, I've been hearing that number for five years -- I don't think that is an accurate number anymore," Trump said on MSNBC’s Morning Joe July 24. "I am now hearing it's 30 million, it could be 34 million, which is a much bigger problem." Host Joe Scarborough then asked Trump, "Who are you hearing that from?" Trump replied: "I am hearing it from other people, and I have seen it written in various newspapers. The truth is the government has no idea how many illegals are here." Is Trump right that there are 30 million or more illegal immigrants? We decided to see what the latest evidence shows. Counting illegal immigrants The U.S. Department of Homeland Security comes up with an estimate of the number of illegal immigrants each year, and its most recent estimate was 11.4 million unauthorized immigrants as of January 2012. That includes those who entered the United States illegally and those who overstayed their visas. According to the department’s estimates, the number of illegal immigrants peaked around 12 million in 2007 and has gradually declined to closer to 11 million. The Homeland Security figure is in the same ballpark as several independent organizations that study illegal immigration, including Pew Research Center (11.3 million); the Center for Migration Studies (11 million), which studies migration and promotes policies that safeguard the rights of migrants, and the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for low levels of legal immigration (11-12 million). All of them arrive at their figures by subtracting known legal immigrants from the total number of foreign-born people documented in the U.S. census and then controlling for the estimated percentage of unauthorized immigrants who refuse to answer the census. All of the researchers we interviewed found similar figures to the federal government and said that Trump’s claim was wildly inflated. "There are, to my knowledge, no credible, research-based estimates of 30 million," said Jeffrey Passel, an expert on Hispanic immigration at the Pew Research Center. "The 11-12 million range is broadly accepted by almost all researchers and immigration advocates (regardless of perspective)." Steven Camarota, research director at the Center for Immigration Studies, said that the total number of illegal immigrants has essentially held constant in recent years, because the number arriving has roughly balanced the number going home or getting legal status. Could the census be missing enough illegal immigrants in its counts that the estimate is actually in Trump’s range? The experts we talked with said no. "Even though the empirical estimates have a margin of error of maybe plus or minus a million, there is virtually no evidence that the real number could be even a few million higher than 11 million," said Robert Warren, a fellow at the Center for Migration Studies and a former demographer with the Census Bureau and the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Camarota said that the reason the 30 million figure is unlikely is that the census asks other questions that allow researchers to estimate how good the data is -- for example, the number of births to immigrant mothers, school enrollment and death records, which helps shore up the figure. In other words, if there were three times the generally accepted number of illegal immigrants in the United States, they would show up in those other categories. Marc Rosenblum of the Migration Policy Institute, a think tank that doesn’t take positions on immigration legislation, said that 30 million "is a totally absurd number." "There is NO published report by a serious research organization or academic that suggests anything in the range of 30 million," he said. So how did Trump come up with his inflated figure? We aren’t certain, since a campaign spokeswoman declined to comment. But we’ve heard others cite similar figures. In her book Adios America, conservative columnist Ann Coulter said there are 30 million illegal immigrants. Her starting point was a 2005 article from two Bear Stearns financial advisors, who looked at the rise in money sent back to Mexico and housing permits in three New Jersey communities. Coulter emphasized that "the assumption that illegal people will fill out a census form is the most ridiculous concept I have ever heard of." The Center for Immigration Studies disagrees with that last point. In a recent report, the center wrote, "It is well established that illegal aliens do respond to government surveys such as the decennial census and the Current Population Survey." Our ruling Trump said the number of illegal immigrants in the United States is "30 million, it could be 34 million." The Department of Homeland Security says the number of illegal immigrants was about 11.4 million as of January 2012. Other independent groups that research illegal immigration put the number between 11 and 12 million. We found no compelling evidence that the number could as high as Trump said. Trump has provided no proof that the number of illegal immigrants is triple the widespread consensus. We rate this claim Pants on Fire. https://www.sharethefacts.co/share/b6c9e9d4-0fe9-4bf5-abbd-15a37945e468 | null | Donald Trump | null | null | null | 2015-07-28T14:18:13 | 2015-07-24 | ['United_States'] |
pomt-05672 | Says David Rivera "received a $5,000 campaign contribution from Congressman Spencer Bachus, who is currently under House Ethics investigation for insider trading." | mostly true | /florida/statements/2012/mar/16/luis-garcia/david-rivera-took-5000-donation-spencer-bachus-inv/ | Miami Beach state Rep. Luis Garcia says that U.S. Rep. David Rivera, R-Miami, took money from a peer accused of insider trading. "Last week, Congressman David Rivera allowed House Republican leaders to strip key provisions from the STOCK Act that would crack down on corruption of public officials and on those who peddle political inside information for profit. Rivera has received a $5,000 campaign contribution from Congressman Spencer Bachus, who is currently under House Ethics investigation for insider trading, and whose behavior is the target of the STOCK Act," said Garcia, a Democrat, in a Feb. 15 campaign press release. In a related report about whether Rivera "allowed" Republican leaders to soften the bill, we examined in detail the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, which passed the Senate and House in February. Although insider trading by members of Congress is already illegal, the STOCK Act is a response to newspaper reports and academic research that raise suspicions that politicians on Capitol Hill use their unique access to information to make lucrative trades. The bill is intended to make it crystal clear that members can’t inside trade, and it requires them to disclose their transactions within 30 to 45 days. In this item, we will explore whether Rivera received a $5,000 contribution from Bachus, who is under investigation for insider trading. For questions about the campaign donation, Rivera’s congressional office spokeswoman referred us to a generic email address for Rivera’s campaign, and we did not get a reply. We also tried to reach Rivera directly but were unsuccessful. First, some background about Rivera. A longtime state legislator, Rivera was elected to Congress in 2010 and now faces re-election in 2012. Rivera is the subject of a criminal probe by the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service related to $510,000 in undisclosed payments from a former dog track to a company owned by his mother. The press release noted that Rivera received a contribution in 2010 from Bachus’ Growth and Prosperity Political Action Committee. The PAC’s report filed with the Federal Election Commission showed that it gave to multiple congressional campaigns, including $5,000 to Rivera’s congressional campaign on May 13, 2010 (Rivera’s FEC report shows that he received the donation June 24, 2010.) The Center for Responsive Politics shows a summary of donations by Bachus’ Growth and Prosperity PAC -- it spent about $724,000, for the 2010 cycle. The contribution to Rivera’s campaign was not among the top recipients or vendors. In November 2011, 60 Minutes aired a report inspired by the book Throw Them All Out, by Peter Schweizer, which cast a spotlight on Bachus, R-Ala., and his trades during the 2008 financial crisis. "While Congressman Bachus was publicly trying to keep the economy from cratering, he was privately betting that it would, buying option funds that would go up in value if the market went down," the 60 Minutes report stated. "He would make a variety of trades and profited at a time when most Americans were losing their shirts." The Washington Post reported on Feb. 9, 2012, that the Office of Congressional Ethics had launched an investigation of Bachus, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, over possible violations of insider-trading laws. Bachus "has been a frequent trader on Capitol Hill, buying stock options while overseeing the nation’s banking and financial services industries," the Post stated, explaining that it was the first investigation of its kind of a member of Congress. The Post wrote that the OCE has found probable cause that insider-trading violations have occurred. The Post report was based on anonymous sources, which we cannot independently confirm or refute. However, we’ve seen nothing that refutes the Post’s key findings. And Bachus himself released a statement on the matter. "I welcome the opportunity to set the record straight," Bachus said in a statement. "I respect the congressional ethics process. I have fully abided by the rules governing members of Congress and look forward to the full exoneration this process will provide." Among the examples cited in the Post article: On Sept. 18, 2008, Bachus participated in a closed-door briefing with then-Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke. Paulson wrote in a book that they discussed the high likelihood of decline across the entire economy if drastic steps weren’t taken, but Bachus denied that he received any insider information. The next day Bachus made trades that earned him profits. "The Office of Congressional Ethics has requested information and I welcome this opportunity to present the facts and set the record straight," Bachus said in a statement quoted in the Post report. Bachus’ spokesman did not respond to PolitiFact Florida. Facing a primary challenge on March 13 (which Bachus won), Bachus defended himself in an ad in which he blamed "liberal Washington reporters" and "Obama’s Democratic allies" and claimed that "news reports are clear. The attacks are false." The ad shows a headline from The Hill which quoted a former federal judge and SEC head, tapped by Bachus to review the allegations, as saying that he is innocent. Two former SEC chairman also said in a guest editorial that the allegations are "laughable." "If Mr. Bachus attended a meeting in which the troubled state of the economy (and how to deal with it) was discussed, that hardly was a state secret at the time of the meeting. Moreover, immediately after the meeting, the organizers disclosed what had been discussed," stated the editorial. So Bachus’ PAC gave money to Rivera’s campaign in May 2010 for a race he won that year, and nearly three years later the Washington Post reported that Bachus was under investigation. Our ruling Garcia said that "Rivera has received a $5,000 campaign contribution from Congressman Spencer Bachus, who is currently under House Ethics investigation for insider trading." Technically, the donation came from Bachus’ PAC and not Bachus as an individual, but that isn’t a key difference in this case. More significantly, the donation was made in 2010, years before news broke about the recent investigation. We should also note that although Bachus has acknowledged providing information to the ethics office, their findings have not been made public. Obviously, we don’t know what its findings will be. But in a literal sense, Garcia’s claim about the donation is accurate. But it omits the additional information that the donation was made before Bachus was under investigation. We rate this claim Mostly True. | null | Luis Garcia | null | null | null | 2012-03-16T14:25:28 | 2012-02-15 | ['None'] |
farg-00090 | Just hit 50% in the Rasmussen Poll, much higher than President Obama at same point. | false | https://www.factcheck.org/2018/04/presidential-approval-numbers/ | null | the-factcheck-wire | Donald Trump | Lori Robertson | ['polling'] | Presidential Approval Numbers | April 18, 2018 | [' Twitter – Sunday, April 15, 2018 '] | ['Barack_Obama'] |
goop-02066 | Meghan Markle’s “Wild Past” Being Erased By MI5 Agents? | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/meghan-markle-mi5-erase-wild-past/ | null | null | null | Holly Nicol | null | Meghan Markle’s “Wild Past” Being Erased By MI5 Agents? | 6:13 am, December 8, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
vees-00264 | VERA Files joins Facebook’s third-party fact-checking program in PH | none | http://verafiles.org/articles/vera-files-joins-facebooks-third-party-fact-checking-program | null | null | null | null | Fact check,facebook | VERA Files joins Facebook’s third-party fact-checking program in PH | April 13, 2018 | null | ['None'] |
snes-00628 | Did the Parkland Shooting Suspect Have a ‘Connection’ to Barack Obama? | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nikolas-cruz-promise-obama/ | null | Politics | null | Dan MacGuill | null | Did the Parkland Shooting Suspect Have a ‘Connection’ to Barack Obama? | 9 May 2018 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-05129 | Says New Jersey’s job growth in May represents "25 percent of all the jobs created in the country." | false | /new-jersey/statements/2012/jun/24/chris-christie/chris-christie-claims-new-jerseys-job-growth-may-r/ | For those Democrats questioning whether to cut taxes, Gov. Chris Christie has a statistic to prove his "Jersey Comeback" is real: the Garden State in May created one out of every four net new jobs in the nation. Christie offered that statistic during a June 14 press conference as one of the "real facts" Democrats should address. "Fact is, it is time for a tax cut in this state," said Christie, according to a video posted June 15 on YouTube. "It is long overdue for a tax cut in this state, and I hope that today they stop with the make-believe and start addressing the real facts, which are that New Jersey is the single biggest job producer last month of any state in the country -- 25 percent of all the jobs created in the country right here." But PolitiFact New Jersey found that Christie was making an invalid comparison of federal labor statistics. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced June 1 that the nation had seen a net increase of 69,000 nonfarm jobs in May, accounting for both job gains and losses. State officials said June 14 that New Jersey saw an over-the-month increase in May of 17,600 nonfarm jobs. Both figures are preliminary and seasonally adjusted. Christie’s mistake was claiming that the 17,600 jobs in New Jersey were part of that 69,000 for the nation. The bureau separately develops two sets of employment estimates -- one for the nation as a whole and then estimates for each individual state. Compiling the state estimates does not necessarily equal the national total. For example, if you combine the job gains and losses for the 50 states and Washington, D.C., you reach a net increase of 98,400 nonfarm jobs in May -- not 69,000. So, since the two sets of estimates are done separately, it's wrong to compare the two. "As mentioned earlier, the CES national estimates are independently produced and are not an aggregation of statewide data," the bureau said, referring to the Current Employment Statistics program. "Therefore users cannot disaggregate or compare CES national economic movements to state, regional, or metropolitan area CES estimates." The most valid comparison would be to consider New Jersey’s 17,600 jobs as a share of the job gains across the country in May, according to Doug Hall, director of the Economic Analysis and Research Network at the Washington, DC-based Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank. In May, a total of 184,500 jobs were created in 27 states and Washington, D.C. Of that amount, New Jersey’s growth represents about 9.5 percent. Those statistics, which were released by the bureau the day after Christie’s press conference, also show that California and Ohio saw greater job gains in May than New Jersey. So, Christie’s wrong to say "New Jersey is the single biggest job producer last month of any state." Brian Murray, a spokesman with the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development, argued that at the time of the governor’s statement, Christie only had "the net national gain of 69,000 jobs against which to compare the state numbers." "I understand your point that the comparison made is not recommended by the BLS," Murray said in an e-mail. "But I think you should consider that it was not until June 15, a day after the Governor made his remarks, that the public and Governor’s Office could have seen the full BLS numbers on national figures and other states like California." Christie may not have had the additional labor statistics, but that doesn’t change the fact that he made a flawed comparison with the publicly available figures at his disposal. Our ruling At his June 14 press conference, Christie claimed New Jersey’s over-the-month increase of 17,600 jobs in May represented "25 percent of all the jobs created in the country." The governor was comparing the state’s job growth to the national estimate of 69,000 net jobs created. But according to the bureau, state estimates and the national estimate are developed separately, making it wrong to compare the two. We rate the statement False. To comment on this ruling, go to NJ.com. | null | Chris Christie | null | null | null | 2012-06-24T07:30:00 | 2012-06-15 | ['None'] |
vogo-00625 | Help Us Fact Check | none | https://www.voiceofsandiego.org/fact/help-us-fact-check/ | null | null | null | null | null | Help Us Fact Check | March 9, 2010 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-12574 | Says small businesses "make up 98.9 percent of all businesses in the state and employ nearly half of the state's private sector workforce" and "almost never receive a penny of government money." | half-true | /florida/statements/2017/apr/11/richard-corcoran/are-small-businesses-getting-gypped-incentives/ | Florida House Speaker Richard Corcoran continued his scorched-earth campaign against taxpayer-backed business incentives, this time attacking Gov. Rick Scott for spending too much time defending Enterprise Florida and not enough time on issues that protect jobs. In an April 3 Tampa Bay Times column, Corcoran warned that not addressing the state's workers' compensation system and a property insurance issue known as "assignment of benefits" will put small and family-run businesses in jeopardy. Corcoran said that instead of working with the House on these issues, Scott has spent most of the 60-day legislative session fighting for an agency that doesn’t help small businesses. "(Enterprise Florida) subsidizes big companies with over 1,000 employees to compete against our small businesses, which make up 98.9 percent of all businesses in the state and employ nearly half of the state's private sector workforce and who almost never receive a penny of government money," Corcoran wrote. For this fact-check, we decided to focus on the statistics about small businesses in Florida and whether they "almost never" receive government money. Regardless of how you define them, small businesses make up a large chunk of all businesses in Florida. However, his point that small businesses "almost never" receive government money is at best an exaggeration. Small businesses not so small in Florida There is no standard definition for a small business. The difference between large and small firms can depend on how many people a firm employs, the amount of revenue the firm makes or the type of industry. No matter which way you slice the pie, small businesses in Florida comprise a significant chunk of all business in the Sunshine State. Florida is home to approximately 2.4 million businesses of all sizes. That figure includes large firms, small firms and nonemployer firms — a technical term to describe a business with no employees. Most nonemployers are self-employed individuals whose business may or may not be the main source of income, such as someone who earns money as a tutor. Nonemployers make up 81.5 percent of all businesses in the state. The latest snapshot comes from the federal government. The Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy considers a small business as any firm with fewer than 500 employees (including the nonemployers). Under that metric, the total number of small businesses is about 2.3 million. That comes out to 99.8 percent of all businesses, an even larger share than Corcoran’s figure. Corcoran got to his figure of 98.9 percent by excluding firms without a single employee. The figure came from a report that divided the number of firms with fewer than 500 employees (almost 420,000) with the total of firms with employees (424,550). See Figure 1 on PolitiFact.com To throw out another measure that still proves the prevalence of small businesses, firms with fewer than 20 employees make up about 90 percent of all businesses in the state. Corcoran’s point about small businesses employing "nearly half" of the workforce is slightly above the actual figure. The latest number shows that small businesses (defined as fewer than 500 employees) employed 3.2 million people. That is about 42.8 percent of the workforce. Kwame Donaldson, a senior economist at Moody’s, said that compared to the national average, small businesses in Florida employ a smaller share of the workforce (43 percent in Florida vs. 48 percent nationwide). Are small businesses getting gypped? Corcoran said small businesses "almost never" get government money. Corcoran’s team pointed to a December 2016 review of Enterprise Florida’s economic development system by the Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability, a nonpartisan research arm of the Legislature. The analysis found that the majority of businesses incentives (51.9 percent) went to employers with more than 1,000 employees. The analysis pointed out that businesses with less than 50 employees received only 14.5 percent of economic incentives. "Although 96 percent of the state’s businesses employ fewer than 50 employees, most state-level economic development programs, particularly incentives, generally benefit large businesses," it reads. Here’s the breakdown: If we consider a small business as a firm between 1 and 499 employees, as Corcoran did for the other part of his point, then small businesses were awarded 38.3 percent of economic incentives. That’s not as much as the big firms got, but it’s not "almost nothing." Our ruling Corcoran said small businesses "make up 98.9 percent of all businesses in the state and employ nearly half of the state's private sector workforce" and "almost never receive a penny of government money." No matter the definition, small businesses in Florida make up the majority of all businesses in the state. Corcoran’s specific numbers are accurate if a small business is defined as any firm with fewer than 500 employees. However, by that 500-employee metric, it is not the case that small businesses "almost never" receive government money. While large firms get the majority of incentives, firms that employ between 1 to 499 people in Florida were awarded almost 40 percent of all incentive projects in past years. So while large firms receive the majority of economic incentives, it is imprecise to say there’s "almost nothing" left for the little guy. For a partially accurate claim that requires explanation, we rate it Half True. See Figure 2 on PolitiFact.com | null | Richard Corcoran | null | null | null | 2017-04-11T15:48:50 | 2017-04-03 | ['None'] |
pomt-07432 | We are the most generous in New England and New England is known for its generosity toward its welfare recipients. | half-true | /rhode-island/statements/2011/apr/24/colleen-conley/ri-tea-party-founder-says-rhode-island-most-genero/ | In the ongoing debate over how and where to cut the state budget, social services -- particularly welfare -- are popular targets. After all, social service spending costs residents nearly $1.1 billion a year and makes up nearly 40 percent of the general revenue budget. So when Colleen Conley, founder and president of the Rhode Island Tea Party said on WHJJ's Helen Glover Show on April 13 that welfare recipients in Rhode Island are treated to the "most generous" benefits in New England, that caught our attention. Conley made the comment following an appearance by state Rep. Brian Newberry, a North Smithfield Republican, who said that the state's health and human services budget has increased by 73 percent since 2002. Conley moved to the welfare issue after criticizing Gov. Chafee's assertion that he wasn't hearing any viable alternatives to his proposal to raise taxes. "If he would sit down and meet with us we could give him 10 HUGE concrete ideas that could spread the difficulty, the pain, around a little bit," Conley commented. "But as Brian was saying, health and human services -- huge in this state. If we brought it in line with just the other New England states it would save millions and millions of dollars. That is just one component right there. We are the most generous in New England and New England is known for its generosity toward its welfare recipients." When we contacted Conley, she said her source was a study by the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council. Do welfare recipients really have it that good in Rhode Island? We decided to check. The simple answer: When it comes to how folks commonly define welfare -- cash assistance to poor people -- they don’t. The RIPEC report, released in 2010 using data from 2008, doesn't have a state-by-state comparison of cash payments. Instead, it examines them by two different measures. And both show we’re far from the most generous in New England. First, to gauge how we compare with other states, it divided the amount spent on cash assistance by the Rhode Island population. The cash assistance program cost each resident, on average, $53. Rhode Island ranked fifth out of the six New England states. Only residents of New Hampshire spent less -- $44 per capita. Second, to compare how much Rhode Islanders could afford to pay, RIPEC divided the amount spent on cash assistance by the amount of personal income Rhode Island residents had that year. By that measure, the state spent $1.30 per $1,000 of personal income and Rhode Island ranked third in New England, behind Maine ($4.08 per $1,000) and Vermont ($2.63 per $1,000). And how do we compare in actual dollars paid to recipients? The RIPEC report didn’t have those figures, but the liberal Poverty Institute did. Rhode Island is fifth in New England, with payments of $554 per month for a family of three. Only Maine pays less - $485 per month. Rhode Island’s hasn't increased its welfare payments in more than 20 years, said Rachel Flum, a Poverty Institute policy analyst. Up to this point, Conley's "most generous in New England" assessment doesn’t hold up. When we questioned her, Conley directed us to the welfare "vendor payments" section of the RIPEC report, noting, as RIPEC did, that "per capita vendor payments almost tripled in Rhode Island, growing by 178.9 percent between FY 1998 and FY 2008." When we asked Conley what the payments were and how those payments might be cut back to bring us in line with everyone else, she said it's up to the state to look into that. "I'm not a policy wonk nor do I head a 501c3 think tank," she added. So what is a vendor payment? We went to RIPEC. "Those are not welfare recipients. Let's be very clear," said Ashley Denault, RIPEC's research director. They represent payments to doctors, nursing homes and organizations that charge the state for health- or mental health-related services for the poor. Vendor payments soak up a whopping 88 percent of public welfare expenditures, according to RIPEC's ranking. The state paid $1,785 per capita to vendors in 2008, more than any other state in the United States. Massachusetts ranked second at $1,667. "The rapid increase in vendor payments is not just a Rhode Island issue," she said. "It's the medical inflation rate, which has been very high over the last decade. You can't look at it and say Rhode Island is a welfare magnet, or we have tons of people on Medicaid." "It could be we could have more people who qualify for these programs. It could be wider eligibility. It could be we're not providing services in the most efficient manner. It could be how we set our reimbursement rate, which might be out of line with the rest of the country," Denault said. She said Chafee's budget includes proposals to try to bring these costs into line, including changes in nursing home reimbursements expected to save $6.1 million in the coming fiscal year and outpatient hospital reimbursements that could save $2.7 million. To sum up, Conley is right when she asserts that Rhode Island’s overall social services spending -- and particularly the amount paid to vendors for health services -- ranks high, both in New England and nationally. But when she said Rhode Island is the "most generous in New England . . . toward its welfare recipients," that invoked the image of single mothers receiving the biggest welfare checks in New England. That's simply not true, no matter how you measure it. She may not have intended to give that impression, but her words clearly conveyed that. So we’ll split the difference and give her a Half True. | null | Colleen Conley | null | null | null | 2011-04-24T00:01:00 | 2011-04-13 | ['New_England'] |
pomt-01747 | This administration is slashing the Navy to pay for more Obamacare. | pants on fire! | /virginia/statements/2014/aug/03/ed-gillespie/ed-gillespie-says-white-house-cutting-navy-pay-oba/ | The Navy is ailing, and Obamacare is to blame, says Ed Gillespie, the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate. "This administration is slashing the Navy to pay for more Obamacare," he said during a recent debate with Democratic incumbent Mark Warner. "There’s no two ways about it when looking at their budget." It wasn’t the first time Gillespie has made this claim on the campaign trail in Virginia, home to the world’s largest Naval base. We decided to see if he’s right. The Navy Budget The final Navy allocation requested by George W. Bush’s administration, for fiscal 2009, was $149.3 billion. Congress appropriated $148.1 billion. Here are the amounts President Barack Obama has requested for the Navy: 2010 -- $156.4 billion 2011 -- $160.6 billion 2012 -- $161.4 billion 2013 -- $157.3 billion 2014 -- $155.8 billion 2015 -- $148 billion. And here are the amounts Congress appropriated for the Navy: 2010 -- $156.1 billion 2011 -- $156.1 billion 2012 -- $158.3 billion 2013 -- $161.6 billion 2014 -- $149.8 billion. You may notice that the first list goes one year into the future while the second list doesn’t. That’s because Obama has made his Navy budget request for 2015, but Congress hasn’t agreed on the appropriation. There are two important trends in these lists. First, over the course of Obama’s administration, a chart of his Navy budget requests would look like a hill, sloping up in the early years and then dropping below its starting point. A chart for the congressional allocations would have the same shape. The second trend is that in four of the first five years of the administration, Congress appropriated less Navy money than Obama requested. The trends stem from a partisan showdown over the federal debt in 2011 that resulted in an unhappy compromise. The fight arose over raising the nation’s debt limit so the government could continue to pay its obligations, something Congress had routinely done in the past. This time, however, Republicans insisted on spending cuts in return for raising the limit. Democrats initially refused. The standoff was broken that August by passage of the Budget Control Act of 2011, which eventually triggered $1.2 trillion in automatic budget cuts over 10 years -- called sequestration -- in exchange for raising the borrowing limit. Half the cuts will be made in domestic programs, which Democrats sought to protect, and half will come in defense spending -- including the Navy -- that Republicans wanted to shield. The cuts began to take effect on March 1, 2013. Is Obamacare tied to Navy cuts? The Navy and Obamacare -- also known as the Affordable Care Act -- are funded under different budget rules. The Navy falls under discretionary spending, which accounts for about 40 percent of all federal outlays. These are programs that receive annual appropriations subject to the whims of Congress and are affected by the sequester. Although defense consumes about half of the discretionary budget, other areas include education, agriculture and housing. Obamacare was set up to be self-supporting through a series of specially enacted taxes and long-term Medicare savings. It doesn’t rely on an annual appropriation. In other words, the ACA and the Navy are supported by two unconnected funding streams. So where does Gillespie find the link? His campaign sent us a variety of information but none of it tied the Navy cuts to Obamacare. We received: A 2013 blog entry by Adm. Jonathan Greenert, chief of Navy operations. He warned that the U.S. fleet could sink to about 255-260 ships in 2020 if sequestration continues. That’s a loss of about 30 ships, or about 10 percent. A 2013 news release from Rep. Randy Forbes, R-4th, announcing he had introduced a bill to remove the Department of Defense from the sequester. Two long-term budget outlooks published by nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office this year, noting there will be costs for expanding health insurance subsidies under Obamacare. The reports, however, did not address ACA revenues. "They looked completely at the spending side," said Josh Gordon, an analyst for the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan organization urging deficit reduction. For now, insurance provisions under Obamacare are costing less than expected. The CBO estimated in April that the expanded insurance under the act will cost $104 billion less than it originally projected over the next 10 years. Experts told us Gillespie’s linkage of Navy cuts to Obamacare is way off base. "I don’t see any connection between the defense budget and the Affordable Care Act," said Todd Harrison, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a think tank focused on defense policies. Winslow T. Wheeler, director of the Straus Military Reform Project for the Project on Government Oversight, called Gillespie’s comment "specious nonsense." Our ruling Gillespie says the Obama administration is "slashing the Navy to pay for more Obamacare." The claim is erroneous for two reasons. First, Congress is complicit in the Navy budget cuts. By failing to agree on a debt-reduction plan, it triggered a self-imposed regimen of automatic cuts to defense and domestic programs. Second, Obamacare is shielded from those reductions because it’s not subject to annual appropriations from Congress. The ACA is self-funded through a series of specially enacted taxes and health care efficiencies. Its fortunes are not tied to those of Navy. Gillespie, who has made this statement at least twice, sent us plenty of information, but none of it linked the Navy cuts to Obamacare. We agree with the military expert who called the claim "specious nonsense." But at PolitiFact, we call it Pants on Fire. | null | Ed Gillespie | null | null | null | 2014-08-03T00:00:00 | 2014-07-26 | ['None'] |
abbc-00134 | Our constituents are the poorest, that's one thing we do know and so we are always looking out for them, Deputy Leader of the Nationals Barnaby Joyce told ABC TV's Q&A. | in-the-green | http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-12-10/do-the-nationals-represent-australias-poorest-electorates/6952166 | Mr Joyce's claim checks out. Experts agree that there is no "gold standard" in measuring poverty. Fact Check was unable to find one dataset that definitively measures poverty in relation to electorates. However, three separate datasets all indicate that the Nationals' electorates are on average poorer or more disadvantaged than those represented by Labor and the Liberal Party. | ['poverty', 'political-parties', 'nationals', 'australia'] | null | null | ['poverty', 'political-parties', 'nationals', 'australia'] | Fact check: Do the Nationals represent Australia's poorest electorates? | Fri 11 Dec 2015, 11:30am | null | ['None'] |
snes-00702 | Hulu cancelled plans to stream comedian Michelle Wolf’s standup special after her appearance at the 2018 White House Correspondents Dinner. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/michelle-wolf-hulu-special/ | null | Junk News | null | David Mikkelson | null | Did Hulu Cancel Michelle Wolf’s Standup Special? | 29 April 2018 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-11099 | The city that I was mayor of was 50 percent Latino, and I won with 90 percent of the vote... | mostly false | /pennsylvania/statements/2018/jun/12/lou-barletta/hazleton-wasnt-half-latino-when-lou-barletta-was-r/ | In an interview with Fox Business Network’s Stuart Varney on June 7, Republican Congressman and U.S. Senate candidate from Pennsylvania Lou Barletta claimed that he won re-election as mayor of Hazleton, a city in northeastern Pennsylvania with a large Latino population, while also serving as the driving force behind a heavily scrutinized crackdown on undocumented immigrants there. "The city that I was mayor of was 50 percent Latino, and I won with 90 percent of the vote, and I was standing up for legal immigrants. Legal — keyword — legal immigrants," Barletta asserted. Barletta was on the program to discuss, among other things, a federal court’s ruling against the Trump administration’s plan to penalize Philadelphia for its sanctuary city policy by docking its federal funding. Barletta, a Trump supporter, has been an outspoken critic of U.S. immigration policy, sanctuary cities and the Democratic Party’s approach to dealing with millions of immigrants who entered the country illegally. This includes the approach of his Democratic opponent for the U.S. Senate seat, longtime incumbent Bob Casey. But is Barletta’s claim that he won re-election by a landslide in a majority Latino city in the midst of a high-profile crackdown on undocumented immigrants accurate? See Figure 1 on PolitiFact.com By the numbers There are a few things to consider with Barletta’s claim: First, did he win with 90 percent of the vote? Yes, if you round up slightly. According to archived Luzerne County elections records, Barletta won 89.05 percent of the vote when he was re-elected mayor of Hazleton in 2007. Barletta was the only major party candidate on the ballot and appeared as both the Republican nominee and the Democratic nominee after winning the Democratic nomination with a write-in campaign. Barletta first won election in 1999 with 65 percent of the vote and won re-election in 2003 with 68 percent of the vote, according to the Hazleton Standard-Speaker, which pulled results from their archives to provide to Politifact Pennsylvania. Second, was the city half Latino at the time? No. According to Census data, Hazleton’s Latino population grew from 1,132 or 4.84 percent of the city’s overall population in 2000 to 9,454 or 37.31 percent of the total population in 2010. In 2007, the last time Barletta was re-elected as mayor before being elected to U.S. Congress — and the only time he was re-elected mayor with anywhere near 90 percent of the vote — the city’s Latino population was under 37 percent. It’s unclear how many of those Latino residents were eligible or registered to vote, or how many of them did vote. According to a 2017 report in the Washington Post, the town never studied the number of undocumented immigrants living in Hazleton. Philly.com,in 2016, reported an unnamed "veteran police official" estimated 10 percent of the city’s Latino population was undocumented. And while Census data are not infallible as a gauge of demographic makeup, Barletta’s claim that Hazleton was 50 percent Latino at the time of his re-election is not supported by a more reliable source. Barletta spokesman David Jackson offered the following response: "Even if you think that legal immigrants only made up ‘nearly 40 percent’’ of the population of Hazleton in 2006, to garner 90 percent of the vote, many of them had to have supported his policies. This is anecdotal, but we're talking hard numbers here." There was also no empirical evidence provided by his campaign to support the implication that support for Barletta’s Illegal Immigration Relief Act, which threatened Hazleton landlords and employers with fines for housing or hiring undocumented immigrants, helped propel him to victory. "The fact that he won with such a high proportion of the vote at a time when the ordinance was so prominent in the news is evidence in and of itself that it was not received as negatively as it is being portrayed," Jackson added. "I don't think he made the statement that the ordinance was the driving factor in his re-election, but by any measurement, a 90 percent re-election win is a mandate to continue the policies an elected official had begun." Worth noting: the 89.05 percent of the vote Barletta received in winning re-election in 2007 represents just 89.05 percent of the votes cast, not 89.05 percent of the city’s population or 89.05 percent of overall registered voters. There were 3,964 total votes cast in the Hazleton mayor’s race in 2007 and 3,530 of those went to Barletta. Hazleton’s total population was roughly 21,000 at the time. Today, the city is more than 50 percent Latino and that number continued to grow even during the controversy over Barletta’s Illegal Immigration Relief Act. The ordinance drew a lawsuit before being struck down by a federal court. Our ruling Barletta’s claim that he won re-election with 90 percent of the vote in a majority Latino city while driving a crackdown on illegal immigration there misstates the size of Hazleton’s Latino population at the time and the timeline involved. Barletta was re-elected mayor of Hazleton with roughly 90 percent of the vote in 2007 but the city was not majority-Latino then. It is now. And while Barletta’s crackdown was certainly popular with some in the city at the time, and unpopular with others, it’s unclear what role it played in his 2007 victory. We rate this claim Mostly False. | null | Lou Barletta | null | null | null | 2018-06-12T12:00:00 | 2018-06-07 | ['None'] |
snes-05596 | Michele Bachmann compare the Great Wall of China to a U.S.-Mexico border fence. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/bachmann-trump-overdrive/ | null | Junk News | null | Dan Evon | null | No Illegal Mexicans in China Thanks to the Great Wall | 20 August 2015 | null | ['China', 'Mexico–United_States_border', 'Michele_Bachmann'] |
pomt-13996 | Says Merrick Garland "authored an opinion that resulted in the release of 17 Guantanamo Bay prisoners who were part of a group of violent Islamist extremists the State Department had designated as terrorists." | mostly false | /pennsylvania/statements/2016/jun/07/pat-toomey/pat-toomeys-beef-supreme-court-pick-merrick-garlan/ | U.S. Senator Pat Toomey has doubts about Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland -- particularly regarding a ruling that set free prisoners from Guantánamo Bay. Garland "authored an opinion that resulted in the release of 17 Guantanamo Bay prisoners who were part of a group of violent Islamist extremists the State Department had designated as terrorists," Republican Toomey wrote in an April op-ed for PennLive titled, "Here's why I'm opposing Merrick Garland's Supreme Court nomination." Look closely: Toomey’s statement combines two court rulings, Garland’s and a later decision. The first, decided by a three-judge panel and indeed authored by Garland, ordered the release of one detainee, not 17. Uighurs in China Toomey is not referring to a typical Guantánamo case. The story begins with social unrest in China, and the status of the Uighurs. Uighurs (pronounced wee-gurs) are a Muslim ethnic minority primarily from the northwestern province of Xinjiang. After alleged discrimination and violent clashes, the 22 Uighurs fled China for the Afghan mountains, and fled again after airstrikes reached their settlement after 9/11. They were captured and sent to Gitmo in 2002. Many had been captured in Pakistan, close to the Afghan border, by bounty hunters who sold them to the United States for $5,000 each. Why would a Uighur militant be a part of Al Qaida? In the 2013 report "Terrorism in China," University of Virginia Professor Philip B.K. Potter traces it to "China’s ongoing security crackdown in Xinjiang [forcing] the most militant Uyghur separatists into volatile neighboring countries, such as Pakistan, where they are forging strategic alliances with, and even leading, jihadist factions affiliated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban." So, as the executive branch pushed for Guantánamo’s closure, the case of the Uighurs and their possible ties to terrorism took center stage. Five Uighurs were cleared and released in 2006, resettling in Albania. Seventeen remained in custody. Which brings us Garland and the 2008 opinion that Toomey is referencing. What made the government back down Really, the three-judge panel on which Garland sat only released one Uighur: Huzaifa Parhat. Parhat told the FBI, per court documents, that he left China to escape harsh discrimination. His people suffered "harassment, forced abortions for more than two children, high taxes, the taking away of land, and the banishing of educated people to remote areas," he said. He was one of the Uighurs who had basic gun training from the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (or ETIM; Turkistan is a name some Uighur independentists use for their homelands), learning how to take apart and clean guns. Much of the evidence that the government provided came from his own interviews. Parhat identified Hassan Maksum and Abdul Haq, as leaders at the camp; both men were ETIM fighters and Al Qaida members. In court, Parhat argued that just because some people in the camp were members of ETIM, it didn’t mean that the whole camp was. Garland, in his opinion, noted that the intelligence didn’t seem certain. "The documents repeatedly describe those activities and relationships as having ‘reportedly’ occurred, as being ‘said to’ or ‘reported to’ have happened, and as things that ‘may’ be true or are ‘suspected of’ having taken place," he wrote. "But in virtually every instance, the documents do not say who ‘reported’ or ‘said’ or ‘suspected’ those things." Further: "To be clear, we do not suggest that hearsay evidence is never reliable -- only that it must be presented in a form, or with sufficient additional information, that permits the Tribunal and court to assess its reliability." The three-judge panel unanimously found that the government didn’t have enough evidence to prove that Parhat was Taliban-affiliated or an enemy of the United States. The government conceded that it would not argue differently for the remaining detainees. The D.C. Federal District Court, Ricardo Urbina, ordered their release later that year. Urbina also ordered them transferred to the United States, but a federal circuit court panel later blocked this move. Federal law bans transferring Guantanamo detainees to American soil. Because the United States has a non-refoulement policy that prohibits sending refugees to countries where they would be in danger, the detainees could not be sent back to China. So these men were resettled in nations like Palau, Switzerland and Bermuda. The last Uighur detainees left Guantánamo for Slovakia as 2013 came to a close. What do experts think? It’s worth noting that the government pointed to other evidence against the Uighurs that remains classified. But Toomey isn’t basing his statement on classified documents. What’s unclassified is "ample" enough, according to his spokeswoman, to substantiate the claim. Out of the unclassified documents, the primary sources are the Uighurs themselves. Many of the Uighur 17 admitted that they received basic gun training, but none said they had Al Qaida ties. Many said they were fighting -- but for their independence, not in global jihad or with efforts to hurt Americans. In 2003, according to the Washington Post, the Pentagon had already considered five of the Uighurs innocent (the same five who were relocated to Albania three years later) and another 10 "low-risk," approving 15 for release. The report quotes a State Department official calling the Uighurs’ case "unfortunate." Some experts believe the Uighurs’ detainment was likely a mistake. Benjamin Wittes, a governance studies researcher at the Brookings Institution, told PBS NewsHour that he considered this a case of wrong place, wrong time. "These are actually not people who have a problem with the United States," said Wittes. "These are people who have a problem with the government of China and whose marriage of convenience with the Taliban is really just a convenience thing. It’s not part of any global jihad." While Thomas Joscelyn, senior editor at the Long War Journal, doesn’t believe the Uighur detainees were high-threat, he doesn’t see them as harmless and disagrees with Wittes. "It’s what we call the Forrest Gump story," he said. "Where they happened upon these places that are Al Qaida-affiliated by accident. ... It strains credulity that would accidentally find their way to the Tora Bora Mountains, a known Al Qaida stronghold, jihadist country at that time." Almerindo Eduardo Ojeda, director of the Center for the Study of Human Rights in the Americas, calls the detainees "mostly independentists that happened to be Muslims." Labeling them terrorists on "grounds that [the government] cannot reveal... is particularly insidious, as there is a definite interest in large areas of the government to inflate the claims. At an enormous cost to the detainees," he emailed. "For GTMO prisoners to be released," Ojeda asked, "They have to be cleared by all relevant intelligence agencies. What does Pat Toomey know that they don't?" Our ruling Toomey wrote that Garland "authored an opinion that resulted in the release of 17 Guantanamo Bay prisoners who were part of a group of violent Islamist extremists the State Department had designated as terrorists." Toomey’s claim is misleading. We have no definitive proof that the Uighur detainees engaged in terrorist acts or were "violent Islamist extremists." They were an oppressed ethnic minority in China and may have been caught up in events without endorsing terrorism. The courts released them because the government’s case against them seemed dubious. We rule the claim Mostly False. | null | Pat Toomey | null | null | null | 2016-06-07T09:30:00 | 2016-04-15 | ['United_States_Department_of_State'] |
pomt-02960 | Congress, criminals, Scientologists and other groups are exempt from Obamacare. | mostly false | /truth-o-meter/statements/2013/oct/24/facebook-posts/congress-criminals-scientologists-and-other-groups/ | Internet memes are great for quickly spreading jokes and important information. And because they’re also efficient at sharing inflammatory falsehoods, they keep us busy here at PolitiFact. When a reader emailed us a graphic he came across on Facebook about which groups are exempt from Obamacare, our warning bells went off. Under the headline, "Where is your OPT OUT? Let’s get this straight, it doesn’t exist," a long list claims to show who is and is not exempt from the health care law, which requires everybody to have insurance beginning in 2014. Groups like Congress and the White House, criminals and Muslims are listed as exempt, according to the graphic. Catholics, Jews and "you" are not. At the end, the list emphasizes, "Christians In General NO Exemption." In addition to making the rounds on Facebook lately, we’ve found the graphic on several websites like Liberal Logic 101. It’s hard to tell when and where it originated. A few of the items on the list are actually accurate. A lot of it, though, is plain wrong. Let’s break this down piece by piece. Government officials PolitiFact is no stranger to the "Congress is exempt" claim. Ted Cruz and others have claimed lawmakers either have an exemption or are trying to get one. We’ve found no truth to that. Lawmakers and their staffs are actually singled out, forced off their employer-provided insurance and sent into the health care marketplaces. (In their case, their employer is the federal government.) Members of Congress and staff will receive their traditional employer contribution to put toward a plan from the marketplaces. It’s a special circumstance, but it’s not a pass by any means. They still need to get insurance like everyone else. Although the graphic only lists Democrats like Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, it’s important to note that all lawmakers have the same obligation to buy insurance, regardless of political affiliation. So Democratic and Republican lawmakers are treated alike under the law. President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are a different story, said David Howard, an Emory University health policy professor. They’re eligible for many different health coverage options, and can choose go to the Bethesda Naval Hospital. Like everyone else, they would be fined if they didn’t have any health insurance. Criminals Incarcerated criminals are exempt from the penalty for not having insurance. That’s because it’s the prison’s responsibility to provide health care to its inmates. The Affordable Care Act specifically indicates that "incarcerated individuals excluded." The specific care prisoners receive varies by state, but generally speaking, prisoners get regular check-ups (typically not frequently) and emergency care. This technically isn’t considered insurance. American Indians American Indians are also exempt from the individual mandate, so members of federally recognized tribes will not be fined. They don’t have insurance, but they do get health care through the Indian Health Service, according to Leighton Ku, the director of George Washington University’s Center for Health Policy Research. They have a long-standing treaty with the federal government guaranteeing them health care. The Indian Health Service is a federal agency that provides care to American Indians and Alaska Natives. Although they won’t be fined for not enrolling in plans through the marketplace if they are eligible for IHS care, they can still choose to do so at any time. Religious groups The meme targets a whole host of religious groups. The Amish, Scientologists, Christian Scientists and Muslims are categorized as exempt, but Baptists, Catholics, Lutherans and Jews are not. But that’s not really accurate. The law doesn’t contain specific language about which denominations or religions would qualify for an exemption, but it does specify that individuals belonging to religious groups for exemptions if they have religious beliefs opposed to health insurance or medical treatment. These kinds of exemptions exist for other federal programs, and there are rules for determining who qualifies. Based on who has obtained exemptions from other federal programs like Medicare and Social Security, it looks like the Amish would qualify, as would Mennonites. The assertion that an exemption for Muslims is specified in the law is wrong -- Pants on Fire wrong. Scientologists typically have no objection to medical treatment for physical ailments. Our ruling This Internet meme rattles of a list of groups that are and are not exempt from the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act. Most of the claims are way off-base, but we found some facts buried among the falsehoods. Obama and Biden don’t need to buy insurance on the marketplaces, but they’re not exempt from fines if they don’t have coverage. Prisoners and American Indians are in fact exempt, but they still have health care of some sort. Members of small number of religious groups can receive exemptions if they have formal objections to medical care or health insurance, but we found no evidence that Muslims or Scientologists meet that criteria. Because most of the list is wrong, we rate the claim Mostly False. | null | Facebook posts | null | null | null | 2013-10-24T16:56:38 | 2013-10-21 | ['United_States_Congress', 'Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act'] |
pomt-05076 | Fireworks have never been safer, and their use continues to increase each year. | true | /ohio/statements/2012/jul/04/bill-weimer/fireworks-executive-says-theyve-never-been-safer-a/ | Picking a favorite holiday is almost like picking a favorite child, but PolitiFact Ohio admits to particular fondness for the Fourth of July. We enjoy the invocations of history, especially when they're factually accurate. We like the annual cookout with old friends. And we love fireworks. So we were especially interested to read a newspaper commentary by Bill Weimer, vice president of Youngstown-based Phantom Fireworks, the nation’s largest retailer of consumer fireworks. "Fireworks have never been safer, and their use continues to increase each year," he wrote. "This alone provides a strong case for the regulated and sensible use of consumer fireworks." Really? Safer than ever? In 1994, Weimer said, the United States imported 117 million pounds of fireworks, and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission reported 12,500 fireworks-related injuries. By 2010, fireworks imports grew more than 75 percent to 205.9 million pounds, but the number of fireworks-related injuries dropped by more than 30 percent to 8,600. "This is phenomenal progress in safety," Weimer wrote, calling on Ohio's General Assembly to relax state laws and legalize consumer fireworks. PolitiFact Ohio looked at the law and checked the numbers. Ohio law, which now permits the use of only "novelty and trick" fireworks, is among the more restrictive nationally. Three other states have similar laws, and four ban all consumer fireworks. Forty-one states and Washington, D.C., allow some or all types of consumer fireworks permitted by federal regulations, according to the American Pyrotechnics Association. We found that Weimer's numbers, as reported by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and the American Pyrotechnics Association, a trade group, are accurate. The same day Weimer’s column was published, the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission, which set standards for consumer fireworks in 1976, issued its annual fireworks report last week. It confirmed the injury number Weimer used -- 8,600 for 2010. CPSC spokeswoman Nikki Fleming said the injury rate as measured by injuries per 100,000 persons has leveled off. The Massachusetts-based National Fire Protection Association takes the position that "using consumer fireworks is simply not worth the risk," division manager Guy Colonna said. "We don't seem to be trending that rapidly toward zero," he said of the injury numbers. "You haven't moved the needle so much in terms of saying it's safe for consumers to use." The NFPA -- which coordinates the national Alliance to Stop Consumer Fireworks -- said in its annual report in June that there are more fires on a typical July 4th than any other day of the year, and that fireworks account for 40 percent. Colonna acknowledged statistics showing that the rate of injury per 100,000 pounds of imported fireworks has declined, but said it is "still a significant number." The American Pyrotechnics Association, a trade group, cites the latter statistic. It shows that the rate of injuries dropped from 38 per 100,000 pounds of fireworks in 1976 to 7 in 2000 and to 4 per 100,000 pounds of fireworks in 2010. The trade group considers that significant because U.S. fireworks consumption has skyrocketed. It more than doubled between 2000, when the trade group says "the trend in relaxing (state) consumer fireworks laws was first initiated," and 2011, when 212 million pounds were sold. The trade group credits "safety education efforts and the ever improving quality of its products." It says that injuries and fires most typically result from illegal fireworks and from improper use, especially involving children. But does that mean that fireworks themselves are safer? We asked Weimer what he had to support his statement. He immediately credited the work of the CPSC and the American Fireworks Standards Laboratory. In the 1970s, the CPSC set federal requirements for consumer fireworks that cover cautionary labeling, the burn time of fuses, explosive powder content, stability for both ground-based and aerial devices and proper performance. In 1988, the CPSC started an inspection and enforcement program for Chinese-manufactured fireworks. China -- which now supplies 98 percent of the fireworks in the United States -- began exporting fireworks to this country in 1973. Initially, 75 percent of fireworks tested by the CPSC failed to comply with the regulations. "The quality truly wasn't very good," Weimer said. "The quality was inconsistent. The industry knew that if it didn't so something there would be big issues." Working with the CPSC, importers established the American Fireworks Standards Laboratory to set additional, stricter requirements for consumer fireworks. The AFSL went to factories in China, conducted seminars, worked with manufacturers and started a testing program in China in 1994. "The linchpin of the system is the testing," Weimer said. The testing is conducted by an independent laboratory hired from outside China by the AFSL. Each fireworks shipment is tested for compliance with 15 quality standards, Weimer said. If any standard is not met by any of the randomly selected cases, the entire case lot fails. In the program's first year, 1994, 36 percent of the random lots of tested fireworks were rejected. By 2002, that number was less than 10 percent. The compliance rate exceeded 90 percent. CPSC Chairman Inez Tenenbaum, speaking at a symposium in China last January, noted that the agency has been working for years with manufacturers and with China's General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine. "While AQSIQ and CPSC may work to improve product safety with somewhat different motivations, everyone benefits from the end result, which is improved product safety," she said, adding that "we have increased the frequency, scope, and depth of our training in China." Weimer thinks that the availability of regulated consumer fireworks diminishes the use of the "really lethal" illegal and homemade variety. So what's the grand finale? PolitiFact Ohio is not ruling on the advisability of maintaining, relaxing or tightening Ohio laws regulating fireworks. And we’re not taking a position on whether consumer use of fireworks is even a good idea. Weimer’s statement addressed legal and proper use of fireworks by consumers -- not use of homemade or illegal products. And fireworks are -- as Weimer told us -- a "product with risk associated with it." But, the statistical record shows that the rate of injury from fireworks declined nationally while their use increased dramatically, and while laws governing their consumer use loosened. There still are injuries, but the annual rate has plateaued even while consumption continues to grow. We found no stronger explanation than the concurrent regulatory and policing work of the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the American Fireworks Standards Laboratory to make fireworks safer. Weimer’s claim is accurate. On the Truth-O-Meter it rates True. | null | Bill Weimer | null | null | null | 2012-07-04T06:00:00 | 2012-06-26 | ['None'] |
goop-02447 | Kim Kardashian Did “Tell All” On “Crumbling Marriage” To Kanye West, | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/kim-kardashian-not-tell-all-crumbling-marriage-kanye-west-anniversary-allure/ | null | null | null | Shari Weiss | null | Kim Kardashian Did NOT “Tell All” On “Crumbling Marriage” To Kanye West, Despite Report | 3:09 pm, September 18, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-04957 | The new 21st State Senate district was "created in secret for Van Wanggaard. It was drawn within half a block of his house." | true | /wisconsin/statements/2012/jul/26/john-lehman/lehman-senate-district-secret-wangaard-house/ | Shortly after his June 5, 2012 recall election victory over incumbent Van Wanggaard was affirmed by a recount, state Sen. John Lehman (D-Racine) said it will be tough for him to win the seat again. Lehman told WTMJ radio listeners July 10, 2012, that the borders of 21st state Senate District were changed significantly by Republicans in 2011 when they controlled the Legislature. The redistricting is required every 10 years, based on updated census figures, and this was the first time in decades that one party in Wisconsin had complete control over the process. The seat is up in November 2014, and Wanggaard is expected to run. "I’m not surprised that he’ll run in the district," Lehman said. "The district was created in secret for Van Wanggaard. It was drawn within a half a block of his house, around his house two blocks away then went out to western Racine and western Kenosha County down to the Illinois line." Sounds like neither Lehman nor Wanggaard should unpack their boxes. If Lehman and Wanggard face each other in 2014 (or earlier, if there is another recall), it would be the third time the two have run against each other. Wanggaard topped Lehman to win the seat in 2010. But the next time a much different mix of voters would make the choice. On July 13, 2011, the Journal Sentinel’s Craig Gilbert took a detailed look at the differences between the new and old 21st Senate district. "The new plan goes to some extra lengths in reducing the potential for partisan competition," wrote Gilbert, author of the Wisconsin Voter blog. "The most striking example is the transformation of two very competitive districts, the 21st in Racine County and 22nd in Kenosha County, into one very Republican Racine-Kenosha seat to the west and one very Democratic Racine-Kenosha seat to the east. "Republicans who drew the lines have produced a plan that favors the GOP, which is certainly nothing new for political parties," the piece continued. "Among the state's most competitive districts, the plan gives GOP incumbents Terry Moulton, Joe Liebham and Pam Galloway safer seats and (Alberta) Darling, (Leah) Vukmir and Wanggaard dramatically safer seats." In an earlier piece, Gilbert wrote: "The Wanggaard seat would shed most of the city of Racine and some nearby areas -- wards that voted 63 percent Democratic in last fall's race for governor. (The one section of the city of Racine that's kept in the district is the one where Wanggaard lives.)" Gilbert calculated that the new 21st was far more Republican, based on the vote in the 2010 governor’s race. Gov. Scott Walker would have won the district by 23 points, rather than 9 points in the old 21st. Now the map’s borders. Wanggaard lives in the 1200 block of Blaine Ave. on the west side of Racine. The new border is 13th Ave., just south of his home. That portion of Racine -- Lehman calls it a "peninsula" -- lies within the new 21st district. (Indeed, Lehman’s house is on Orchard St., several blocks away from Wanggaard. His house, too, lies just inside the new district.) On the "in secret" question, GOP lawmakers were allowed to see advance copies of their proposed district maps at the law offices of Michael Best & Friedrich near the Capitol. The Republican lawmakers -- including Wanggaard -- signed confidentiality agreements in which they promised not to disclose the contents of the maps, according to a Feb. 6, 2012, Journal Sentinel article. Our rating Lehman says the new 21st State Senate district was "created in secret for Van Wanggaard. It was drawn within half a block of his house." It’s common, of course, for the party in control to draw maps favorable for itself -- and the lines in question here have been approved by the courts. While the points Lehman cites may sound outrageous, even unbelievable, the record shows them to be accurate. We rate the statement True. | null | John Lehman | null | null | null | 2012-07-26T09:00:00 | 2012-07-10 | ['None'] |
thet-00032 | Claim Scotland Office hospitality spending has increased seven-fold is False | none | https://theferret.scot/scotland-office-spending-increased-seven-fold-false/ | null | Fact check Politics | null | null | null | Claim Scotland Office hospitality spending has increased seven-fold is False | January 11, 2018 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-05723 | The top 1 percent (of income earners) paid 36.7 percent (of the taxes). ... The top 50 percent pay 97.7 percent. | true | /ohio/statements/2012/mar/06/jim-renacci/jim-renacci-says-top-50-percent-pay-nearly-all-inc/ | Whether it’s the so-called "99 percenters" occupying Wall Street, Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett publicly suggesting that billionaires like himself should pay more taxes, or President Obama calling for tax hikes on households earning more than $250,000, the share of taxes borne by the nation’s wealthiest Americans remains a hot topic. Freshman GOP Rep. Jim Renacci - a self-made businessman who is among the wealthiest members of Congress - explored the subject with a group of constituents who attended a Town Hall meeting he hosted Feb. 13, 2012, in Medina. At the meeting, Renacci attempted to shoot down a "misconception on wage earners and income taxes paid," citing the percentage of the nation’s taxes paid in 2009 based on income levels. "The top 1 percent (of income earners) paid 36.7 percent (of the taxes). The top 5 percent paid 58.7 percent, and the top 10 percent paid 70.5 percent." Renacci continued as the figures were projected onto a screen: "The top 25 percent pay 87.3 percent of the taxes paid in this country. The top 50 percent pay 97.7 percent. So, it’s interesting when you hear the story that the wealthy need to pay more of their share." Trackers from a Democratic Super PAC called American Bridge recorded the meeting and sent some video highlights to reporters. The data Renacci presented to his constituents piqued PolitiFact Ohio’s curiosity, so we decided to learn more. Renacci cited Internal Revenue Service taxation data compiled by the Tax Foundation in Washington, an organization that calls itself non-partisan but is widely regarded as conservative. Its board of directors includes Douglas Holtz-Eakin, the top economic advisor to Republican John McCain’s presidential campaign in 2008, and former congressman William Archer, a Texas Republican who chaired the House Ways and Means Committee. We consulted the Tax Foundation report he used as well as articles on the same subject from sources such as Kiplinger.com, a personal finance website. The numbers were consistent between sources, identifying the top 1 percent of taxpayers as those with an adjusted gross income of at least $343,927. That group, roughly 1.4 million taxpayers, reported 16.9 percent of the nation’s income and paid 36.7 percent of the taxes in 2009. The top 5 percent, those with adjusted gross incomes of at least $154,643, earned 31.7 percent of the nation’s income and paid 58.7 percent of the taxes. Those in the top 10 percent made at least $112,124. They earned 43.2 percent of the nation’s income and paid 70.5 percent of the taxes. The income cutoff for the top 25 percent in 2009 was $66,193. Folks with that income or higher earned 65.8 percent of the nation’s income, and paid 87.3 percent of the taxes. To be in the top half of all taxpayers, one had to make $32,396. That group’s share of total earnings was 86.5 percent and its share of taxes was 97.7 percent. That means those in the bottom 50 percent of income earners accounted for 2.3 percent of taxes paid. Since Renacci publicly mused about whether the "top 10, 25 or 50" percent pay their share under the current system, we also decided to examine why the top half of the households pay such an overwhelming percentage. According to National Journal magazine, the Earned Income Tax Credit is a big reason why. The program allows working families making under $49,000 (with three children) or $41,000 (with one child) to get a refundable tax credit whose size depends on marital status and family size. The refunds, by design, can sometimes exceed what people pay in taxes, it says. Before 1986 tax reforms adopted under GOP President Ronald Reagan expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit, low-income Americans paid 0.02 percent of individual income taxes while the top one percent paid about 24.6 percent. The share of income taxes borne by the highest Americans rose to its current levels, while the share of income taxes paid by the poor dropped. Nearly two thirds of low-income taxpayers who don’t pay income taxes do pay payroll taxes, according to a report by the non-partisan Tax Policy Center. More than half of those who pay neither tax are elderly. More than one third are non-elderly with yearly incomes under $20,000. The statistics Renacci cited to his constituents were accurate. The top 1 percent of the nation’s taxpayers do pay 36.9 percent of its income taxes and the top half of earners do pay 97.7 percent of the nation’s income taxes. On the Truth-O-Meter, Renacci’s claim rates True. | null | Jim Renacci | null | null | null | 2012-03-06T06:00:00 | 2012-02-13 | ['None'] |
chct-00248 | FACT CHECK: Is There 'No Evidence' Tax Cuts Lead To Economic Growth? | verdict: false | http://checkyourfact.com/2017/12/22/fact-check-is-there-no-evidence-tax-cuts-lead-to-economic-growth/ | null | null | null | Emily Larsen | Fact Check Reporter | null | null | 11:11 AM 12/22/2017 | null | ['None'] |
hoer-01159 | Fake Center Parcs Facebook Page | facebook scams | https://www.hoax-slayer.net/fake-center-parcs-facebook-page-is-a-like-farming-scam/ | null | null | null | Brett M. Christensen | null | Fake Center Parcs Facebook Page is a Like-Farming Scam | March 14, 2016 | null | ['None'] |
snes-04907 | Coca-Cola has bought the rights to Dr Pepper and will be discontinuing production of the latter soft drink. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/dr-pepper-discontinued/ | null | Junk News | null | David Mikkelson | null | Dr Pepper Bought by Coca-Cola, to Be Discontinued | 17 April 2016 | null | ['Coca-Cola', 'Dr_Pepper'] |
pomt-07170 | Says opponent Kathie Tovo "believes that Austin invests too much in the cops, firefighters and paramedics that protect our families and neighborhoods." | mostly true | /texas/statements/2011/jun/11/randi-shade/randi-shade-says-kathie-tovo-believes-austin-inves/ | Randi Shade, the Austin City Council member in a June 18 runoff, says in a mailer sent voters after the May general election that her challenger, Kathie Tovo, "believes that Austin invests too much in the cops, firefighters and paramedics that protect our families and neighborhoods." In the mailer, Shade traces her characterization to Tovo’s answer on a questionnaire presented to candidates by the Austin Neighborhoods Council. Asked if the city's public safety contracts "put an undue burden on the city budget," Tovo replied: "Yes, Austin’s public safety budget makes up more than 65 percent of the general fund. The continuing growth of (the) public safety budget is limiting the ability of the city to deliver other services that are important to maintaining a high quality of life. Escalating public safety contracts are financially unsustainable and must be addressed for the long-term health of the city." We can’t divine what anyone believes. For this fact check, we looked into positions Tovo has taken in her campaign. Specifically, we wondered if her criticism of escalating public-safety contracts as "unsustainable" amounts to saying the city spends too much on its police officers, firefighters and the like. We asked Tovo’s campaign to elaborate and also reviewed news accounts on her position on public safety spending. On May 19, Austin’s KVUE-TV quoted Tovo saying: "I am very supportive of public safety, fire, and EMS." A May 20 Austin American-Statesman news story quoted Tovo saying she would look for ways to reduce waste in all city departments but would not cut the number of police, firefighters or paramedics. "If we can save money in other ways, we can have more (public safety employees) on the street," she said. And in an interview by the Austin Chronicle, posted online June 3, Tovo said she favors "safe and secure neighborhoods, and so a big part of that is making sure we have police and EMS and firefighters out on the streets. I certainly don't support making cuts to those." By email, Tovo spokesman Jim Wick said Tovo’s response to the questionnaire was "intended to address the growing gap in the (city’s) general fund between spending on public safety contracts and spending on everything else. With the way the public safety contracts are structured right now, the spending is unsustainable without either cutting spending or raising taxes," Wick said. Wick noted that City Council Member Bill Spelman was quoted in a Sept. 19, 2010, Austin Chronicle story saying that adjusted for inflation, per-resident public safety spending had increased nearly 50 percent since 2000, while spending from the general fund on every other part of the budget increased 2 percent. Spelman is also quoted saying: "We've taken all the new money we've gotten from property taxes, sales taxes, and what have you, and put it all into public safety. And none of it into parks, libraries, health and human services, development services, and so on." Wick said in an interview that Tovo’s questionnaire answer speaks to "the future, not the present" and "there is no place anywhere" that Tovo has said she’d cut public-safety jobs. Tovo says in a more recent campaign mailer: "I will not cut police, paramedics or firefighters." So, Tovo seeks to corral public-safety contracts, but would not cut police, paramedics or firefighter jobs. That’s like having it both ways. Then again, by basing her claim solely on Tovo’s questionnaire, Shade ignores her opponent’s subsequent comments. We rate Shade’s statement Mostly True. | null | Randi Shade | null | null | null | 2011-06-11T19:54:20 | 2011-05-18 | ['None'] |
hoer-00146 | The Westfield Gift Card Competition on Facebook | bogus warning | https://www.hoax-slayer.com/westfield-giftcard-comp-facebook.shtml | null | null | null | Brett M. Christensen | null | Scam Rumours About The Westfield Gift Card Competition on Facebook | November 2009 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-14751 | The head of the FBI has told Congress they cannot vet those (Syrian) refugees. | mostly false | /truth-o-meter/statements/2015/dec/15/ted-cruz/ted-cruzs-claim-head-fbi-told-congress-they-cannot/ | At the Las Vegas Republican primary debate, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, stressed the need to secure the border to keep out jihadists masquerading as refugees. "President Obama and Hillary Clinton are proposing bringing tens of thousands of Syrian refugees to this country when the head of the FBI has told Congress they cannot vet those refugees," he said Dec. 15, 2015, on CNN. Is it true that Obama’s own FBI director, James Comey, said national security and intelligence officials can’t screen Syrian refugees? The Cruz campaign forwarded us a report on Comey’s concerns over a bill put forward by Republicans that would toughen the refugee vetting process. The bill would require Comey — and other top national security officials — to personally certify every single refugee admitted into the United States was not a security threat. Comey, appearing before Congress on Dec. 9, said he couldn’t. "Could I certify to there being no risk associated with an individual?" he said. "The bureau doesn't take positions on legislation, and we don't get involved in policy decisions. But that practically would be impossible." But that’s not the same standard Cruz mentioned during the debate. For the record, the United States can vet the refugees through a process that involves the FBI as well as the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Defense and other agencies. The vetting process can take up to two years, in which refugees undergo several rounds of security clearance checks. Comey has stressed, in testimony before several different congressional committees, that there are challenges (namely, information gaps) to how we screen the refugees, and that there’s no risk-free process. But, he said, we’ve gotten "dramatically" better at the task in the past few years. He never said that the federal agencies "cannot vet" refugees in as plain of terms as Cruz suggested. (Later in the debate, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie made a similar claim as Cruz about Comey’s remarks.) Appearing before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Oct. 8, Comey said, "There is risk associated with bringing anybody in from the outside, but especially from a conflict zone like that. From the intelligence community's perspective, as I said, I think we've developed an effective way to touch all of our databases and resources to figure out what we know about individuals. … I don't think that's a cumbersome process. My concern there is that there are certain gaps." Comey made similar comments before the House Homeland Security Committee on Oct. 21 and talked about the information gaps in more detail. "If someone has never made a ripple in the pond in Syria in a way that would get their identity or their interest reflected in our database, we can query our database until the cows come home but we are not going to -- there will be nothing show up because we have no record on that person," he said, adding, "The good news is we are much better doing it than eight years ago. The bad news is, there is no risk-free process." A day later, on Oct. 22, Comey repeated his comments before the House Judiciary Committee: "We have gotten much better as an intelligence community at joining our efforts and checking our databases in a way that gives us high confidence. If we have a record on somebody, it will surface. That's the good news. … The challenge we face with Syria is that we don't have that rich set of data. So even though we've gotten better at querying what we have, we certainly will have less overall. And so as I said to a question earlier, someone only alerts as a result of our searches if we have some record on them. That's the challenge we face with Syria." Our ruling Cruz said, "The head of the FBI has told Congress they cannot vet those refugees." The Cruz campaign pointed to comments Comey made about how he cannot personally vet every refugee admitted to the United States (required by a House bill that seeks to toughen the admissions process). But the FBI director never said, as Cruz claims he did, that the government "cannot vet" refugees. Comey has said there are challenges and gaps to the process and that there are always risks to admitting people from conflict zones. But he also said the process is effective and has gotten more so in the past few years. We rate Cruz’s claim Mostly False. | null | Ted Cruz | null | null | null | 2015-12-15T21:45:24 | 2015-12-15 | ['United_States_Congress', 'Federal_Bureau_of_Investigation', 'Syria'] |
pomt-12116 | Says he "made St. Petersburg the state's best maintained large sewer system in 2007." | half-true | /florida/statements/2017/aug/18/rick-baker/was-st-petersburg-states-best-maintained-large-sew/ | Former Mayor Rick Baker says his management of St. Petersburg’s sewage system was so good, it earned statewide recognition. Writing on Facebook, Baker plucked a city achievement from his two terms as proof of his management prowess compared with Mayor Rick Kriseman. Kriseman, Baker’s main opponent in the Aug. 29 primary election, has been hampered by the sewage crisis that developed after the city closed a plant. Baker linked to a Tampa Bay Times story about how fixing the sewage system to reduce spills may lead to higher utility bill payments at the start of the next year. "Who do you trust to fix this mess?" Baker asked in a July 28 Facebook post. "A man who caused the mess and is tens of millions of dollars over budget on the pier, police station and public relations staff? Or a mayor who made St. Petersburg the state's best maintained large sewer system in 2007?" See Figure 1 on PolitiFact.com St. Petersburg did nab its first Wastewater Collection System Award in 2007 under Baker. But Baker’s claim goes further to say St. Petersburg was the state’s best sewer system — which is not entirely true, because only utilities that applied were considered, and not every utility in the state applied. Further, Baker left out the backstory about why the city was pouring so many resources into the sewers at the time. In an interview with PolitiFact Florida, Baker emphasized he has been more precise with his word choice in other instances touting this accomplishment, saying the city was "named" the best maintained large sewer system. Still, we wanted to take a look at this specific claim. St. Petersburg won an award, but the competition was not stiff The award came from the Florida Water Environment Association, a nonprofit group that recognizes utilities for significant accomplishments related to the operation and maintenance of wastewater collection systems among other things. Lane Longley, the division manager of St. Petersburg’s Wastewater Collection Division, submitted the city’s 2007 application. Longley said St. Petersburg started adopting maintenance strategies to prevent spills rather than wait for problems to happen on their own, and those steps reduced the number and magnitude of sanitary sewer overflows from 1999 to 2007. But the award doesn’t reflect a real contest among Florida cities. For one thing, not every city applies for the award. The city of Tampa stopped applying for the FWEA awards decades ago, saying it takes up too much time to gather the information and fill out the applications. A spokeswoman for the city of Orlando said the city has heard of the FWEA, but she couldn’t point to any specific awards the city had won or applied for. And a spokeswoman with the city of Jacksonville said the city was aware of the FWEA, but said it hasn’t won or applied for any awards. What’s more, these other cities could point to other awards. Tampa won a 15-year Directors Award from a different group in 2013 for treating water significantly above minimum standards at the David L. Tippin Water Treatment Facility. Orlando won recognition from the Water Environment Federation, an FWEA sister organization. Another major issue with Baker’s claim: St. Petersburg made a lot of the improvements because it was under Florida Department of Environmental Protection consent orders that required changes be made to the sewer system. One order started in 2000 and the other started in 2002. Both went on to cover Baker’s entire tenure. After massive spills in the late 1990s, St. Petersburg entered into its first consent order. A spokeswoman for the FDEP said it covered the city's four facilities for unauthorized discharges and included corrective actions pertaining to the collection system and the facilities to address the discharges. The second consent order covered violations and discharges only from the Albert Whitted Facility. In both cases, the state agency assessed civil penalties against the city, but decided to implement programs for environmental enhancement, education and restoration in lieu of payment. Baker acknowledged the city was ordered to improve, but said the improvements were significant nonetheless. "We invested everything that was recommended to me by either my staff or FDEP under the consent order to get the system to the point where we didn't have spills," Baker told the Tampa Bay Times on June 24. "It was absolutely a success, what we did." According to the Tampa Bay Times, the highest year of sewer spending under Baker was 2005, when the city spent $38.5 million in inflation-adjusted dollars. By the end of his second term, spending had dropped to less than $2 million a year. See Figure 3 on PolitiFact.com Baker said he started by doing an analysis of the system to evaluate what needed to be done and to prioritize the repairs — and then developed a funding and operational plan. Along the way, the city charted its progress online. As an example, Baker’s campaign sent a graph showing that the city went beyond the requirements laid out in the consent order. The original goal was to rehabilitate 97,680 linear feet of pipe. By September 2008 a little under 160,000 linear feet of pipes had been rehabilitated, according to the city document. Still, the Baker years haven’t escaped criticism when it comes to sewers. Investigators have traced some of the blame for the city’s sewage woes to the city’s decision to close and not reopen the Albert Whitted treatment plant in 2015. That move was approved by the city council in 2011 and carried out under Kriseman. Taking the plant offline reduced capacity and led to the release of millions of gallons of sewage into the Tampa and Boca Ciega bays after major storms in 2015-16. But a draft report from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission also places much of the blame for the sewage spills on the Kriseman administration, as well as on the past two decades of city leadership, which includes the Baker administration from 2001-10. The FWC report said the city's many sewage problems were not adequately repaired in the past. During Baker’s tenure, most of the projects recommended in the consent order focused on clearing pipelines and hydraulic improvement to increase flow velocities. Some changes related to inflow happened as a result of a consent order, but the report goes on to blame Baker’s administration and others for not doing enough to fix leaky pipes that contributed to the city's sewage problems. "Claims made by others that they thought the system was fixed and therefore did not need to worry about it were not based in fact," the report said. Our ruling Baker said he made St. Petersburg the state's best-maintained large sewer system in 2007. Baker’s evidence is that the Florida Water Environment Association gave St. Petersburg a Wastewater Collection System Award. But the award was hardly a comprehensive comparison of similarly situated cities in the state. Nor is it the only award that recognizes excellence in sewage management. St. Petersburg was under consent orders for Baker’s tenure that required the city to make improvements to the system. Outside investigators looking into the current sewage crisis have put some blame on Baker’s years for not addressing some problems with the system. This statement is partially accurate, but needs clarification of additional information. We rate it Half True. Tampa Bay Times senior researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report. See Figure 2 on PolitiFact.com | null | Rick Baker | null | null | null | 2017-08-18T10:00:00 | 2017-07-28 | ['None'] |
snes-03796 | Joseph Stalin said some version of "It's not the people who vote that count, it's the people who count the votes." | mixture | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/stalin-vote-count-quote/ | null | Questionable Quotes | null | David Emery | null | Joseph Stalin: ‘It’s Not the People Who Vote That Count’ | 14 October 2016 | null | ['None'] |
farg-00174 | Virginia Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam was the “deciding vote” in “favor of sanctuary cities that let dangerous illegal immigrants back on the streets.” | misleading | https://www.factcheck.org/2017/09/ed-gillespies-sanctuary-cities-attacks/ | null | the-factcheck-wire | Ed Gillespie | D'Angelo Gore | ['Illegal immigration'] | Ed Gillespie’s ‘Sanctuary Cities’ Attacks | September 26, 2017 | [' TV ad – Wednesday, September 20, 2017 '] | ['Virginia'] |
pose-00208 | Barack Obama will direct his Attorney General and Homeland Security Secretary to meet with their Latin American and Caribbean counterparts in the first year of his presidency to produce a regional strategy to combat drug trafficking, domestic and transnational gang activity, and organized crime. A hemispheric pact on security, crime and drugs will permit the U.S. and Latin America and the Caribbean to advance serious and measurable drug demand reduction goals, while fostering cooperation on intelligence and investigating criminal activity. compromise https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/promise/223/direct-attorney-general-and-homeland-security-secr/ None obameter Barack Obama None None Direct attorney general and homeland security secretary to meet with Latin American leaders to develop a hemispheric crime strategy 2010-01-07T13:26:52 None ['United_States', 'Latin_America', 'Caribbean', 'Barack_Obama']
bove-00100 BJP’s H Raja Tweets Moral Policing Protest Photo From Delhi As IIT Madras none https://www.boomlive.in/bjps-h-raja-tweets-moral-policing-protest-photo-from-delhi-as-iit-madras/ None None None None None BJP’s H Raja Tweets Moral Policing Protest Photo From Delhi As IIT Madras Feb 28 2018 5:27 pm, Last Updated: Mar 01 2018 1:21 pm None ['Delhi']
tron-02601 Football Coach Fired Over Obama Song truth! https://www.truthorfiction.com/glover-football-coach-fired/ None miscellaneous None None None Football Coach Fired Over Obama Song Mar 17, 2015 None ['None']
vogo-00602 Statement: “San Diego is in the top three to five in the country in terms of the percent of traffic fatalities that involve pedestrians. The national average is 12 to 13 percent and ours is 20 to 25 percent,” Andy Hamilton, co-founder of WalkSanDiego, told Uptown News for an article published April 15. determination: mostly true https://www.voiceofsandiego.org/fact/fact-check-does-san-diego-rank-high-in-pedestrian-deaths/ Analysis: Hamilton was close on the statistics but the ranking’s outdated. None None None None Fact Check: Does San Diego Rank High in Pedestrian Deaths? April 21, 2010 None ['San_Diego']
pomt-10900 Muslims in America have been subjected to more insults, attacks and hate crimes in the last two or three years than ever before, specifically more than after 9-11." | mostly true | /texas/statements/2018/aug/03/omar-rachid/US-Muslims-more-attacks-hate-crimes-than-ever-be/ | A Texas member of a Muslim congregation said after a man was convicted of setting its mosque on fire that the United States isn’t what it used to be. Muslims can’t afford to lower their guards, Omar Rachid, a board member at the Victoria Islamic Center, told the San Antonio Express-News for a July 2018 news story stating that Marq Vincent Perez, just convicted of burning the mosque, faces up to 40 years in prison when he is sentenced in October 2018. Rachid then made a claim making us wonder: "The reality of it is that Muslims in America have been subjected to more insults, attacks and hate crimes in the last two or three years than ever before, specifically more than after 9/11," Rachid said, adding: "Islamophobia is thriving. This is not America. It is not the America I came to 35 years ago." We didn’t divine how to pin trends in insults. But, we found, the FBI and others tabulate anti-Muslim attacks and hate crimes. Have records recently been set? By phone, Rachid told us he based his declaration on accounts of upticks tied to FBI figures; he emailed us web links to news stories and a commentary published in 2017 and 2018. Included was a November 2017 Pew Research Center blog post citing FBI figures indicating 307 incidents of U.S. anti-Muslim hate crimes in 2016, which marked a 19 percent increase from 2015. Pew’s post specifies that a record was set in 2016 in the subcategory of anti-Muslim assaults, which rose significantly between 2015 and 2016, per the FBI, easily surpassing the previous peak reached in 2001, the year of the 9/11 attacks. For 2016, the FBI reported 127 reported Muslim victims of aggravated or simple assault, compared with 91 the year before and 93 in 2001, Pew's post says. SOURCE: Blog post, "Assaults against Muslims in U.S. surpass 2001 level," Fact Tank, Pew Research Center, Nov. 15, 2017 (accessed July 31, 2018) "But assaults are not the only form of hate crime carried out against Muslims and other religious groups," Pew’s post says. "The most common is intimidation, which is defined as reasonable fear of bodily harm. Anti-Muslim intimidation also increased in 2016, with 144 reported victims, compared with 120 the previous year." Pew cautioned, though, that the 2016 "intimidation" count was "dwarfed by the 296 victims of anti-Muslim intimidation in 2001" tallied by the FBI. A general caution: Pew and others that explore anti-Muslim activism stress that the FBI collects hate crime data from about 15,000 law enforcement agencies that voluntarily participate, which means the statistics likely undercount hate crimes. FBI reports on anti-Muslim incidents Next, we looked directly at the FBI’s annual reports on hate crimes, which the agency defines as "criminal offenses motivated, in whole or in part, by the offender’s bias against" a particular group such as a religion, race or sexual orientation. It looked to us like the greatest percentage spike in reported anti-Islamic incidents occurred between 2000 and 2001. For the latter year, the FBI tallied 481 anti-Islamic incidents--a count up more than 1,600 percent from 28 in 2000. According to the FBI, such incidents decreased by 68 percent to 155 the next year and then dipped to 149 in 2003 before escalating to 156 in 2004. We also reviewed the agency’s recent tallies, finding there was not a bigger-than-post-9/11 spike in incidents in recent years -- though the numbers have been on the rise. The 307 incidents noted for 2016 compare to 257 reported incidents in 2015, the FBI says, and that count was up 67 percent from 154 anti-Muslim incidents reported in 2014. Put another way, the 2016 tally reflected a two-year 99 percent increase. But that latest count still fell 36 percent shy of the agency’s 2001 count of 481 anti-Muslim incidents. A California researcher Rachid offered among the stories fueling his claim a July 2017 analysis of hate crimes against U.S. Muslims by Brian Levin, who directs the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino. Levin’s article, covering every year since 9/11, says that from 2002 to 2014, the FBI’s counts of anti-Muslim crimes receded to a range of 105 to 160 though the 257 tally for 2015 was the highest since 2001 and, the article says, the second-highest total of anti-Muslim hate crimes since the agency began eliciting reports of hate crimes from police agencies in 1992. Not only did anti-Muslim crime cases rise numerically, the article says, they grew as a percentage of all hate crimes, accounting in 2015 for 4.4 percent of all reported hate crimes even though Muslims are estimated to be only 1 percent of the population, the article says. By phone, Levin told us that in 2016, per FBI figures, anti-Muslim hate crimes accounted for 5 percent of all hate crimes. After 9/11, Levin told us, anti-Muslim hate crimes represented 4.5 percent of hate crimes reported by the agency. In 2016, Levin’s published calculations of hate crimes against Muslims were cited by Hillary Clinton to justify her claim that hate crimes against American Muslims and mosques had tripled after attacks in Paris and San Bernardino. Levin said in a 2016 interview that since 9/11, anti-Muslim incidents ranked second to anti-Jewish incidents among all anti-religious hate crimes. PolitiFact rated Clinton’s claim Mostly True. Civil rights reports by CAIR Hoping for more up-to-date information, we approached several non-government groups about research into anti-Muslim incidents. This tack drew data only from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which says it challenges stereotypes of Islam and Muslims. Zainab Arain of CAIR pointed by email to the council’s latest annual civil rights report. The April 2018 report, based on investigations by council staff, says that in 2017, there were 2,599 U.S. anti-Muslim "bias incidents," including 300 hate crimes--a count exceeding the council’s confirmation of 2,213 incidents in 2016 by 17 percent. The report classifies incidents by type. Harassment, it says, accounted for 14 percent of the confirmed incidents in 2017 with incidents in which an individual was "inappropriately targeted and harassed by Customs and Border Protection" proving second-most prevalent. Anti-Muslim hate crimes, including crimes targeting children and families, made up 12 percent of the 2017 cases, the report says, with incidents involving FBI harassment or other targeting of individuals constituting 10 percent of incidents. SOURCE: Web page, "2018 Civil Rights Report: Bias Incident Data," Council on American-Islamic Relations, April 30, 2018 (fetched Aug. 1, 2018) Its counts, the report says, should be considered only a "snapshot of the experiences of American Muslims, including children, youth, and families. From experience, CAIR knows that bias incidents targeting the community are vastly underreported to both law enforcement and community institutions. Community members will often not report incidents, such as harassment and bullying, because of a certain level of desensitization," the report says. Arain told us: "Based on the numbers we report, we have documented more anti-Muslim bias incidents and anti-Muslim hate crimes from 2015 to present than were documented in the year immediately following September 11, 2001." We followed up by checking the council’s 2002 civil rights report. It says the group received 1,516 complaints from community members over the year involving the lives of more than 2,250 people, most of whom "were subjected to incidents of bias-motivated harassment and violence" including several murders, the report says. The report says its complaint count was up 300 percent from the year before. "Excluding the September 11 backlash incidents," the report says, "this year's normal reporting period contains 525 valid complaints, up from 366 in 2000/2001--a 43 percent increase." Our ruling Rachid said: "Muslims in America have been subjected to more insults, attacks and hate crimes in the last two or three years than ever before, specifically more than after 9-11." Incidents confirmed by the pro-Muslim CAIR support this statement. Also, FBI hate-crime statistics drawn from police departments indicate there were more anti-Muslim assaults in 2016 than after 9/11 though its counts generally indicate there were more anti-Muslim incidents after 9/11. A footnote: We didn’t come up with a way to gauge shifts in the prevalence of insults. We rate this claim Mostly True. MOSTLY TRUE – The statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information. Click here for more on the six PolitiFact ratings and how we select facts to check. | null | Omar Rachid | null | null | null | 2018-08-03T15:36:01 | 2018-07-21 | ['United_States'] |
snes-04768 | Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton both seek an abortion "cutoff date" of 36 weeks, and both claim that late-stage fetuses feel no pain and have no rights. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/boycott36-clinton-sanders-late-term-abortion/ | null | Politicians | null | Kim LaCapria | null | #Boycott36: Do Clinton and Sanders Support Late-Term Abortions? | 13 May 2016 | null | ['Bernie_Sanders'] |
pomt-00028 | On being on stage campaigning with the president | full flop | /punditfact/statements/2018/nov/06/sean-hannity/hannity-vows-not-appear-onstage-trump-rally-then-h/ | On the eve of the midterm elections, Fox News host Sean Hannity promised he would not go onstage to campaign with President Donald Trump at a rally. Later that evening, he appeared to do exactly that. Both Hannity and Trump were in Cape Girardeau, Mo., where incumbent Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill is locked in a close race with Republican state Attorney General Josh Hawley. Trump was there to amp up the crowd for Hawley ahead of the vote. Earlier that day, Hannity said he would broadcast his nightly show from the rally venue, but pledged not to participate in the campaign event. "In spite of reports, I will be doing a live show from Cape Girardeau and interviewing President Trump before the rally," the Fox News host tweeted. "To be clear, I will not be on stage campaigning with the president. I am covering final rally for my show. Something I have done in every election in the past." See Figure 1 on PolitiFact.com Yet minutes into Trump’s remarks, the president praised Hannity and called him onstage. "I have a few people, and they’re right out here, and they’re very special, they’ve done an incredible job for us," Trump told the crowd. "They’ve been with us from the beginning also. I’m going to start by saying, Sean Hannity, come on up." Hannity took the stage and embraced Trump. Then the Fox News host approached the podium and wagged his finger at the media, which included reporters with Fox News. "By the way, all those people in the back are fake news," he said to applause, invoking one of Trump’s favorite epithets. Hannity told the crowd he was unaware Trump would call him onstage. He then delivered an inventory of Trump’s accomplishments, took a veiled swipe at former President Barack Obama, then left the stage. "The one thing that has made and defined your presidency more than anything else," Hannity said, "promises made, promises kept." To any reasonable observer, it looked like Hannity was onstage campaigning with the president — in direct contradiction to his statement hours earlier. Fox News did not respond to a request for comment. Hannity and Trump have had each other's ears since the 2016 election, when Hannity openly supported Trump’s presidential bid, provided political counseling to the candidate, and even appeared in a pro-Trump ad ahead of the vote. "I’m not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next president of the United States." Hannity told the New York Times in August 2016, adding, "I never claimed to be a journalist." (In a subsequent interview with Times, Hannity described himself as an "advocacy journalist.") Fox News draws a distinction between its opinion and news sides of the house. But the relationship between Fox News opinion programming and the Trump White House has raised ethical questions about whether the channel is reporting the news or promoting the president’s agenda. Hannity, whose evening show attracts more than 3 million viewers, is the network’s most popular opinionator, and his program is typically the most-watched cable news talk show. The day after the rally, Fox News issued the following statement: "Fox News does not condone any talent participating in campaign events. We have an extraordinary team of journalists helming our coverage tonight and we are extremely proud of their work. This was an unfortunate distraction and has been addressed." The network also pointed to a tweet from Sean Hannity about the incident, that said he was surprised to be called onstage and that his earlier tweet was truthful. See Figure 3 on PolitiFact.com In any case, Hannity did in fact appear onstage to campaign with Trump at a rally, directly contradicting himself. Our conclusion Hannity promised he would not go onstage to campaign with Trump at a rally. Hours later, he did exactly that. We rate this a Full Flop. Update: This story was updated soon after its initial publication to include a statement from Fox News and a tweet from Sean Hannity. See Figure 2 on PolitiFact.com | null | Sean Hannity | null | null | null | 2018-11-06T11:30:51 | 2018-11-05 | ['None'] |
goop-01430 | Jamie Foxx ‘Betrayed’ Katie Holmes By ‘Getting Cozy’ With Mystery Woman At Oscars? | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/jamie-foxx-katie-holmes-oscars-mystery-woman/ | null | null | null | Andrew Shuster | null | Jamie Foxx ‘Betrayed’ Katie Holmes By ‘Getting Cozy’ With Mystery Woman At Oscars? | 2:22 pm, March 7, 2018 | null | ['Jamie_Foxx'] |
pomt-01033 | In Iraq and Syria, American leadership, including our military power, is stopping (the Islamic State’s) advance. | half-true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jan/27/barack-obama/barack-obama-says-america-stopping-islamic-states-/ | President Barack Obama briefly updated Americans on the state of the Islamic State during his State of the Union address. "In Iraq and Syria, American leadership, including our military power, is stopping (the Islamic State’s) advance," Obama said. "Instead of getting dragged into another ground war in the Middle East, we are leading a broad coalition, including Arab nations, to degrade and ultimately destroy this terrorist group." The comment came during a string of examples of his administration engaging the Middle East — militarily and diplomatically — without the need for large-scale troops. But is his claim that U.S. airstrikes have improved the situation in Syria and Iraq, where the Islamic State wreaked havoc last summer, accurate? We decided to take a look. Iraq vs. Syria There are two elements we will look at: Whether the situation has improved in the two countries, and whether it’s the result of U.S. intervention. First, what’s going on in Iraq and Syria? There’s general agreement among experts that the Islamic State’s movement in Iraq has been halted and, in some cases, reversed since Aug. 8, when the first airstrikes launched. For example, their march toward Baghdad has stopped short of the city, and they’ve been pushed out of the Mosul Dam, a critical victory for the United States in the early days of its military intervention. However, Syria is a different story. The key to Obama’s language is he said the U.S. "is stopping." That suggests an ongoing process that’s not complete. And in Syria, it isn’t. "It’s fluid," Defense Department spokesman Carl Woog told PolitiFact. "It is possible that (the Islamic State) has taken certain areas of the map in Syria (since airstrikes began). I think that is plausible and likely in some cases, but it’s not the case everywhere. This is a large area." There are disputes over how much area Syria has won, if any, since the airstrikes began. A map published by the Wall Street Journal shows considerable gains by the Islamic State compared to another map of their movements from Aug. 31. However, the airstrikes on Syria did not begin until Sept. 24, so it’s possible that ground was gained before U.S. intervention there, and the source is partially credited to the Coalition for a Democratic Syria, an organization of Syrian rebel forces that have called for more U.S. action. Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a Middle East expert at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy, said based on his own analysis of the Islamic State’s movements, any gains in Syria have been offset by losses in other regions. For example, the United States has heavily bombed the city of Kobani, a Kurdish stronghold in northern Syria near the Turkish border. In fact, according to an analysis of Pentagon daily briefings by longtime Middle East reporter Robin Wright, 78 percent of all U.S. airstrikes in Syria have come on Kobani. Despite repeated efforts by the Islamic State to overtake the city, the United States through the air and Kurdish fighters on the ground have beaten back those attempts. Reports from Jan. 26, after Obama’s speech, indicate Kurdish fighters have pushed the Islamic State almost entirely out of Kobani. In some ways it makes sense that Syria is a murkier situation. For one, U.S. airstrikes there started a month and a half after the first American bombs dropped in Iraq. The U.S. military has openly admitted it has an "Iraq first" strategy, aimed at eliminating the Islamic State in Iraq, while shaping their movements in Syria and training vetted moderate forces there. Iraq is also more familiar territory for the United States, after a decade of fighting there. And it has a government that is cooperating with the United States and supplying forces to fight. The same cannot be said for Syria, which is embroiled in a civil war between President Bashar al-Assad (Obama has called for him to step down) and rebel groups. Additionally, while the Islamic State may be partially halted in Syria, other extremist groups in the region have "gone on a rampage," Gartenstein-Ross said. The bottom line, said Wright, now a joint fellow at the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Woodrow Wilson International Center, is "we’ve contained (the Islamic State) in terms of stopping their sweep. They’re paying an enormous price and their supply lines have clearly been disrupted. But four and a half months in, (the Islamic State) is still there and has taken over huge chunks of both Iraq and Syria. "So (Obama’s characterization) is partly true and partly not true," she added. "But this was never gonna happen overnight." With or without the U.S. How much credit should the United States get for stopping the Islamic State? Experts said U.S. intervention has been key. It has disrupted supply lines, directly killed many fighters, and delivered supplies to Kurdish forces. The terrorist group’s strong march relied on acting as a conventional military force, using humvees and artillery to move across the region. The constant threat of airstrikes has forced them to change strategies. The Islamic State’s stall is also a result of many other influences in the region, many of which have come from the ground while the United States remains entirely airborne. In Syria, for example, as the United States has focused on Kobani, Assad’s forces have prevented the Islamic State from taking over the major metropolitan hub of Aleppo. So while Obama has backed Assad’s ouster, the dictator’s ability to prevent further movement by the Islamic State has been hugely important in Syria. Meanwhile, in Iraq, Iran’s support for Shiite Islamic militia groups fighting against the Islamic State, which practices the Sunni branch of Islam, has stopped their spread into southern Iraq, said Rick Brennan, a Middle East expert at the RAND Institute. Much of the Islamic State’s campaign has involved winning over converts, by force or otherwise, in predominantly Sunni regions, Brennan added, so they were naturally going to have trouble spreading when they tried to push into areas controlled by other populations. "ISIS made progress when they went through Sunni-controlled areas, but when they went to Shi’a and Kurdish areas, they slowed," Brennan said. "So there are natural demographics at play here as well." Our ruling Obama said, "In Iraq and Syria, American leadership, including our military power, is stopping (the Islamic State’s) advance." Obama’s language is carefully worded not to oversell the United States’ progress or the Islamic State’s lackthereof. And U.S. airstrikes have had a qualitative, if not quantifiable, impact on slowing the group’s swift spread compared with the situation last summer. However, Obama’s statement implies the United States is winning its war against the Islamic State, and that is not at all clear. While the terrorist group has stalled in Iraq, its movements in Syria are much more fluid. Things look improved today, but the situation can change quickly. Additionally, other countries in the region, including those outside our alliances, have played a role in fighting the Islamic State. Obama's statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details. We rate it Half True. | null | Barack Obama | null | null | null | 2015-01-27T14:49:42 | 2015-01-20 | ['United_States', 'Iraq', 'Syria'] |
pomt-08839 | Bill McCollum voted for higher taxes and fees 42 times while he was in Congress. | mostly false | /florida/statements/2010/aug/10/rick-scott/adding-bill-mccollums-42-votes-raise-taxes-and-fee/ | Without a record of votes to haunt him, Republican gubernatorial frontrunner Rick Scott has been free to attack primary opponent Bill McCollum for his 20 years in Congress. Scott's latest charge is a whopper -- that McCollum voted 42 times to raise taxes and fees. The accusation came up during the candidates' second and final debate on Aug. 5, 2010, and plays off a new Scott television ad called "Omelette." The ad starts with an egg breaking on the ground with a narrator saying that "Once, could be a mistake." Then a few more eggs fall to the ground. "Two or three times? Bad luck," the narrator says. Then the eggs really start pouring. "But 42 times? "Bill McCollum voted for higher taxes and fees 42 times while he was in Congress," the narrator says in the 30-second ad, which is airing statewide. "Yet now McCollum claims he won't increase taxes as governor. If you believe McCollum won't raise your taxes, the yolk's on you." The ad is no doubt effective, particularly in a Republican primary. But is it an accurate depiction of McCollum's two decades spent representing an Orlando-area community in Washington? PolitiFact Florida wanted to find out. Scott's evidence Scott's campaign referred PolitiFact Florida to a campaign-created website, www.factsforflorida.com, to review McCollum's Congressional record. The supporting evidence is difficult to digest, mainly because it's a simply a string of bill numbers, roll call votes and Internet links. Think we're lying? Here's one paragraph: Congressman Bill McCollum Voted To Raise Employment Taxes, Tobacco Taxes, Gas And Energy Taxes, Airport Taxes, Telephone Taxes, Taxes On Business, And Medicare And Social Security Taxes. (H.R. 4961, Roll Call Vote #303: Adopted 226-207: R 103-89; D 123-118, 8/19/82, McCollum Voted Yea; H.R. 1646, Roll Call Vote #282: Passed 398-5: R 157-4; D 241-1, 8/1/83, McCollum Voted Yea; H.R. 3575, Roll Call Vote #396: Passed 396-30: D 260-4; R 135-26; I 1-0, 11/14/91, McCollum Voted Yea, http://clerk.house.gov/evs/1991/roll396.xml; H.R. 2005, Roll Call Vote #408: Adopted 386-27: R 147-26; D 239-1, 10/8/86, McCollum Voted Yea; H.R. 6211, Roll Call Vote #488: Adopted 180-87: R 73-46; D 107-41, 12/21/82, McCollum Voted Yea; H.R. 3128, Roll Call Vote #60: Motion Agreed To (Thus Cleared For The President) 230-154: R 146-21; D 84-133, 3/20/86, McCollum Voted Yea; H.R. 1900, Roll Call Vote #43: Adopted 243-102: R 80-48; D 163-54, 3/24/83, McCollu m Voted Yea; H.R. 2470, Roll Call Vote #164: Adopted 328-72: R 98-63; D 230-9, 6/2/88, McCollum Voted Yea) The Scott campaign provided us a better summary of the votes to help us sort through the madness. The campaign says McCollum voted at least 27 times between 1981 and 2001 for legislation that included higher taxes, and at least 15 times for legislation that included higher fees. We then took the bill numbers and checked Thomas, a website through the Library of Congress. That site provides summaries of the legislation and also records how members voted. We also relied on descriptions of the legislation provided by the Tax Policy Center, a joint venture of the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution. Scott is right that McCollum voted for legislation that increased taxes. Most notably, McCollum voted for the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982, which undid some tax cuts passed a year earlier. The bill increased excise taxes, airport and airway trust fund taxes, cigarette excise taxes, and a telephone excise tax. The bill also increased employment taxes, according to the Tax Policy Center. The bill passed the House 226-207, with Republicans supporting the tax increases 103-89 and Democrats voting 123-118 in favor. Florida's four Republicans in the U.S. House (McCollum, C.W. Bill Young, Louis Bafalis and Clay Shaw) all supported the tax increases. McCollum, in the debate, called it a vote he regrets. "The only time that I voted for a tax increase when I was in Congress was Ronald Reagan's economic plan," McCollum said. "And I voted for that, and that's the one vote I regret that I ever took. I always said that after I did it." McCollum's support of the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 is a notable example of a tax increase McCollum supported, but it also highlights a problem with Scott's accounting methods. The vote on the one bill constitutes three of the 42 votes Scott is referencing in his ad because the bill included increases in employment (1), aviation (2) and tobacco (3) taxes. Double and triple counting is common in Scott's list of votes. According to the Scott campaign, four of McCollum's 42 votes to increase taxes and fees come in 1997 with the passage of a bill that's called -- ironically -- the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. In two separate roll call votes, McCollum voted in favor of raising the cigarette tax. And in two other votes, McCollum voted to support an aviation tax. Scott accurately accounts for those tax increases, though double-counting them is somewhat disingenuous. But more alarming is what he fails to mention: Namely that the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 actually cut taxes by $240 billion, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. The legislation introduced a $500 per child per year tax credit, created an education tax credit, reduced the rates for the capital gains and estate taxes, and repealed the alternative minimum tax for small businesses. The bill passed the U.S. House, 389-43, with only one Republican voting "No." PolitiFact Florida noted at least four other instances where a vote was counted more than once to reach Scott's 42-vote claim. Scott also counts tax extensions as tax increases -- the 1997 tax cut package included an extension of air transportation excise taxes. And a 1991 vote that Scott said was for a tax increase actually extended "taxes on heavy trucks and trailers sold at retail." That's not the same thing as voting 42 times for higher taxes and fees, which is what Scott says in his ad. What Scott leaves out Scott's ad also neglects McCollum's record of supporting tax cuts in Congress. McCollum voted for Ronald Reagan's first tax cut package, the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981. The legislation reduced marginal tax rates 23 percent over three years, reduced the maximum rate to 50 percent and reduced the maximum capital gains rate to 20 percent. In 1986, he also supported tax reform legislation to simplify the U.S. tax code. The bill was designed to be revenue neutral but actually provided overall tax relief, according to the Office of Management and Budget and the Congressional Budget Office. (By the way, this is listed as a tax increase vote by Scott's campaign). Bruce Bartlett, a columnist for Forbes.com and the one-time executive director of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress, published a good macro look at tax policy during Reagan's presidency. Using Office of Management and Budget data, Bartlett found that between 1981 and 1988 Congress approved $275 billion in tax cuts and about $133 billion in tax increases. The tax cuts are almost entirely contained in the 1981 and 1986 legislation McCollum supported. Even if McCollum supported every tax increase, he was still a net tax-cutter. McCollum also supported the major tax cut package in the 1990s, the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. Our ruling We should note that we didn't track back every single vote Scott cites. We asked the McCollum campaign if there were any votes they thought were misrepresented or that Scott had gotten wrong and did not hear back. PolitiFact Florida's review suggests Scott has been able to locate 42 taxes or fees that were either raised, or had their shelf-life extended, because of votes McCollum took while in Congress. But that only tells part of the story. Several of the votes are double counted, meaning that while 42 taxes may have been extended or raised, McCollum didn't vote 42 times for increases. Moreover, the Scott ad overlooks McCollum's votes to cut taxes, and specifically tries to label a $240 billion tax cut McCollum supported as a tax increase -- four different times. At best, Scott is cherry picking the votes to help make his case that "Bill McCollum voted for higher taxes and fees 42 times." But he's also brazenly trying to label a tax cut as a tax increase, and double and triple counting some votes. We rate the statement Barely True. Editor's note: This statement was rated Barely True when it was published. On July 27, 2011, we changed the name for the rating to Mostly False. | null | Rick Scott | null | null | null | 2010-08-10T18:53:21 | 2010-08-03 | ['United_States_Congress', 'Bill_McCollum'] |
snes-04477 | During an interview with the Washington Post, President Obama stated that Americans would be better off under martial law. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/obama-americans-are-better-off-under-martial-law/ | null | Politics | null | Kim LaCapria | null | President Obama: Americans Are Better Off Under Martial Law | 11 July 2016 | null | ['Barack_Obama', 'The_Washington_Post', 'United_States'] |
pose-00480 | That's why I am committed to pursuing greater funding for the EPA so that its responsibilities are carried out. Clean water, land and air, and ensuring the health and safety of our citizens, especially children, will be high priorities in an Obama Administration. | promise kept | https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/promise/500/increase-funding-for-the-environmental-protection-/ | null | obameter | Barack Obama | null | null | Increase funding for the Environmental Protection Agency | 2010-01-07T13:27:00 | null | ['Presidency_of_Barack_Obama', 'United_States_Environmental_Protection_Agency'] |
tron-03574 | It Takes Guts to say Jesus Virus | fiction! | https://www.truthorfiction.com/gutstosayjesus/ | null | virus | null | null | null | It Takes Guts to say Jesus Virus | Mar 17, 2015 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-06220 | Says 25 percent of Oregonians oppose the death penalty. | half-true | /oregon/statements/2011/dec/06/joshua-marquis/oregon-district-attorney-puts-opposition-capital-p/ | Death penalty politics are back in vogue after Gov. John Kitzhaber’s recent decision to suspend capital punishment for the remainder of his term. Carla Axtman a contributor to the Democratic blog Blue Oregon got into the discussion over the governor’s executive move by posting a short news excerpt and some quick encouragement: "Well done, Gov." Naturally, this set off a pretty long debate that pulled in, among others, Clatsop County District Attorney Josh Marquis, a longtime supporter of the death penalty. In one of his responses on the blog, he told opponents that they "were in a minority of about 25 percent." That caught our attention. Could it be that only a quarter of Americans oppose the death penalty? Our first stop was Gallup, the polling organization, which has recorded the national appetite for capital punishment for more than seven decades. Gallup’s most recent survey, conducted October 2011, asked respondents whether they were "in favor of the death penalty for a person convicted of murder." The response was 61 percent in favor, 35 percent opposed and 4 percent without an opinion. Generally, the data that Gallup has on hand shows a growing discomfort nationally with the death penalty. In the mid-1960s, opposition eclipsed those in favor, but it soon began to fall until the mid-’90s when opposition hit an all-time low of 16 percent. Since then, the tide has turned again, and opposition has been on a slow climb. Of course, it’s still clear the majority of those polled favor capital punishment in some cases. One other poll from late September 2011, this one done by CNN, showed that 50 percent of respondents favored life in prison as a penalty for murder, while 48 percent favored the death penalty. We called Marquis to see whether he had any evidence to back up his claim. He had a lot to say. First, he clarified that he wasn’t talking nationally, he was referring to Oregon specifically when he made that 25 percent comment. As for his evidence, he said that back in 2002, there was a group that was considering mounting a campaign to abolish the death penalty in Oregon. But, he said, they backed off after polls showed just 20 to 25 percent opposed. We pointed out that Gallup showed similar numbers 10 years ago, but since then the number opposed has changed. Marquis was unconvinced. He said the poll’s question made the issue appear too black and white. He also felt that the national poll wasn’t representative of Oregon. "Most importantly what about OREGON? You say that the numbers I cited from 2002 are too old but unless someone has documented numbers from OREGON, not nationally, where 15 states do NOT have capital punishment, I don't see how the comparison can be made," he wrote in one of several follow-up e-mails. In subsequent e-mails, he pointed us to polls in California (where 68 percent supported the death penalty), and Connecticut (where 67 were in support). He then cited a national Angus Reid poll conducted in October that showed support at 70 percent and opposition at 20 percent. Finally he presented us with this argument: "The last ‘poll’ of any significance was the 1984 vote in Oregon which was 75% in favor." There, he is referring to the year in which Oregonians put capital punishment back on the books after abolishing it decades earlier. Oregonians voted on two related measures in 1984. One exempted the death penalty from the part of the Oregon Constitution that bars cruel and unusual punishment. That measure passed with 55 percent in favor. The second granted a separate sentencing hearing before the trial jury to those convicted of aggravated murder and gave juries the power to sentence convicts to death. That was the vote that passed with 75 percent of the vote. Still, those votes were taken nearly 17 years ago before DNA evidence in several states cleared a number of convicts on death row and doubts about eyewitness testimony were widely publicized. In addition, officials in some states have flip-fopped, citing the public cost of protracted death penalty appeals. We talked to Stuart Elway, an independent pollster up in Seattle who works regionally. First we asked him what he thought about the Gallup poll and whether Marquis’ criticism seemed fair. He said it’s possible that the question, if asked differently, could elicit a slightly changed result -- but only a couple points in either direction. "In a question where public opinion is pretty settled the wording makes less difference than when asking about some tax policy that (a respondent has) never heard about before." He did, however, agree with Marquis that it wasn’t necessarily fair to tie the national polls to Oregon. Attitudes differ regionally and could certain affect the results by 5 to 10 points. Still, Elway said, the fact that Oregon was trending with the nation in 2002, probably indicates that the trend Gallup has found over the past few decades is somewhat present in Oregon as well. All that said, the facts are these: There is no recent Oregon-specific polling regarding the death penalty and national polls tend to vary pretty wildly, depending on how the question is asked. Marquis is basing his statement on numbers from at least a decade ago. The Gallup and CNN polls seem to indicated that the national mood is changing. How true this is for Oregon, we can’t say, but neither can Marquis. With PolitiFact, the burden of proof is always on the speaker. Marquis’ statement might have the smallest grain of truth, but it ignores some important details. We give his statement that death penalty opponents are "in a minority of about 25 percent" a Half True. Tell us what you think by visiting Oregonlive and leaving a comment. | null | Joshua Marquis | null | null | null | 2011-12-06T16:03:43 | 2011-11-27 | ['Oregon_Territory'] |
snes-02118 | Giant pythons were discovered in a small creek in Indiana. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/giant-pythons-discovered-in-salt-creek-in-brown-and-monroe-county-indiana/ | null | Junk News | null | Dan Evon | null | Giant Pythons Discovered in Salt Creek in Brown and Monroe County Indiana? | 3 July 2017 | null | ['Indiana'] |
snes-03939 | Hillary Clinton wore a secret earpiece during the first presidential debate of 2016. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/clinton-secret-earpiece-debate/ | null | Fauxtography | null | Dan Evon | null | Hillary Clinton Wore Secret Earpiece During First Presidential Debate? | 27 September 2016 | null | ['None'] |
vees-00339 | ASEAN pushes for media literacy to fight fake news | none | http://verafiles.org/articles/asean-pushes-media-literacy-fight-fake-news | null | null | null | null | fake news,ASEAN50,AMRI | ASEAN pushes for media literacy to fight fake news | November 14, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
goop-02171 | Jennifer Garner Has Taken Back Ben Affleck, | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/jennifer-garner-ben-affleck-back-together-thanksgiving/ | null | null | null | Andrew Shuster | null | Jennifer Garner Has NOT Taken Back Ben Affleck, Despite Report | 10:53 am, November 21, 2017 | null | ['Ben_Affleck', 'Jennifer_Garner'] |
pomt-07009 | Says that when President Bill Clinton raised the top tax rates to levels now proposed by Obama, the country experienced significant job growth. | half-true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2011/jul/07/barack-obama/obama-claims-job-rate-soared-after-clinton-raised-/ | While many Republicans have warned that President Barack Obama's plan to raise taxes on wealthy Americans would hurt the fragile economy, Obama fired back in a Twitter town hall on July 6, 2011, that he's only proposing to return the top tax rate to the level it was raised to under President Bill Clinton, when job growth subsequently soared. Said Obama: "If wealthy individuals are willing to simply go back to the rates that existed back in the 1990s when rich people were doing very well -- it’s not like they were poor -- and by the way, that’s when we saw the highest job growth rates, and that’s when we saw the highest -- the greatest reduction in poverty, and that’s when we saw businesses very profitable -- if the wealthiest among us -- and I include myself in this category -- are willing to give up a little bit more, then we can solve this problem. It does not take a lot. "And I just have to say, when people say, job-killing tax increases, that’s what Obama is proposing, we’re not going to -- you’re entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts. And the facts are that a modest increase for wealthy individuals is not shown to have an adverse impact on job growth. "I mean, we can test the two theories. You had what happened during the ‘90s -- right? Taxes for wealthy individuals were somewhat higher, businesses boomed, the economy boomed, great job growth. And then the 2000s, when taxes were cut on wealthy individuals, jobs didn’t grow as fast, businesses didn’t grow as fast. I mean, it’s not like we haven’t tried what these other folks are pitching. It didn’t work. And we should go with what works." First, let's look at the history of the top tax rates at issue here. Clinton raised the top marginal rate from 31 percent to 39.6 percent with the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 (previously, President George H.W. Bush had raised the top tax rate from 28 percent to 31 percent in 1990). At the time, Clinton said, "The deficit has increased so much beyond my earlier estimates and beyond even the worst official government estimates of last year. We just have to face the fact that to make the changes our country needs, more Americans must contribute today so that all Americans can do better tomorrow." Sound familiar? President George W. Bush later lowered the top marginal rate to 39.1 percent in 2001 and 38.6 percent in 2002 by the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. And then he lowered the top rate again, to 35 percent, with the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003. The Bush tax cuts -- extended in a compromise deal in December -- are set to expire at the end of 2011 unless Congress seeks to extend them or make them permanent. Obama proposes to let the Bush tax cuts expire for people making over $250,000 a year. In other words, Obama would like to return the top marginal tax rate to the 39.6 percent it was under Clinton. As for Obama's claim that in the years after the Clinton tax increase, job rates soared, the numbers back him up. Employment rates grew a healthy clip through the mid 1990s after Clinton's tax hike, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. And it's also true that jobs didn't grow as quickly after the Bush tax cuts were enacted. So tax hikes equal job growth? "The 1990s were very good, but not because of higher tax rates," said Dan Mitchell, an economist with the libertarian Cato Institute. In an April 18, 2010, blog post, Mitchell argued that "while Bush had a better record (than Clinton) on taxes, he had a much worse record on spending." Other economists say the trend at least shows raising taxes on the wealthy isn't going to cause the economy to tank. "I don't think Obama was claiming that the higher tax rates in the '90s led to the boom, just that they did not prevent it," said Dean Baker, a liberal economist and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. "Similarly, the tax cuts of the Bush years did not lead to strong growth. Most of the evidence shows that tax increases with a given level of deficits will have a modestly negative impact on the economy." Higher tax rates in the top brackets does create some disincentive effect, Baker said, and some people work less, "but it is not a very big deal in the scheme of things." "The idea that going back to something like Clinton era tax rates would be a disaster is nonsense," Baker said. Said Gus Faucher, director of macroeconomics with Moody's economy.com: "I think he (Obama) is making the point that higher tax rates, at least at the levels under President Clinton, are compatible with strong economic growth, and the evidence is clear on that." "You can argue that one reason we had strong growth in the 1990s is that Bush I and Clinton reduced the deficit (cut spending and raised taxes), bringing down budget deficits," Faucher said. "This, in turn, lowered long-term borrowing costs and made more capital available to the private sector. The strong growth then helped bring down the deficit further, and eventually we got surpluses. I think the fiscal discipline of Bush I and Clinton was a reason for the strong growth in the 1990s." J.D. Foster, an economist with the right-leaning Heritage Foundation, scoffed at the suggestion that higher tax rates might be responsible for higher job growth rates and a booming economy. "The most you could even hope to say is that the Clinton tax hikes didn't do much damage," Foster said. "The economy was poised for a dramatic boom in 1993, and instead we got muddle and negative real wage growth," Foster said, drawing from arguments he made in a March 4, 2008, post on the Heritage website about this very topic. "The Clinton boom? It started not in 1993, but in 1997, which not coincidentally coincided with Republicans taking firmer control of the budget, welfare reform, and especially the capital gains tax rate reduction. Did these policies cause the boom? I argue they contributed to a propitious moment. But at least the case is plausible, whereas to ignore history and argue that the tax hikes somehow led to a boom that began four years later is simply laughable." Foster argued that while the Clinton tax hikes didn't trigger job losses in the 1990s, tax increases could now. "The real difference between 1993 and 2011 is that the circumstances of 1993 suggested a recovery well underway that was on course for rapid expansion, an expansion that was dulled by the tax hikes," Foster said. "We had just come out of a very mild domestic recession, inflation was low, energy prices were low, peace reigned as democracy bloomed and a confluence of new technologies were about to transform the world economy. "2011? We're still struggling out of a finance-centered deep global recession, the recovery is weak and retarded by a series of economic policy gaffes by this administration, global political tensions are high, oil prices are high, Europe is in the grips of a massive sovereign debt crisis of their own making. Do you really think the consequences of a tax hike today would be the same as in 1993? Not hardly." Eric Toder, co-director of the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, doesn't dispute Obama's facts. But he questions what it proves. "It does not prove that tax increases cause growth and tax cuts retard it," Toder said. "Lots of other stuff was happening in both decades, and simple correlations don’t prove causation. It is even possible that growth in the 1990s would have been stronger without the tax increases and weaker in the 2000s without the tax cuts. It is true, however, that the Clinton tax increases did not prevent an economic boom from occurring, whatever their incremental effect may have been. And the Bush tax cuts did not forestall a decade of relatively weak performance, even if one is willing to argue that things would have been worse without them." So where does this leave us? It is true that when Clinton raised the top marginal tax rate to 39.6 percent -- the same level Obama would like to return it to now -- the U.S. saw strong job growth in the ensuing years. But to the extent Obama is suggesting a cause and effect relationship between those two events -- and we think he certainly leaves that impression when he says we "should go with what works" -- that is dubious, according to the cross-section of economists we spoke to. There were many other economic factors that played a larger role in job growth, they said. However, most agree that the tax increases did not appear to hinder job growth, and that's significant given the dire warnings some Republicans have issued about Obama's plan to return the top tax rate to Clinton levels. Perhaps, as Foster argues, the situation is different enough now -- more precarious -- that a tax hike would have a more damaging effect. That's a matter for economists to debate. When Obama says we saw job growth in the 1990s even as Clinton raised taxes, he's right. But to the extent that he's suggesting raising taxes created job growth -- as he appears to be when he says "we should go with what works," he goes too far. We rate his claim Half True. | null | Barack Obama | null | null | null | 2011-07-07T18:26:29 | 2011-07-06 | ['Bill_Clinton', 'Barack_Obama'] |
faan-00051 | “The only person on that stage who’s never held a private sector job is Stephen Harper.” | factscan score: false | http://factscan.ca/elizabeth-may-private-sector-job/ | It’s false that Harper never worked a private sector job. After dropping out of the University of Toronto, he took a job with Imperial Oil in the company’s Edmonton office in 1978, leaving in 1981 for a second go at university. | null | Elizabeth May | null | null | null | 2015-10-14 | mber 17, 2015 | ['Stephen_Harper'] |
goop-00105 | Angelina Jolie ‘Destroying’ Brad Pitt’s Personal Items, | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/angelina-jolie-brad-pitt-personal-items-destroy-trash/ | null | null | null | Andrew Shuster | null | Angelina Jolie NOT ‘Destroying’ Brad Pitt’s Personal Items, Despite Report | 10:47 am, October 22, 2018 | null | ['Brad_Pitt', 'Angelina_Jolie'] |
hoer-00524 | 'Sarah Palin Calls on Obama to Invade Ebola' | statirical reports | https://www.hoax-slayer.com/sarah-palin-demands-obama-invade-ebola.shtml | null | null | null | Brett M. Christensen | null | Fake-News: 'Sarah Palin Calls on Obama to Invade Ebola' | October 6, 2014 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-11137 | One in six Texans don’t have health care. We’re the most uninsured state in the U.S. | mostly true | /texas/statements/2018/may/31/lupe-valdez/lupe-valdez-1-6-Texans-lack-health-care-uninsured-/ | Lupe Valdez, the former Dallas County sheriff nominated for governor by Texas Democrats, says health care will get much-needed attention once she’s in charge. Valdez was quoted in a May 23, 2018, New York Times news story saying: "One in six Texans don’t have health care. We’re the most uninsured state in the U.S." It’s an exaggeration, we’d suggest, to say that all uninsured individuals don’t have any health care. As we concluded in a 2010 fact-check, many avenues exist to make care available--including paying out of pocket and going to hospital emergency rooms. Still, many people don't get the care they need. A slightly different 1-in-6 statement appears on Valdez’s campaign website: "1 in 6 Texans lack health insurance," Valdez says on the "Health Care" portion of the site. She goes on: "The truth is, we’re already paying for universal healthcare, we are just doing it in the most expensive and inefficient (way) possible." Valdez, calling Republican Gov. Greg Abbott foolish for rejecting the option of expanding Medicaid in Texas as permitted by the Obamacare law, further says that as governor she’ll push to reverse his decision. We’ve found validity to other claims that Texas has the greatest share of residents who lack health insurance. After Valdez spoke, we decided to look again at how Texas ranks. Census Bureau estimates Valdez’s campaign didn’t respond to our email asking for her backup. But to our inquiry about the latest available data, Paul Fronstin of the Washington, D.C.-based Employee Benefit Research Institute, who previously advised us on the number of uninsured residents by state, pointed by email to a September 2017 Census Bureau report estimating that in 2016, Texas still had the nation’s greatest share of residents without health insurance, 16.6 percent--or 1 in 6 people. The Texas rate, the report says, was down from 17.1 percent the year before and 22.2 percent in 2013, according to information collected in the American Community Survey. In 2016, the report says, Alaska ranked second nationally with 14 percent of residents lacking coverage and Oklahoma was third with a 13.8 percent uninsured rate. Also answering our query by email, the Kaiser Family Foundation’s Chris Lee shared its calculations indicating that in 2016, Texas led other states with 15 percent of residents lacking health insurance, per research connected to the bureau’s Current Population Survey. According to the foundation, states ranking second and third in residents lacking coverage were Alaska (14 percent) and Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Utah (12 percent each). Lee guided us next to a Kaiser chart showing that Texas in 2016 also had the nation’s greatest share of uninsured residents younger than 65 (when residents qualify for Medicare). The Texas uninsured rate of 17 percent outpaced No. 2 Alaska’s rate, 15 percent, a foundation chart says. Gallup survey results We spotted a more recent nongovernmental estimate. In May 2018, Gallup said that surveys the polling company took in 2017 asked respondents: "Do you have health insurance coverage?" For the 10th straight year, Gallup said, Texas had the nation’s highest rate of uninsured residents, 22.5 percent, which was still an improvement from the uninsured rate Gallup gauged for Texas in 2013, 27 percent. In 2017, Gallup gauged, Massachusetts residents had the nation’s lowest uninsured rate in 2017, 4 percent. SOURCE: Press release, Gallup, "Uninsured Rate Rises in 17 States in 2017," May 9, 2018 Our ruling Valdez said: "One in six Texans don’t have health care. We’re the most uninsured state in the U.S." One in six Texans in 2016 lacked health insurance, according to government surveys, and the state remained No. 1 for its share of residents without coverage. It’s an exaggeration to say that all uninsured people have no health care. We rate this claim Mostly True. MOSTLY TRUE – The statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information. Click here for more on the six PolitiFact ratings and how we select facts to check. See Figure 1 on PolitiFact.com | null | Lupe Valdez | null | null | null | 2018-05-31T12:31:17 | 2018-05-23 | ['United_States', 'Texas'] |
pomt-01553 | Says Gina Raimondo's "venture capital firm secured a secret no-bid contract funded by taxpayers." | mostly false | /rhode-island/statements/2014/sep/14/angel-taveras/taxpayers-paid-secret-no-bid-contract-benefited-gi/ | A TV commercial that ran before the Sept. 9 primary showed two well-dressed men carrying briefcases, approaching each other. They meet in the shadows of a stairwell to shake hands. The implication: they don't want anyone to see what they're doing. The word "SECRET" appears in large green letters, followed by the words "No-bid Contract." A narrator talks about General Treasurer Gina Raimondo, then one of four Democrats running in a primary for governor, a race she ultimately won. "Her venture capital firm secured a secret no-bid contract funded by taxpayers," the narrator says The commercial was for Providence Mayor Angel Taveras, one of Raimondo’s opponents. It didn't say what the contract was about, but it sure sounded shady. Even though the primary is over, we decided to examine the commercial’s claim because the issues it raises may well come up again as Raimondo runs against Cranston Mayor Allan Fung, who won the Republican gubernatorial primary. The commercial cites a March 1, 2014 story in The Providence Journal that explored the terms of a 2006 investment that Providence made in a venture capital investment firm, Point Judith Capital. Raimondo co-founded the company. In March 2006, four years before Raimondo would enter politics, a board chaired by then-Mayor David Cicilline voted to invest $1 million in retirement money with Point Judith. The investment would last 10 years; the city initially invested $100,000. Under the terms of the deal, if the investment made money by 2016, Point Judith would get 20 percent of the profit and it would refund the management fees Providence would be paying to Point Judith -- as much as $200,000 during the duration of the deal. By Dec. 31, 2013, the city had invested $907,211 and Point Judith had deducted $159,690 in fees, but the value of the investment had grown to $1.466 million. What makes this a "secret" deal? Venture capital firms, which provide early financing for innovative companies in hopes of getting big payoffs down the road, are tight-lipped about how they invest their money and demand secrecy from those who invest in them. The Journal spent months trying to get details about the city's Point Judith investment, which included debate between Point Judith and the city over what to release. In April, more than a month after The Journal reported on the general terms of the deal and eight years after it was approved, Providence released a copy of its agreement with Point Judith to the newspaper, with several portions -- including dollar amounts, investment periods, interest rates and other key elements -- redacted. So key elements Providence's contract with Point Judith remain secret. But when it comes to other aspects of the deal, the image of two shadowy businessmen cutting an illicit deal in a stairwell is ridiculously wrong. The vote to invest money with Point Judith was approved unanimously on March 23, 2006, during a regular meeting of the city's Board of Investment Commissioners. The public session was in a third floor conference room in City Hall. A transcript of the meeting, during which Raimondo made a presentation and members weighed the pros and cons of the deal, is available online. The investment was recommended by the fund's investment counselor. One reason the city went with Point Judith: at the time, the company was the only venture capital firm based in Rhode Island. "We did not say the contract was entered into secretly," said Dawn Bergantino, spokeswoman for Taveras’ gubernatorial campaign. "We are saying the contract itself is secret. We were talking specifically about the non-disclosure aspect of the contract. When the agreement was signed, the position of Point Judith was that the information is not for public disclosure. The Mayor has fought Point Judith to subsequently make the contract public." "If the specifics of the contract are hidden from public view, and if on being asked to release the contract the requests are refused – the contract is secret," she said. And was this a no-bid contract? The short answer: yes. But that's not unusual on the state or local level. Investments are often done without bidding because they are based on the recommendation of a fund's investment adviser. "For the most part, most do not go out for bid" unless an investment board doesn't have a financial consultant, said Howard Pohl of The Bogdahn Group. He is a well-known consultant to many public pension plans. Spokespeople for Taveras insisted that most investments were done through requests for proposals. We asked to see copies of past RFPs. Providence's consultant, Wainwright Investment Counsel, said it didn't have any available. We also asked three of the four people who voted on the Point Judith investment about whether bidding was standard practice. Cicilline, now a U.S. Congressman, said through spokesman Andrew Gernt that individual investments did not go out for bid. Myrth York, who was a member of the investment commission at the time and is supporting Raimondo's bid for governor, said the same thing. "Someone would come in and say they had something, and we would either be interested in it or not, and part of it would depend on how it fit in with the overall portfolio. It's wasn't like you opened three bids and picked one," she said. Stephen T. Napolitano, also a former commission member, said: "We relied on our consultant to make recommendations and provide us with people in the field to come in and do interviews. Based on that, we made a decision to hire them. . . . In terms of putting it out to bid, I don't think it was ever done back then. I don't think that's the normal procedure." Our ruling Angel Taveras said Gina Raimondo's "venture capital firm secured a secret no-bid contract funded by taxpayers," citing a newspaper story that deals with the terms of Point Judith's deal with Providence. Some elements of the deal remain secret. But the ad’s clear implication that the contract was approved in secret is wrong. It wasn’t. It was voted on in an open session. To call it a no-bid contract is technically correct, but that phrase suggests something improper. The reality is that many such investment decisions never go out for bid because the investments have been vetted by a financial consultant. Because the statement in Taveras' commercial contained some element of truth but ignored critical facts that would give a different impression, we rate it Mostly False. (If you have a claim you’d like PolitiFact Rhode Island to check, email us at politifact@providencejournal.com. And follow us on Twitter: @politifactri.) | null | Angel Taveras | null | null | null | 2014-09-14T00:01:00 | 2014-08-19 | ['None'] |
goop-00410 | Meghan Markle Pregnant With “Two Girls,” | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/meghan-markle-pregnant-two-girls-twins-prince-harry-false/ | null | null | null | Shari Weiss | null | Meghan Markle NOT Pregnant With “Two Girls,” Despite Report | 10:14 am, August 22, 2018 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-13331 | Mike Madigan made a fortune on tax appeals… Saving his friends millions... It’s an inside game played by people like Merry Marwig, Madigan’s hand-picked candidate. When Marwig thought her property taxes were too high she got them lowered at your expense. Saved so much she did it again. Marwig and Madigan: Profiting from the same corrupt system. | mostly false | /illinois/statements/2016/oct/05/citizens-michael-mcauliffe-and-house-republican-or/attack-marwigs-property-taxes-misses-mark/ | Illinois’ 20th House district is considered one of the most important in-state races to watch come Election Day in the battle for seats between Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan and GOP Gov. Bruce Rauner. The district, which includes parts of Chicago’s Northwest side and nearby suburbs,features Republican state Rep. MichaelMcAuliffe defending his seat from first-time candidate Democrat Merry Marwig. McAuliffe’s defense includes a new television ad that calls Marwig corrupt and ties her to Madigan because she has successfully appealed her property tax bills. The ad, titled "Inside Game," is a 30-second spot running in the Chicago area and was produced by Citizens for Michael McAuliffe and the Illinois House Republican Organization. Here’s the transcript: "Mike Madigan made a fortune on tax appeals. Representing the powerful and politically connected. Saving his friends millions. Forcing you to pay more. It’s an inside game played by people like Merry Marwig, Madigan’s hand-picked candidate. When Marwig thought her property taxes were too high she got them lowered at your expense. Saved so much she did it again. Marwig and Madigan: Profiting from the same corrupt system." It got us wondering: Did Marwig get her property taxes lowered? Did Madigan have anything to do with it? Is it corrupt to get your property taxes lowered? We took a look to find out. Madigan’s law firm and tax appeals The opening line of the advertisement says: "Mike Madigan made a fortune on tax appeals. Representing the powerful and politically connected. Saving his friends millions." Madigan’s personal law firm, Madigan & Getzendanner, has made quite a bit of money from property tax appeals. According to the Chicago Tribune, Madigan & Getzendanner represented 45 of the 150 most valuable Chicago downtown buildings in 2008. The Tribune also found "Madigan's firm won enough appeals to cut more than $183 million from the taxable value of the top high-rises it represented" in 2006. A 2013 Chicago Magazine article also backs this claim, citing a Sun-Timesarticle that says over the course of a decade Madigan & Getzendanner made nearly $14 million for suburban Cook County landowners. Madigan and Marwig Where the ad gets murky is when it starts linking Marwig to Madigan. The advertisement says Madigan "saved his friends millions, forcing you to pay more." It also says Marwig is Madigan’s "hand-picked candidate." The ad lays out these ideas in an order that implies Madigan’s firm represented Marwig during her property value reassessment. However, Marwig and her husband were not represented by an attorney and filled out the forms themselves. Marwig’s property taxes Next, the ad claims Marwig had her property taxes "lowered at your expense. Saved so much she did it again." Marwig once unsuccessfully appealed to the Cook County Assessor to have her property value lowered in 2015. However, she successfully appealed to the Cook County Board of Review twice. It resulted in getting her property taxes lowered by about $400 in her 2013 appeal and then about $700 in her 2015 appeal. Marwig believes there is a double standard for McAuliffe to criticize her practices. In an emailed statement to Reboot Illinois she said: "For Mike McAuliffe -- a 20-year politician who has personally benefited from a property tax appeal -- to attack my family for going through the legal process of correcting a government error in an unfair tax bill is another sad example of what’s wrong with the politics and hypocrisy that local residents are so fed up with." Note: McAuliffe did benefit from getting his property taxes lowered when his condominium association appealed its property value in 2012. However, McAuliffe did not file the claim himself. And when the advertisement says Marwig got her property taxes "lowered at your expense," it’s technically correct. But Chicago-based property appeals lawyer Gary H. Smith believes the ad implies Marwig is stealing, which is not actually the case. "It’s got elements of the truth," Smith said. "When someone gets their property assessment lowered, it has to be made up by everyone else." But is it corrupt? The ad ends by saying, "Marwig and Madigan: Profiting from the same corrupt system." Not at all, Smith says. Anyone, regardless of whether they are regular citizen or a political candidate, can appeal a property tax bill if they believe it is inaccurate. According to the most recent available data from the Cook County Board of Review website, citizens filed appeals for nearly 403,000 parcels in 2013. The Board of Review approved a reduction for 63 percent of them. Smith said the ad’s message is misleading and paints the practice of property value reassessment as ugly. "It’s horrible we live in a society that a system that’s meant to improve our lives might be perceived as a detriment based on a person’s political status," Smith said. Our ruling In their advertisement, Citizens for Michael McAuliffe and the House Republican Organization say, "Mike Madigan made a fortune on tax appeals. Representing the powerful and politically connected.… When (Merry) Marwig thought her property taxes were too high she got them lowered at your expense... Marwig and Madigan: Profiting from the same corrupt system." Merry Marwig did, in fact, get her property taxes lowered twice and it did raise other people’s taxes. But the ad’s tone and inferences are misleading to viewers. It makes it seem like Madigan’s firm was connected to Marwig’s property value reassessment. Madigan’s firm never represented Marwig. In fact, Marwig never used an attorney during her property tax appeals. The ad also calls the practice of appealing one’s property taxes corrupt. While there is evidence Madigan has been a highly successful property tax appeal lawyer whose clients win breaks more than many others, any citizen within the geographic boundary can file an appeal to the Cook County Assessor's Office or Cook County Board of Review. The process becomes public record. While some people may think Madigan succeeds more than average citizens, there’s no evidence the system as a whole is corrupt. We rate this claim as Mostly False. https://www.sharethefacts.co/share/fa7dab3e-6788-47a1-a2d6-b1a64c11ecc8 | null | Citizens for Michael McAuliffe and House Republican Organization | null | null | null | 2016-10-05T09:36:55 | 2016-09-14 | ['Michael_Madigan'] |
pomt-01549 | Says NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell interviewed domestic abuse victim Janay Rice with Ray Rice present and for "every domestic violence agency, every law enforcement agency, that’s a no-no." | mostly true | /punditfact/statements/2014/sep/14/mike-wise/did-nfl-commissioner-roger-goodell-interview-janay/ | The Sunday news shows broke from their usual coverage of Washington’s inner-workings to examine another institution fraught with controversy: the National Football League. The heat is on NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for his discipline of former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice, who was shown in a video leaked last week punching out his now-wife Janay Rice in an Atlantic City, N.J., casino elevator in February. The video’s release prompted more voices to question Rice’s initial two-game suspension as too lenient, including Goodell, who announced Rice’s indefinite suspension amid fallout from the video. To some sports pundits and victim advocates, that’s not nearly enough to prove Goodell is for real about punishing players accused of domestic violence. Washington Post sports columnist Mike Wise said Goodell should lose his job on CNN’s State of the Union. "The thing that bothered me most is Roger Goodell at one point tried to play essentially a marriage counselor with the victim and the perpetrator, Janay and Ray Rice," Wise said. "He put the victim and the perpetrator together. Every domestic violence agency, every law enforcement agency, that’s a no-no." Wise continued: "She is sitting, telling her story in front of the person who essentially abused her. And it’s the tone deafness of those types of things that show me that this commissioner does not take domestic violence seriously enough." PunditFact wondered if Wise is right: Did Goodell talk to victim Janay Rice with Ray Rice present? And does that violate the policy of domestic violence advocacy organizations and law enforcement agencies? The meeting lead-up and fallout An NFL spokesman declined to comment, citing the investigation by former FBI director Robert Mueller of the NFL's actions. The meeting in question occurred June 16 at the NFL’s headquarters in New York, three months after a New Jersey grand jury indicted Rice on charges of third-degree aggravated assault from the elevator incident. Ray Rice, who married Janay Rice on March 28, was accepted into a pretrial intervention program to avoid time behind bars in May. The purpose of the mid-June meeting was to discuss disciplinary action by the NFL. Sports Illustrated’s Peter King broke the first details about the meeting, citing anonymous inside sources that the NFL has not contradicted. The meeting included not just Goodell and Ray and Janay Rice, but also Ravens General Manager Ozzie Newsome, Ravens President Dick Cass, and two NFL executives, King reported. In the meeting, Janay Rice asked Goodell to be lenient to Ray Rice, the source told King, saying major discipline could ruin the running back’s career. On July 24, the NFL announced it would suspend Rice for just two games, setting off early waves of criticism. King’s story is important because it informed the subsequent chorus of columns and punditry that slammed Goodell for not talking to the couple separately. The popular sports blog Deadspin quoted two domestic violence victim advocates -- Rene Renick, vice president of programs and emerging issues with the National Network to End Domestic Violence, and attorney adviser Viktoria Kristiansson of prosecutor resource group AEquitas -- who said Goodell’s combined meeting with the couple was inappropriate. "Even having the two of them in the room and thinking that she can speak freely in that kind of a situation is crazy," Renick told Deadspin. "There is no way she can speak freely. And if there was any chance that she was afraid or coerced, she couldn't have said that. She would have been probably in a whole lot of danger." A columnist for the Ravens’ hometown paper, the Baltimore Sun’s Dan Rodricks, interviewed a local social worker and counseling professor who echoed that point. And Wise, too, wrote a July 29 column that went into more detail about Goodell’s meeting with the couple than Wise discussed on CNN. In an interview with PunditFact, Wise said the meeting was "ethically irresponsible" and shows Goodell’s background lacks professional mental health training. "I have no qualms whatsoever about maintaining that law enforcement agencies and domestic violence advocates on the whole support not interviewing a perpetrator and the abused together, especially when deciding matters of discipline for the perpetrator," Wise said. Law enforcement policies Ruth M. Glenn, interim executive director of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, confirmed to PunditFact what other domestic violence advocates told other news organizations: Goodell should not have talked to Janay Rice in front of her husband. "When that incident is being reviewed, investigated, whatever it is, there should never be an opportunity where that inquiry occurs when they’re both present," Glenn said. "Absolutely, it doesn’t make it any different if it had happened a day before." Glenn said the domestic violence prevention community has pushed for years for law enforcement agencies to adopt policies that call for interviewing victims and suspects separately (example of model policies and checklists here.) We found plenty of examples of law enforcement agencies that expressly say to separate the victim, suspect and witnesses involved in the dispute, including Santa Clara County (Calif.), Kentucky, Michigan, South Carolina and New Jersey. (We didn’t have time to check each district or state by our deadline, and the U.S. Department of Justice did not offer a comment, but we are comfortable saying this policy is widespread.) Stanford University law professor Robert Weisberg noted that detectives always question witnesses separately. Still, while separation may be required in the immediate aftermath of an incident, it isn’t always maintained throughout the legal process, said said Charles H. Rose III, Stetson University College of Law professor. Sometimes couples in domestic violence cases are interviewed together so officials can judge how they act with one another. "By the time Goodell was involved it was no longer necessary to have them be interviewed apart," Rose said. "In effect, the wagons had already been circled." Also left unsaid by Wise: Goodell was not initiating a law enforcement investigation. That already had occurred. "You cannot apply a law enforcement paradigm to an employment issue," Rose said. "Different standards, different law, and different results." Goodell’s goal for talking with Ray and Janay Rice may not have been analogous with a law enforcement investigation, cautioned James Acker, a University at Albany-SUNY School of Criminal Justice professor. "If it was, then for the same reasons, such a joint discussion would not likely be appropriate," Acker said. "On the other hand, for all I know, the context was quite different. Perhaps Goodell already had received a factual account elsewhere; perhaps he wanted to attempt to gauge the Rices' relationship and try to form an impression of them together." Our ruling Wise has a problem with Goodell meeting with Ray and Janay Rice together as Goodell sought information about the February elevator incident and aftermath that would inform Rice’s discipline by the league. First, there’s little debate that the meeting occurred, as it has been widely reported and not challenged by the NFL. Second, Wise also claimed that "in every domestic violence agency, every law enforcement agency" a meeting like that would be "a no-no." That’s for the most part correct as well, though experts we spoke to questioned whether it’s the right parallel to draw. Questioning victims separately from suspects in domestic violence cases does appear to be a widespread practice both encouraged by domestic violence advocates and many police and state policies after an incident occurs. But Goodell was not conducting a criminal investigation -- that already had occurred, and he had access to that information. Also, there are occasions when couples involved in domestic violence cases are interviewed together later, allowing police and prosecutors to judge how they act with one another so they can assess credibility and potential prosecution, one expert told us. Setting aside whether the comparison is apt, Wise’s claim is accurate but needs clarification or additional information. We rate it Mostly True. | null | Mike Wise | null | null | null | 2014-09-14T18:15:40 | 2014-09-14 | ['None'] |
hoer-00073 | Eating Shrimp and Taking Vitamin C Can Cause Death by Arsenic Poisoning | bogus warning | https://www.hoax-slayer.com/shrimp-vitamin-c-hoax.shtml | null | null | null | Brett M. Christensen | null | Hoax - Eating Shrimp and Taking Vitamin C Can Cause Death by Arsenic Poisoning | March 11, 2013 | null | ['None'] |
snes-02400 | 'Time' ran a cover story titled "How to Survive the Coming Ice Age" in 1977. | false | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/the-coming-ice-age/ | null | Science | null | Alex Kasprak | null | Did a 1977 ‘Time’ Story Offer Tips on ‘How to Survive the Coming Ice Age’? | 18 May 2017 | null | ['None'] |
bove-00069 | BJP Revives Rajiv Gandhi’s 1984 Speech Video Justifying Sikh Riots | none | https://www.boomlive.in/bjp-revives-rajiv-gandhis-1984-speech-video-justifying-sikh-riots/ | null | null | null | null | null | BJP Revives Rajiv Gandhi’s 1984 Speech Video Justifying Sikh Riots | May 22 2018 9:40 pm, Last Updated: May 22 2018 9:42 pm | null | ['None'] |
pose-00986 | Will voluntarily and immediately pay the full employee contribution for his own pension if elected governor. “Currently, Wisconsin taxpayers foot the bill for both the employer and employee contributions for the pension benefit received by state employees and elected officials.” | promise broken | https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/promises/walk-o-meter/promise/1021/immediately-pay-full-employee-contribution-his-sta/ | null | walk-o-meter | Scott Walker | null | null | Immediately pay full employee contribution on his state pension | 2011-11-04T18:46:38 | null | ['Wisconsin'] |
pomt-03618 | The labor market is weak because if you count the unemployed, underemployed, and those who’ve stopped looking for work, the unemployment rate "actually went up last month to 13.5 percent." | half-true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2013/may/07/newt-gingrich/newt-gingrich-says-rise-employment-statistic-shows/ | On NBC’s Meet the Press, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., pointed to a somewhat obscure labor statistic as evidence that the economy continues to fare poorly more than five years after the onset of the last recession. "I think it's very dangerous to suggest that this economy's healthy," Ginrgich said. He went on to argue that the implementation of President Barack Obama’s health care law could push some companies to turn full-time workers into part-timers in order to avoid providing health coverage. "The pain level it's going to cause, is going to be enormous," Gingrich said of the health care law. "The number of people who are going to have their jobs reduced to 29 hours, because that way their employer doesn't have to pay for their insurance, is going to be staggering. And if you look at the U-6 number, which was unemployed, under-employed, and dropped out, it actually went up last month to 13.5 percent." The U-6 number, for the nonwonks in our audience, is a federal statistic that tries to capture a broader picture of labor-market weakness than the more familiar unemployment rate. As Gingrich indicated, the statistic takes into account not just people who are unemployed but also people working part-time who would rather have full-time work, as well as people who have stopped looking for work but would begin to look again if labor-market conditions improved. Because it includes these additional factors, the U-6 rate tends to track the official unemployment rate, but is usually a few points higher. The experts we interviewed didn’t object to Gingrich’s concern about the health of the economy. In general, labor market measures have improved significantly from their weakest point in 2010, but the key measurements are "still historically very high and not dropping precipitously," particularly this long after the beginning of the last recession, said George Washington University economist Tara Sinclair. However, we will focus on whether the rise in the U-6 measurement Gingrich cited supports his point about the health of the economy. As it turns out, Gingrich was actually low when he said the current U-6 level is 13.5 percent. The seasonally adjusted figure -- which is the preferred number when comparing the data across months, as Gingrich is doing -- was 13.9 percent in April 2013. Still, the more important factor given his comment is to look at how the number has been moving. And while Gingrich was right that the number went up in April 2013, there’s less to that fact than meets the eye. The statistic rose from 13.8 percent in March to 13.9 percent in April. The experts we interviewed saw two big asterisks in this rise. • A change of one-tenth of a percentage point is not statistically significant. We checked with Bureau of Labor Statistics, and a spokesman told us that the U-6 measure needs to move three-tenths of a percentage point in a month for the change to qualify as statistically significant. The actual change from March to April was one-third of that, meaning that the change is essentially statistical noise. (Obama supporters note: The 0.1 percentage point fall in the unemployment rate from March to April was also statistically insignificant, so you shouldn’t make too much of that statistic either.) • With the exception of April’s number, the U-6 has generally been falling, not rising. In fact, while there were occasional jogs upward, the statistic has been on a pretty steady decline since it peaked at 17.1 in April 2010. The current level of 13.9 percent is now about where it was in December 2008, a month before Obama was inaugurated. Indeed, since January 2013, the statistic has fallen by half a percentage point -- an amount that is statistically significant, unlike April’s small rise. Gingrich’s portrayal of a small increase like April’s as evidence of a worrisome trend amounts to cherry picking. "Kvetching about a 0.1 percentage-point change seems a bit silly in the context of other changes in employment, unemployment, and underemployment published in April’s BLS report," said Gary Burtless, a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution. "The number of payroll jobs increased by 165,000 in April and has increased 635,000 since January. " Burtless agreed that "conditions are improving way too slowly for anyone to think it’s time to break out the champagne," but he added that "it’s ridiculous to suggest April’s employment report contains evidence of a weakening in the trend toward a better job market." Our ruling Gingrich said that if you count the unemployed, underemployed, and those who’ve stopped looking for work, the unemployment rate "actually went up last month to 13.5 percent." Gingrich is correct that the measurement in question did rise. However, that rise was not statistically significant, and it has been more than outweighed by a consistent decline in the numbers over the past three years. On balance, we rate his claim Half True. https://www.sharethefacts.co/share/586dbf1f-5b60-4e69-bdbe-32f6e2f691ac | null | Newt Gingrich | null | null | null | 2013-05-07T16:07:07 | 2013-05-05 | ['None'] |
snes-00041 | Does This Photograph Show a Nude Man Walking the Runway with a Group of Young Girls? | miscaptioned | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/man-walking-runway-girls/ | null | Politics | null | Dan Evon | null | Does This Photograph Show a Nude Man Walking the Runway with a Group of Young Girls? | 25 September 2018 | null | ['None'] |
snes-06381 | Article examines various automobile manufacturers' contributions to September 11-related relief efforts. | mixture | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/automaker-911-contributions/ | null | September 11th | null | David Mikkelson | null | Automaker 9/11 Contributions | 26 October 2001 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-15258 | Says states not directly involved in the gay marriage lawsuits that reached the Supreme Court "are not bound" by the court’s ruling. | mostly false | /texas/statements/2015/jul/31/ted-cruz/ted-cruz-states-not-singled-out-supreme-court-not-/ | The U.S. Supreme Court holds ultimate sway on the laws of the land, yes? Hold on, Ted Cruz said in an interview about the court’s 5-4 decision holding that state bans on gay marriage violate federal principles of equal protection and fair treatment under the law, creating a "grave and continuing harm" to families led by such couples. After the June 26, 2015, ruling, which addressed challenges to state laws in Ohio, Tennessee, Michigan and Kentucky, Cruz said that if a party isn’t directly involved in a dispute before the Supreme Court, it’s not required to comply with the ruling. "Those who are not parties to the suit are not bound by it," Cruz said. A reader asked us to check Cruz’s claim. The Republican senator and presidential aspirant should know about the high court. He argued before the court on Texas’ behalf in a past job as the state’s solicitor general. In the interview, Cruz told Steve Inskeep, who hosts NPR’s Morning Edition program, that the court’s ruling imposed "elitist radical views," short-circuiting the ability of each state to define marriage. Inskeep asked if Cruz would encourage officials who disagree with the ruling to ignore or defy it. State officials "cannot ignore a direct judicial order," Cruz said. "The parties to a case cannot ignore a direct judicial order. But it does not mean that those who are not parties to case are bound by a judicial order." INSKEEP: "Did I understand you to say just now that as you read the law, as you read our system, this decision is not binding on the entire country, only to the specific states that were named in the suit." CRUZ: "Article III of the Constitution gives the court the authority to resolve cases and controversies. Those cases and controversies, when they're resolved, when you're facing a judicial order, the parties to that suit are bound (by) it. Those who are not parties to the suit are not bound by it. Now, in subsequent litigation, other courts will follow the precedence of the court, but a judicial order only binds those to whom it is directed, those who are parties to the suit. That's the way our litigation system works." (See fuller excerpts of this part of the interview here.) We alerted Cruz’s campaign to this fact check and didn’t hear back. Legal experts Separately, several legal experts told us the idea that states not party to the marriage cases weren’t bound by the court’s ruling may have technical merit, but that’s all. Richard Fallon, a Harvard specialist in constitutional law, said by email that under the doctrine of precedent, "any official who failed to issue gay marriage licenses would be sueable for failure to do so, and any court in which the suit was filed would be obliged to follow the Supreme Court’s gay marriage ruling. In the long run, non-compliance thus amounts at most to a delaying tactic. And there are lots of complicated questions about whether officials should regard themselves as obliged to do what they know a court would order them to do if they were sued — even if they are not technically bound by the Supreme Court’s ruling. But on Senator Cruz’s technical point, he is probably correct, if you understand it as being only a very limited, technical point about a delaying tactic." In contrast, Lynn Wardle, a law professor at Brigham Young University who has advocated that the Constitution leaves it to legislators to stipulate who may marry, called Cruz’s statement "precisely correct." Entities not party to a suit are not bound by the resulting judicial order, Wardle said by email, adding: "That’s the way our litigation system works." Only parties before the court are bound by its judgment and orders, Randy Barnett, a professor of legal theory at the Georgetown University Law Center, said by email, but all other courts are bound to follow the court (which Cruz hinted at). So, Barnett wrote, "it is futile for states who are not parties to resist. More importantly, when a ruling is clear, ignoring the Supreme Court's decisions until a court directly orders them to obey undermines the rule of law. Bad people say ‘we won't obey the law until you make us.’ Unless they are engaged in justified civil disobedience — in which case they are liable to be punished — good people follow the law before they are directly commanded." If nonparties to the suits don’t go along with the ruling, he said, "they are postponing the inevitable and flouting the rule of law that was announced by the Court." Stephen Vladeck, an American University law professor, called Cruz’s statement "literally true, but deeply misleading. Technically, the only parties that are bound by a ruling by the Supreme Court are the parties to that litigation — and so, in the context of the marriage cases, the small subset of states whose bans on gay marriage were before the Court. "But the way our system works," Vladeck emailed, "every state and federal court is ultimately subject to the supervision of the Supreme Court at least where federal law is concerned. That’s why those courts generally apply the Constitution as it has been interpreted by the Justices in Washington; if they don’t, they’re likely to be reversed." Asked if Wardle had a point saying Cruz was precisely correct, Vladeck said that read is misleading in that states still have to go along with such a ruling, absent a good-faith reason not to. In the "immediate aftermath of a decision like this one, when there is no reason to think the Supreme Court would answer the question any differently were a different state a party to the suit," Vladeck said, "it’s unreasonable for a state official or state court to decline to follow that ruling. They’re not literally bound to do so (and, thus, can’t be held in contempt for failing to do so), but they are practically bound by dint of the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction." By phone, Susan Sommer, the lead lawyer for Lambda Legal in the suits that reached the Supreme Court, suggested that "only in the very most technical and hair-splitting way could it be said that the Supreme Court’s ruling is not immediately and directly binding on every state government and government official in the country." Sommer said she knows of no legitimate school of thought that could say the ruling doesn’t apply to all the states. "It’s sort-of Law School 101," Sommer said. We also heard back from SCOTUS Blog reporter Lyle Denniston, who’s covered the Supreme Court for more than 50 years. The Constitution’s Article III, Denniston said by email, limits the authority of federal courts to actual cases or controversies, so the outcome is between the actual litigants, as Cruz said. Then again, he said, "the Supreme Court since 1803 (Marbury v. Madison) has claimed the authority to ‘say what the law is’ constitutionally, and its conclusions on what the Constitution means in a given case are made binding across the land, as a result of the reinforcement of its authority by the Supremacy Clause of Article VI" of the Constitution. Denniston further said: "The Supreme Court, in the 1958 decision in Cooper v. Aaron (the Little Rock high school integration case), said explicitly that the combination of the Marbury decision and Article VI made the Supreme Court's decisions binding on the states. That decision, by the way, is the only" one "in history where each of the nine Justices explicitly signed the opinion to give it more force." Article VI says the Constitution shall be the "supreme Law of the Land" with judges bound to it along with legislators and executive and judicial officers, state and federal. Our ruling Cruz said states not directly involved in the gay marriage lawsuits that reached the Supreme Court "are not bound" by the court’s ruling. He has a thread of a point in that only four states were directly involved in the case. But that’s an incomplete answer to the question of whether states could ignore the court’s ruling. Other courts would be bound by the Supreme Court’s precedent, making the ruling applicable throughout the nation. That’s a fact that Cruz alluded to only after being pressed by the interviewer for clarification of his earlier misleading statement. We rate the claim Mostly False. MOSTLY FALSE – The statement contains an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression. Click here for more on the six PolitiFact ratings and how we select facts to check. | null | Ted Cruz | null | null | null | 2015-07-31T14:06:22 | 2015-06-28 | ['None'] |
pomt-09897 | Only about 6.8 percent of the (stimulus) money has actually been spent. | mostly true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2009/jul/15/jon-kyl/sen-jon-kyl-says-only-68-percent-stimulus-has-been/ | One of the most common Republican attack lines against President Barack Obama's $787 billion economic stimulus package has been that the money isn't flowing to the nation's economy quickly enough. If the bill's supporters really wanted to help the economy quickly, the argument goes, they should have spent the stimulus money right away rather than using it on projects that will take more time to get up and running. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., the No. 2 Senate Republican, made that point on ABC's This Week With George Stephanopoulos on July 12, 2009. "The reality is (the stimulus) hasn't helped yet," Kyl told Stephanopoulos. "Only about 6.8 percent of the money has actually been spent." It's a matter of opinion and interpretation whether the stimulus has helped the economy since it passed in February. So we won't rule on that. But Kyl is mostly right about the amount that's been spent. The Obama administration publishes u pdated spending figures on Recovery.gov , the administration's Web site tracking the stimulus money. It includes a graph showing the week-by-week trend in spending, which shows how it has steadily increased. As of July 3, $60.4 billion in stimulus money had been spent, according to the chart. If you divide this by the full stimulus amount of $787 billion, you get 7.7 percent — a bit higher than Kyl's 6.8 percent, but in the ballpark. It appears that Kyl was a few weeks out of date in his statistics. The figure spent by June 19 was 6.7 percent; in the subsequent two weeks of reported data, the government shelled out an additional $7.5 billion, boosting the percentage slightly. But on the larger point, Kyl is accurate: A relatively small portion of the stimulus has been spent. So we find his claim Mostly True. | null | Jon Kyl | null | null | null | 2009-07-15T17:08:59 | 2009-07-12 | ['None'] |
pomt-13278 | Says Syrian refugees are not being vetted, and "the FBI is not even being told where they are." | mostly false | /north-carolina/statements/2016/oct/12/pat-mccrory/mccrory-says-syrian-refugees-not-properly-vetted-o/ | During Tuesday’s debate in the North Carolina governor’s race, Republican Gov. Pat McCrory repeated a questionable claim from the realm of national politics when defending his party’s presidential nominee, Donald Trump. Seven North Carolina cities and towns have received several hundred Syrian refugees since 2014. In total across the country, the U.S. recently took in its 10,000th refugee from the war-torn nation. In the debate, McCrory said we don’t know anything about these newcomers. Trump has previously made the False claim that there is "no system to vet" refugees. Former Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson made a similar Mostly False claim that "there is currently no ability to vet these people." The difference between the two claims was that Trump said there’s no system for vetting refugees, and Carson said we don’t have the ability to vet them. There is certainly a system: It has been in place since 1980 and has been tweaked several times since 9/11. Carson’s claim had a tiny bit more truth to it than Trump’s did because it can be difficult to track down every bit of information about every Syrian refugee, given the violence and destruction there. So where did McCrory land with his own claim? Let’s take a look at the whole thing. Debate moderator Chuck Todd was pressing McCrory and his Democratic challenger, Roy Cooper, about their parties’ presidential candidates. He asked McCrory if Trump was a role model. You can watch the entire exchange here. McCrory said Trump "does stand strong on certain issues that need to be said, especially from outside Washington, D.C. The Syrian refugee situation is a disaster. I personally talked to the FBI – one of the top leaders of the FBI – and they kind of laughed when they said they’re checking the backgrounds of the Syrian refugees. No, they aren’t. There’s no embassy to check. There’s no qualifications. So when Hillary Clinton says they’re doing a vetting process of these Syrian refugees coming into our state, the FBI is not even being told where they are." McCrory’s claim that "no, they aren’t" being vetted is in line with Carson’s Mostly False claim that we don’t have the ability to check the backgrounds of these refugees. And his claim that "the FBI is not even being told where they are" reminds us of a Mostly False claim by Sen. Ted Cruz that "the head of the FBI has told Congress they cannot vet those refugees." Vetting refugees McCrory said at the debate there’s no embassy to help with background checks. But the U.S. does have an embassy in Syria. The Syrian government also had an embassy in the U.S. until 2014, when the U.S. suspended it and began recognizing diplomats for the rebels instead. Regardless, embassies are rarely the first point of contact for refugees. The initial vetting is almost always handled by United Nations workers. That process takes four to 10 months. If refugees pass the U.N. checks and are referred to the U.S., they face additional scrutiny from the FBI and other federal agencies – including in-person interviews, medical screenings and background checks. If they pass they are matched with sponsors, begin taking "cultural orientation" classes and undergo a final security clearance. Then they’re allowed to come to the United States. And that’s just the normal process for refugees from anywhere in the world. Syrian refugees undergo an additional layer of security checks, using classified information. The process typically takes one to two years or longer. The State Department says about half are approved. The system certainly isn’t perfect, since many refugees have fled violence hastily, without all their papers. Officials have also said a lack of U.S. troops on the ground means our knowledge of local terrorists isn’t as complete as in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, which have also sent thousands of refugees to the U.S. "If we don’t know much about somebody, there won’t be anything in our data," FBI Director James Comey told Congress in 2015. "I can’t sit here and offer anybody an absolute assurance that there’s no risk associated with this." But few Syrian refugees fit the typical profile of a terrorist or criminal – only about 2 percent resettled in the U.S. have been young adult men, according to a Washington Post article from 2015. Half have been children, and another quarter have been older than 60. Including the 10,000 Syrian refugees now here, the United States still had almost twice as many refugees a decade ago, under President George W. Bush. The number of refugees and asylum-seekers in the United States peaked in 2006 at 970,000 people. In 2015, there were 560,000. Government awareness We’re not sure why an FBI official might have told McCrory that the agency "is not even being told where they are," but we can fill the governor in. North Carolina is one of the top states for Syrian refugees. Only Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania and Texas have taken in more. As of August North Carolina had 430, according to the conservative group Federation for American Immigration Reform. That group, citing data from the federal government, says there are 102 Syrian refugees in High Point, 83 in Raleigh, 70 in Charlotte, 63 in Durham, 61 in Greensboro, 48 in Winston-Salem and three in New Bern. The FBI does not continue automatically tracking the movements of all Syrian refugees once they pass background checks and settle here – but again, most of the refugees are children or senior citizens. And there is nothing keeping the FBI from tracking suspected terrorists of any nationality or residency status. If a refugee does exhibit red flags after making it through the background checks, the FBI can begin tracking that person. In 2010, the FBI arrested two Iraqi refugees who had been under surveillance for being suspected of trying to smuggle weapons from Kentucky back to Iraq. They were caught handling heavy weapons on camera after being set up in a sting by the FBI. Our ruling McCrory said Syrian refugees aren’t being vetted and that the FBI doesn’t know where they are. The vetting process has faced criticism, but it does exist – leading to the rejection of thousands of applicants and, in many cases, taking more than two years for those who are approved. There are also extensive records of where refugees are initially settled. The FBI does not automatically track all of them once they’re settled, but nothing is stopping agents from tracking refugees who make it through the vetting process but later exhibit signs of extremism – and there are recent examples of the FBI doing exactly that. McCrory distorts the reality of the Syrian refugee system, and we rate this claim Mostly False. https://www.sharethefacts.co/share/7de8d8b9-b87c-4e34-bb1e-d1f3d8813722 | null | Pat McCrory | null | null | null | 2016-10-12T13:17:22 | 2016-10-11 | ['Federal_Bureau_of_Investigation', 'Syria'] |
farg-00480 | “Singer Dolly Parton: ‘Trump in one year is already better than 16 years of Bush, Obama put together.’” | false | https://www.factcheck.org/2018/01/parton-dolly-didnt-praise-trump/ | null | fake-news | FactCheck.org | Saranac Hale Spencer | ['Celebrity'] | Parton Me? Dolly Didn’t Praise Trump | January 30, 2018 | 2018-01-30 17:01:59 UTC | ['Barack_Obama', 'George_W._Bush'] |
pose-01055 | I will ... continue and strengthen the Mayor’s Mentors & More program (now under the St. Pete’s Promise umbrella). | promise kept | https://www.politifact.com/florida/promises/krise-o-meter/promise/1137/continue-and-strengthen-mayors-mentors-more-progra/ | null | krise-o-meter | Rick Kriseman | null | null | Continue and strengthen the Mayor’s Mentors & More program | 2013-12-31T12:17:23 | null | ['None'] |
tron-03663 | Lock bumping-a threat to home or office security | truth! | https://www.truthorfiction.com/bumping/ | null | warnings | null | null | null | Lock bumping-a threat to home or office security | Mar 17, 2015 | null | ['None'] |
vogo-00285 | The Mother of All Pension Fact Checks | none | https://www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/news/the-mother-of-all-pension-fact-checks/ | null | null | null | null | null | The Mother of All Pension Fact Checks | January 12, 2012 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-00704 | If we choose Obamacare expansion, 600,000 will lose eligibility for their subsidies, of which 257,000 would be forced into Medicaid. | mostly true | /florida/statements/2015/apr/30/steve-crisafulli/crisafulli-says-257000-would-be-forced-medicaid-un/ | Even before the Florida House adjourned early, Speaker Steve Crisafulli laid blame for the session’s budget impasse clearly on Medicaid expansion. In an essay printed by the Tampa Bay Times, Crisafulli wrote the Senate had "partnered with the Obama administration" to demand the expansion. But the House believed the move would drag people into a costly system that didn’t work. "Under federal law, other low-income Floridians have access to health care subsidies to buy private insurance for less than the average cost of a wireless phone bill," said Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island. "In fact, if we choose Obamacare expansion, 600,000 will lose eligibility for their subsidies, of which 257,000 would be forced into Medicaid. " Estimates say the expansion would cover more than 800,000 people, many of whom are currently uninsured. We wondered where Crisafulli was getting his numbers. Playing percentages This subject can make heads spin pretty easily, so before we begin, let’s review a few basics about the Affordable Care Act. The law’s intent was to expand coverage to the uninsured through two different ways. The first was to give subsidies to people who needed help to buy insurance through HealthCare.gov or a new state marketplace. The second way was to expand Medicaid, a state-federal insurance program for the very poor. Medicaid expansion ended up being optional for the states, thanks to a 2012 Supreme Court ruling. This is what the Florida House and Senate are arguing about. The Senate wants to expand Medicaid so that recipients end up buying heavily subsidized insurance. The House doesn’t want to expand Medicaid at all. Crisafulli’s numbers are based on how many Floridians would qualify for the expansion, which would be extended to all adults up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level (100 percent is currently $11,770 for an individual and $24,250 for a family of four). Technically the calculation is actually 133 percent under the law, but a 5 percent deduction is added on top of that. If a state doesn’t expand Medicaid, people who make 100 to 400 percent of the poverty level can get subsidies to buy insurance in a marketplace. These are the subsidies Crisafulli is talking about. But if you qualify for Medicaid, you’re not eligible for help paying premiums. His argument is that if the state extends the program, the people between 100 and 133 percent of the federal poverty level (he’s not citing the full 138, you’ll note) will lose their subsidies to buy policies, and the House simply won’t let that happen. Crisafulli is using 2015-16 fiscal year estimates by the Florida Office of Economic and Demographic Research, which we examined ourselves. That projection says there are about 609,000 people in the 100 to 133 percent of poverty level range, and a little more than 351,000 of them have insurance of some kind. They get it through employers, Medicare or some other form of government assistance program, or buy insurance on their own (subsidized or not). Those people could enroll in Medicaid if they wanted to. More than 257,000 have no insurance at all, and these are the ones Crisafulli is saying will be "forced into Medicaid." His office confirmed he meant they will be left without subsidies and will not make enough money to buy policies, so Medicaid will be their only option. What it means The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and health policy experts largely agreed the numbers were plausible, but there are some points they said Crisafulli is sidestepping. Foremost is the idea that 257,000 people would be "forced" to join the program. There is no law that says you have to use Medicaid if you qualify, and not everyone who is currently eligible enrolls. Ben Sommers, a health policy and economics professor at Harvard, said it’s pretty tough for Crisafulli to imply those quarter-million people would be upset by suddenly qualifying for Medicaid. "Giving uninsured people Medicaid is pretty popular among uninsured people," Sommers said. "There aren’t any public opinion surveys I’ve seen in which low-income adults don’t generally support the Medicaid expansion." Crisafulli neglects to mention there are many Floridians who right now don’t qualify for either Medicaid or federal subsidies, an estimated 669,000 people whose income is below 100 percent of federal poverty level. Those uninsured Floridians account for 18 percent of all Americans in the so-called coverage gap -- second only to Texas. They would all benefit from Medicaid expansion by gaining coverage. Finally, Crisafulli is arguing that expanding Medicaid under Obamacare would unfairly take away subsidies that Floridians need to buy their own insurance. Those subsidies are a feature of the very same Affordable Care Act he criticizes. Our ruling Crisafulli said, "If we choose Obamacare expansion, 600,000 will lose eligibility for their subsidies, of which 257,000 would be forced into Medicaid." Crisafulli is using incendiary language to describe state projections about Medicaid expansion. The state estimates that about 609,000 Floridians would lose access to subsidies to buy insurance under an expansion. About 257,000 of those people would be uninsured, likely because they’re too poor to buy their own. The rest could enroll in Medicaid if they wanted to. So his numbers can be considered accurate. But experts tell us saying those people would be forced into the program isn’t accurate. Many of the very poor would likely see becoming eligible for Medicaid as a benefit. We rate the statement Mostly True. | null | Steve Crisafulli | null | null | null | 2015-04-30T14:56:17 | 2015-04-28 | ['None'] |
vees-00337 | VERA FILES FACT SHEET: PH’s war against human trafficking | none | http://verafiles.org/articles/vera-files-fact-sheet-phs-war-against-human-trafficking | null | null | null | null | Human Trafficking,war on drugs,Leila de Lima | VERA FILES FACT SHEET: PH’s war against human trafficking | November 16, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-02983 | All members of Congress are required to be in Obamacare, but Obama and members of his administration "have their own gold-plated health care plans that they're in." | half-true | /wisconsin/statements/2013/oct/21/sean-duffy/obamacare-congress-must-buy-insurance-marketplaces/ | U.S. Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) flashed what appeared to be a self-satisfied smile after his televised quarrel with longtime Washington journalist Andrea Mitchell over the government shutdown and Obamacare. The MSNBC interview on Oct. 8, 2013 occurred one week after health insurance exchanges, now known as marketplaces, opened under President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act. Those marketplaces were created to offer health insurance to individuals who don’t have coverage from employers and who may be eligible for government subsidies to help pay for the coverage. Duffy’s tussle with Mitchell earned him kudos from conservatives and sparked coverage by news outlets in Wisconsin, as well as by Politico, the Huffington Post, Rush Limbaugh and other national media. He argued that if the health care law is so good, Obama and members his administration should have to buy their insurance from the marketplaces just like members of Congress. "Why won't he join us in Obamacare?" Duffy said of the president, before making a reference to the first lady and the president's press secretary. "Why wasn't Michelle Obama on October 1st at the computer with her family signing up for Obamacare, or Jay Carney? They have their own gold-plated health care plan." "So do you," Mitchell interjected. "No. I’m not. I'm in Obamacare, I’m in Obamacare, Andrea; all members of Congress are, and my family," Duffy replied. "The president should join us in Obamacare and the rest of America. Is that pretty reasonable? We should be all be treated equally under the law. Why should members of Congress be in Obamacare and not the president? Explain that one. Isn’t that fair? Can you defend that? Can you defend why the president shouldn’t be in Obamacare like members of Congress and their staffs?" Duffy essentially repeated his claim Oct. 16, 2013 on MSNBC’s "Morning Joe" show. Is Duffy right that members of Congress are required to buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act's marketplaces, while Obama and his staff can keep their "their own gold-plated health care plan"? Congress So many people have said Congress is exempt from Obamacare that in September 2013, PolitiFact National made the claim, rated False, one of its top 16 myths about the health care law. For many years, members of Congress chose from a variety of insurance plans offered by the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, which serves 8 million federal and retired workers and their dependents. So, members of Congress were like most Americans, covered through their employer with the employer picking up most of the tab. That will end in January 2014, when lawmakers and some of their staff will be required under the health care law to pick from plans in the health care law’s new marketplaces. They are the only Americans facing this requirement, although Uncle Sam will still continue to pick up most of the cost. (Factcheck.org and The Washington Post Fact Checker have also debunked the Congress-is-exempt claim.) The requirement for Congress became part of the law after Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) in 2009 offered an amendment that required lawmakers to get their health care through the marketplaces. A version of the amendment was adopted. So, Duffy is correct on the first part of his claim, that members of Congress must, under the Affordable Care Act, purchase insurance through the law's marketplaces. President Obama and members of his administration and their families will continue to get their health insurance through the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program. But it's not "their own" plan, as Duffy claimed; it's the same plan that covers millions of other federal employees. In other words, they will be like most Americans who get their health insurance through an employer -- nothing will change. In fact, despite Duffy's reference to "the rest of America" joining Congress in the marketplace, the vast majority of Americans will continue to be covered through employers, not purchasing insurance from the marketplaces. Rather than being "gold-plated," the federal health insurance is roughly comparable to what members of Congress will be able to buy in the marketplaces, according to three health care reform experts we consulted: Timothy Jost, law professor at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va.; professor Sabrina Corlette of Georgetown University’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms; and Michael Tanner, senior fellow at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. "It’s a good plan," Tanner said of the federal health insurance, "but it’s roughly the equivalent" of choices available in the marketplaces. Plans available in the marketplace range from "bronze," which has the lowest premiums and pays 60 percent of the total medical costs of everyone in the plan, to "platinum," which has the highest premiums and pays 90 percent. (A fifth category, "catastrophic," is available to people under 30 years old and to some people with very low incomes.) Members of Congress, however, are required under the health care law to choose from among 112 "gold-level" plans, which pay 80 percent of the total costs. By way of comparison, the most common plan chosen in the program offered to all other federal employees is a Blue Cross plan, which pays closer to 90 percent. Our rating Duffy said: All members of Congress are required to be in Obamacare, but Obama and members of his administration "have their own gold-plated health care plans that they're in." Members of Congress will have to buy their health insurance from marketplaces created as part of the health reform law, while the president and members of his administration can keep the coverage they get from the federal government. But the federal offerings are roughly comparable to what Congress can buy in the marketplaces, not vastly superior. For a statement that is partially accurate but leaves out important details, Duffy gets a Half True. To comment on this item, go to the Journal Sentinel's web page. | null | Sean Duffy | null | null | null | 2013-10-21T05:00:00 | 2013-10-08 | ['Barack_Obama', 'United_States_Congress', 'Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act'] |
pomt-00642 | Says Thomas Jefferson said "that government is best which governs least." | false | /wisconsin/statements/2015/may/19/scott-walker/scott-walker-says-it-was-thomas-jefferson-who-utte/ | On his personal Twitter account, Gov. Scott Walker has been posting a number of tweets lately that espouse conservative principles. Some of the most recent ones were "Stop the spending" messages, with pictures of President Barack Obama, as well as Ronald Reagan quotes and a pro-gun rights sentiment. (There was also a tweet with a math error -- which was quickly criticized and corrected -- saying "It's hard to believe that it has been 505 years since the first settlers arrived at Jamestown." The tweet referred to 1607, so it should have been 408 years.) A tweet Walker posted May 14, 2015 caught our attention. A graphic image attached to the tweet said: "That government is best which governs least. -- Thomas Jefferson." And the text of the tweet itself read: "Thomas Jefferson said it best. Retweet if you agree that we need a smaller, more conservative government." That might sound like Jefferson. But it’s not. In September 2014, PolitiFact Georgia checked a similar claim by U.S. Rep. Jody Hice, R-Georgia, who at the time was running for the seat he now holds. Hice attributed this quote to Jefferson in a tweet: "That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves." Our colleagues rated Hice’s claim False. "That sounds like something that he might have said or written, but in fact, he did not," Anna Berkes, the research librarian at the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, said at the time. Meanwhile, the quote Walker used is so often misattributed to Jefferson that it appears on the "Spurious quotations" page of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation’s website. That page says of the quote: "Although the ideas expressed in this quotation may be in line with Jefferson's opinions to some extent, the exact phrasing is almost certainly not Jefferson's. However, this quotation has been associated with the ideological descendants of Jefferson's Democratic-Republican party for a very long time, and this is likely why it ultimately came to be attributed to him." Berkes told PolitiFact Georgia that the quote used by Walker has also been attributed to Henry David Thoreau. But she said research indicates Thoreau was likely quoting the United States Magazine and Democratic Review, where the sentiment first appeared in 1837. Berkes told us that she has done some further research and it's still clear the quote isn't Jefferson's. We also found that "Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations" also attributes the quote to the United States Magazine and Democratic Review. Our rating Walker said it was Thomas Jefferson who said "that government is best which governs least." While it may match closely with Jefferson’s views, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation lists the quote as one of the many that are mistakenly attributed to Jefferson. We rate Walker’s statement False. | null | Scott Walker | null | null | null | 2015-05-19T10:21:22 | 2015-05-14 | ['None'] |
snes-04350 | Hillary Clinton's running mate Tim Kaine stepped aside as DNC chair in 2011 to allow Clinton supporter Debbie Wasserman Schultz to take the job spot in exchange for a slot on the 2016 ticket; in October 2016, | mixture | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/tim-kaine-dnc-deal/ | null | Ballot Box | null | Kim LaCapria | null | Tim Kaine Made DNC Vice Presidential Deal with Hillary Clinton in 2011 | 29 July 2016 | null | ['Bill_Clinton', 'Democratic_National_Committee', 'Debbie_Wasserman_Schultz', 'Hillary_Rodham_Clinton'] |
goop-01801 | Britney Spears “Wedding And A Baby” Claim Tru | 1 | https://www.gossipcop.com/britney-spears-wedding-baby-not-true/ | null | null | null | Shari Weiss | null | Britney Spears “Wedding And A Baby” Claim NOT True | 9:57 pm, January 17, 2018 | null | ['None'] |
thal-00141 | Claim: Niall Collins personally got ICTU’s full support for Fianna Fáil’s approach to the Banded Hours Contract bill. | mostly false | http://www.thejournal.ie/fianna-fail-niall-collins-banded-hour-contracts-ictu-sinn-fein-factcheck-2868658-Jul2016/ | null | null | null | null | null | FactCheck: Did Fianna Fáil REALLY get union support for their zero hour contracts plan? | Jul 8th 2016, 9:50 PM | null | ['None'] |
hoer-00254 | 'Australian Cash and Prize Giveaways' Facebook Page | facebook scams | https://www.hoax-slayer.com/australian-cash-and-prize-giveaways-facebook-scam.shtml | null | null | null | Brett M. Christensen | null | LIKE-FARMING SCAM - 'Australian Cash and Prize Giveaways' Facebook Page | May 1, 2014 | null | ['None'] |
snes-00790 | A video shows a sunbather catching a snake moments before it bites her. | miscaptioned | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/did-a-sunbather-catch-a-cobra-bare-hands/ | null | Fauxtography | null | Dan Evon | null | Did a Sunbather Catch a Cobra with Her Bare Hands? | 9 April 2018 | null | ['None'] |
tron-02623 | Chicago Woman Buried Alive | fiction! | https://www.truthorfiction.com/chicago-woman-buried-alive/ | null | miscellaneous | null | null | null | Chicago Woman Buried Alive | Mar 17, 2015 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-08010 | We had an amendment in the health care law that said the federal government is going to take over education. | false | /florida/statements/2011/jan/11/allen-west/west-says-feds-are-going-take-over-education/ | You've heard the one about the "federal government takeover" of health care, but how about the feds taking over education? U.S. Rep. Allen West, a Republican from South Florida who took office Jan. 5, 2011, has a beef with government takeovers. On Fox News Jan. 2, West said (around page 3 of the transcript): "When you look at the things that happen in our country and the nationalization of so much of our production -- being it an automobile industry, being it a health care industry, being the fact that we had an amendment in the health care law that said the federal government is going to take over education." A day later, this time on CNN, he again spoke critically about health care legislation connected to a change in education loans. In response to a question by host John King related to jobs and health care, West said: "But this health care law is tied to jobs because when you look at the 52-employee rule, a lot of people are not going to have more than 52 employees because of the threat of the high cost. And we also see that insurance premiums are already going up for Americans. Look, you know if we're talking about improving health care, that does not mean 11 new taxes. That does not mean 159 new government agencies or bureaucracies. It does not mean 16,000 new IRS agents. "And I'm waiting for someone to explain to me what does government control of college education loans have to do with health care, which was part of that law. So there are some things that we need to carefully examine and we need to come up with a right, free market, free enterprise-based solution that looks at the cost analysis of health care and not just a simple government expansion." For this Truth-O-Meter we wanted to know what West was referring to about "an amendment in the health care law that said the federal government is going to take over education." And is he right about a takeover? "Takeover" is a hot-button word But first, some background from PolitiFact about that other big alleged "government takeover:" PolitiFact editors and reporters -- as well as readers -- chose "government takeover of health care" as the Lie of the Year for 2010. According to a PolitiFact article published Dec. 16, 2010, "a 'Government Takeover' conjures a European approach where the government owns the hospitals and the doctors are public employees. But the law Congress passed, parts of which have already gone into effect, relies largely on the free market." Employers will still provide insurance through private companies, the government did not nationalize doctors or seize hospitals, and ultimately there was no public option -- a proposed government-run plan. With that reminder of the health care takeover myth, let's return to West's claim about the federal government taking over education. On Jan. 6, we contacted West spokeswoman Angela Sachitano and asked her to explain what amendment West was referring to and how it constituted an education takeover. Health care link to student loans We also did some research to look for a connection between government control of college education loans and the 2010 health care bill. We found some background from updates posted March 6, 2009, and April 5, 2010, on the Obameter, PolitiFact's website tracking promises made by President Barack Obama. The promise Obama had made was to "eliminate wasteful subsidies to private student lenders, which will save nearly $6 billion dollars per year, and invest the savings in additional student aid." The Obameter wrote in 2009: "There are basically two kinds of college loan programs: the Federal Family Education Loan Program, in which private lenders make and secure loans to students and receive subsidies from the federal government, and the William D. Ford Direct Loan Program, in which the federal government directly loans to students. Obama's plan is to shift student lending away from the private loans to the government's direct loan program, which he believes is more efficient and cost-effective." On April 5, 2010, the Obameter wrote: "Congress ultimately decided against cutting the program through the 2010 budget bill, but it was more forthcoming the second time around. On March 30, 2010, Obama signed legislation -- which was part of the health care bill -- that replaces the private lending program with 100 percent direct lending, effective July 1, 2010." In addition to the two updates on the Obameter, PolitiFact's Truth-O-Meter on April 21, 2010, summarized the cost savings of the change in the student loans: "The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, which analyzes the fiscal impact of legislation, has said the student-lending changes will save the government nearly $61 billion in the 10-year period. The office estimates that of those savings, $36 billion will go to Pell grants, $2.2 billion to assist colleges historically serving blacks or other minorities, and $750 million to other college-access grants." The Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, which Obama signed into law March 30, 2010, included a portion on "Student Loan Reform" -- read the Congressional Research Service Summary to learn more about that portion of the bill. On Jan. 7, Sachitano sent us a copy of a March 21, 2010, New York Times article about the House voting to revamp the student loan program as part of the reconciliation bill that included the health care law. Nothing in the article suggests that the move was a federal government "takeover" of education. The article did state that: "Private banks lobbied against the student loan changes, which eliminate a long-flowing source of revenue for them." Higher ed experts weigh in We spoke with three experts on higher education and all concluded that the changes in the loan program did not constitute the federal government taking over education. We spoke to Terry Hartle, vice president of the division of government and public affairs at the American Council on Education; Barry Toiv, vice president for public affairs at the Association of American Universities; and Stephanie Brown, associate vice president for enrollment and student services at Nova Southeastern University in Broward County. Part of West's Congressional District 22 lies in Broward. Hartle gave us more history of the federal student loan program. When that program started in 1965, banks provided student loans that were guaranteed by the federal government. In 1993, then-President Bill Clinton said it didn't make sense for the government to subsidize banks to make loans to students and it would be better for the government to make loans directly to students. Congress didn't want to do away with the loan program involving private banks but did agree to add a direct federal loan program. Two programs co-existed for many years -- until the reconciliation act in 2010. "Very few students will notice any difference in their loans because of the change," Hartle said. "They are filling out the same loan application -- it just goes to a different post office box. The loan -- once it is made -- is not held by SunTrust, CitiBank or Bank of America; the loan is held by the U.S. Department of Education. The Department of Education will hire contractors who might be Bank of America, CitiBank or SuntTrust to manage the portfolio of loans. It's much cheaper for the Department of Education to make student loans this way than to make it through the banks." Colleges will notice some differences -- the financial aid employees are now dealing with the federal Department of Education rather than several banks. "From campus officials I've talked to, it's not that big a difference," Hartle said. "The vast majority of college presidents I talk to said it makes no difference to them, they didn't incur significantly higher costs ... and frankly the implementation was remarkably smooth." Said Toiv, of AAU and a former deputy press secretary under President Clinton, in an interview Jan. 7: The change to the loan programs "didn't take banks out of the program completely because the private sector still administers the loans for the Department of Education. However it did take out the part of the program where banks were the actual lenders. Opponents of this did refer to it as a federal 'takeover' of student lending. The proponents did not refer to it that way mainly because it's always been a federal program." While this changed work responsibilities for some employees in financial aid offices at universities, "This has no impact at all on the management of colleges and universities," Toiv said. Brown, at Nova, agreed in a Jan. 7 interview, saying it's not a takeover and the process is actually simpler for students who don't have to research multiple lenders anymore. We sent Sachitano an e-mail Jan. 7 to tell her that our experts did not describe this as a government takeover and to ask whether she had additional proof to back up West's claim. She replied: "No, we're good." Our ruling Has the government seized control of education? West said: "We had an amendment in the health care law that said the federal government is going to take over education." This is the same type of overblown "takeover" rhetoric that led to our 2010 Lie of the Year award. The federal government was a major player in student loans for years before Obama signed the health care law. And the law does not mean that colleges and universities are now under the control or management of the federal government. We rate this claim False. | null | Allen West | null | null | null | 2011-01-11T11:20:06 | 2011-01-02 | ['None'] |
snes-03324 | No celebrities are willing to perform for Trump's inauguration. | unproven | https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/no-celebrities-will-perform-at-trump-inauguration/ | null | Entertainment | null | Bethania Palma | null | No Celebrities Will Perform at Trump Inauguration? | 16 December 2016 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-06223 | Says Newt Gingrich is responsible for the gridlocked politics of Washington. | half-true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2011/dec/05/david-axelrod/david-axelrod-calls-newt-gingrich-godfather-gridlo/ | During an interview on the Dec. 5, 2011, edition of MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown, David Axelrod, a senior campaign adviser to President Barack Obama, coined a new description for Republican presidential candidate and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich: "the godfather of gridlock." Discussing a newly released Gingrich ad that portrays the former speaker in a soft light, Axelrod told host Chuck Todd that he was amused by the ad "because he talked about (how) he was going to bring the country together to solve problems. You're talking about the godfather of gridlock here, the guy who two decades ago really invented the kind of tactics that have now become commonplace in Washington. So, this is a whole new Newt." We wondered whether it was really fair to pin today’s policy gridlock on tactics engineered by Gingrich. So we sought comments from historians, political scientists and other political observers. We thought analyzing this quote might prove too subjective, but we found concrete evidence to both bolster and undermine Axelrod's claim. Gingrich the fighter Some historians and analysts say Gingrich's bare-knuckled tactics created a sharp partisanship that continues today. Gingrich came to national attention when he led a group of fellow backbenchers to challenge the ethics of House Speaker Jim Wright, D-Texas. Their challenge led Wright to resign in 1989, driving the ousted speaker to decry the "mindless cannibalism" consuming Congress. It was a watershed moment for Gingrich, and only solidified his belief that confrontation, not compromise, was what Congress needed. Beginning in 1989, Gingrich bided his time as House minority whip, serving under a more conciliatory Republican leader, Bob Michel of Illinois. By 1993 and 1994, -- when a Democratic president, Bill Clinton, was in the White House and the 40-year Democratic House majority was looking shaky -- Gingrich upped the ante. "The Republican strategy in 1993 and 1994 was to vote as a parliamentary minority, in unison against the new president's initiatives, and that was as much or more Newt's idea as anybody's," said Norm Ornstein, a congressional scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. "Clinton's economic program, his first big initiative, took almost eight months to pass, denying him a big early victory and making the eventual passage look like a humiliation. The same approach had success with a crime bill and, of course, with health care reform." Michel’s impending retirement cleared the way for Gingrich to become speaker if the GOP managed to take over the House in the 1994 election. And they did. Once in office, Gingrich continued his confrontational strategy, most notably in the budget fights of 1995 that led to shutdowns of the federal government. Purdue University political scientist Bert A. Rockman cited Gingrich's "defamatory misuse of the C-SPAN morning one-minute diatribes to an empty chamber, his over-the-top-rhetoric and his dogged pursuit of Clinton’s impeachment. It’s become much worse, and for reasons hardly exclusive to any individual’s nastiness, but Newt was a major contributor to the nastiness that prevails today." Gingrich developed wedge issues to divide the Democratic majority and magnets to pull voters into the Republican orbit, said Steve Gillon, a historian at the University of Oklahoma and author of The Pact: Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich, and the Rivalry that Defined a Generation. University of Kansas political scientist Burdett Loomis argues that Gingrich’s attacks on Congress itself have harmed the institution in the long term. Though Gingrich is a historian by training, Loomis said, he "ignored the importance of maintaining (Congress’) legitimacy, which has haunted us since." Gingrich the deal-maker But Loomis and others also say Gingrich's legacy is not black and white. After Gingrich lost the public relations war over the shutdown to Clinton, he became more willing to compromise with his rival. "What Axelrod's comment does not account for is the change that took place in Gingrich after the 1995 budget battle," Gillon said. "Both Clinton and Gingrich realized they had more to gain by working together than they did by fighting each other. Both men saw their poll numbers rise." This period of cooperation lasted until the emergence of the Monica Lewinsky affair in 1998, which Gingrich played a significant role in promoting. So what did Clinton and Gingrich accomplish during this era of (relatively) good feelings? Here are a few notable bills, each of which passed with broad, bipartisan majorities. Telecommunications Act, 1996 -- described by the Federal Communications Commission as "the first major overhaul of telecommunications law in almost 62 years." The House passed the final version of the bill by a 414-16 margin, with 236 Republicans and 178 Democrats supporting it. Welfare reform, 1996 -- a landmark bill to end cash payments and instead encourage recipients to find work. The House passed the final version of the bill by a 328-101 margin, with 230 Republicans and 98 Democrats. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, 1996 -- a law that allowed people to change jobs without fearing the loss of their health insurance due to pre-existing conditions, as well as provisions dealing with health information privacy. The House passed the final version of the bill by a 421-2 margin, with 227 Republicans and 193 Democrats. Taxpayer Relief Act, 1997 -- which established a child tax credit, tuition tax credits, and penalty-free withdrawals from IRAs for education expenses and first-home purchases, as well as a decrease in the capital gains tax and limitations on the estate tax. The House passed the final version of the bill by a 389-43 margin, with 225 Republicans and 164 Democrats. Balanced Budget Act, 1997 -- a bill that cut spending in order to balance the budget by fiscal year 2002. The House passed the final version of the bill by a 346-85 margin, with 193 Republicans and 153 Democrats. At the presidential bill-signing ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House, Gingrich called for "‘bipartisan leadership across the planet" to put aside party differences and address other nagging problems that, like the deficit, worry the public," the Washington Times reported. "‘We will meet the moral integrity test in peacetime of not spending our children's and grandchildren's money," he said. "We have a chance over the next three and a half years to work together . . . to accomplish a lot.’" "Overall, Newt’s four years as speaker can be characterized as gridlock followed by greased wheels," said Donald Wolfensberger, who served as the Republican staff director of the influential House Rules Committee before and during Gingrich’s tenure as speaker. Wolfensberger is now director of the Congress Project at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Alan Abramowitz, an Emory University political scientist, agreed, and added that the Senate -- long the home of blocked nomination hearings and a filibuster rule that allows one senator to stand in the way of legislation -- has been at least as much a force for gridlock in Washington as the House. "The Senate deserves far more blame for gridlock than the House," Abramowitz said. So Gingrich has been more of a prince of partisanship than a godfather of gridlock. Axelrod "is mixing up apples and oranges," said John Feehery, a longtime House Republican spokesman who worked under then-House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., among others. "Intense partisanship does not necessarily lead to gridlock, and gridlock is not necessarily the result of partisanship." Gillon, who wrote the book on the Clinton-Gingrich relationship, calls the former speaker "a very complicated figure. He is a man who will use the most ruthless methods in order to gain power, but who can be restrained, creative, and bipartisan once he has power... The political people in the Clinton White House viewed Gingrich as the antichrist. But many of the policy people – Chief of Staff Leon Panetta, domestic policy adviser Bruce Reed, Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles – painted a portrait of a pragmatic, though temperamental, policymaker." Our ruling So while Gingrich was sharply partisan, there are solid examples where he short-circuited gridlock to push bills to enactment. On balance, we rate Axelrod’s statement Half True. | null | David Axelrod | null | null | null | 2011-12-05T18:19:19 | 2011-12-05 | ['Washington,_D.C.'] |
pose-00463 | Will re-commit federal resources to public mass transportation projects across the country. Obama and Biden will work with state and local governments across the country on efforts to create new, effective public transportation systems and modernize our aging urban public transit infrastructure. | promise kept | https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/promise/483/invest-in-public-transportation/ | null | obameter | Barack Obama | null | null | Invest in public transportation | 2010-01-07T13:27:00 | null | ['Barack_Obama', 'Joe_Biden'] |
pomt-07329 | About two-thirds of Medicaid beneficiaries are children, but they account for one-third of the program’s cost, while one-third are elderly, and they account for two-thirds of the cost. | mostly false | /truth-o-meter/statements/2011/may/12/sherrod-brown/sherrod-brown-says-elderly-account-two-thirds-medi/ | During a May 10, 2011, interview on MSNBC, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, defended Medicaid from a Republican proposal to change the structure of the federal-state health insurance program for the poor. MSNBC’s Cenk Uygur asked Brown whether the Democrats will have "as much passion and fight in defending Medicaid" as they have on criticizing GOP proposals to overhaul Medicare for those currently under 55 years of age. Brown said Democrats would fight just as hard. "It's a nonstarter," he said. "It hurts two groups of people. It hurts poor kids. … About two-thirds of Medicaid beneficiaries are children. They are only one-third of the cost, because kids don't get sick as much. The other part of Medicaid is seniors, many of them in nursing homes, low-income, moderate-income seniors who don't have a lot of assets. That's about a third of the individuals in Medicaid but two-thirds of the costs, because … it costs more to take care of a senior than a child. "So they are going after young -- they`re going after poor children and low-income, moderate-income, low-asset, if you will, seniors," Brown concluded. "And that ain`t going to work either because the public gets it." We wondered whether Brown had the numbers right -- that two-thirds of Medicaid beneficiaries are children, but they account for one-third of the program’s cost, while one-third are elderly, and they account for two-thirds of the cost. We turned to statistics produced by the federal agency that runs Medicaid -- the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. First, we’ll look at the figures that break down who enrolls in the program. Table IV.8 here offers two different measurements -- average monthly enrollment and individual enrollees on an annual basis. Since the numbers are similar, we’ll make things simpler and choose the latter yardstick. All told, 68.2 million individuals used Medicaid in 2010. Of that 5.8 million were "aged" -- 65 and older -- while 33.9 million were children. An additional 9 million are counted separately as recipients of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program of SCHIP. (Children are the predominant beneficiaries of SCHIP, though this figure also includes some adults covered under waivers; we’ll ignore that in our calculations.) So 8.5 percent of Medicaid's beneficiaries are aged, and 63 percent are children. That means Brown is quite close on the percentage of beneficiaries who are children, but too low for the percentage of beneficiaries who are elderly. If Brown had adjusted his statement to "elderly, blind or disabled," he would have been closer. Adding those categories together gets the figure to 24 percent, although even that’s well below the one-third Brown stated. Now, we’ll look at expenditures, using data from Table II.4 here. The most recent data is from 2007. The table shows that 20.7 percent of Medicaid payments were made for beneficiaries age 65 and over, while 19.4 percent supported children. Both numbers are well below what Brown said. He’d said that the elderly account for two-thirds of the cost, when in fact they’re just over 20 percent, and that children account for one-third, when they’re actually less than 20 percent. The biggest complicating factor is that the single largest category of payments -- 43.3 percent -- is for those who are blind or disabled. Because the statistics are not broken down by age, we can’t be sure what the final distribution is. However, if Brown had adjusted his statement to "elderly, blind or disabled," he would have been close to correct about payments. The combined category would be 64 percent, just under the two-thirds he cited in the interview. When we asked Brown’s office for further information about the senator’s claim, his spokeswoman said that Brown had intended to combine "elderly, blind or disabled" into one category but failed to use the more inclusive description on camera. She said he has made that point in the past when responding to constituent letters on the issue. Even when Brown leaves out blind and disabled beneficiaries from the calculation, he still has a point, said Henry Aaron of the centrist-to-liberal Brookings Institution. Brown’s underlying point is that the elderly account for a disproportionate share of Medicaid’s costs. By our strictest accounting, elderly beneficiaries are 8.5 percent of those served but account for 20.7 percent of payments -- a cost burden two and a half times the size of their numbers. "The central point, not widely understood, is correct: Although kids account for most of the enrollment, the elderly and disabled account for most of the cost," Aaron said. "That difference -- enrollments vs. cost -- is the key point, and he has that right." In the midst of a television interview, Brown erred in recounting Medicaid’s statistics, oversimplifying figures on both enrollment and costs. In reality, elderly beneficiaries by themselves account for nowhere close to the two-thirds of Medicaid’s costs that Brown suggested. His point that spending on the elderly is disproportionate to their numbers is valid, and he would have been close to accurate if he’d said the "elderly, blind and disabled," as his office said he had intended to. Still, the numbers viewers heard were mostly incorrect, so we rate Brown’s statement Barely True. Editor's note: This statement was rated Barely True when it was published. On July 27, 2011, we changed the name for the rating to Mostly False. | null | Sherrod Brown | null | null | null | 2011-05-12T17:38:14 | 2011-05-10 | ['None'] |
pomt-07479 | For every [coyote] they kill, the population will replace and usually multiply. | mostly true | /rhode-island/statements/2011/apr/15/online-petition/petition-claims-killing-individual-coyotes-doesnt-/ | Coyotes have people howling mad on Aquidneck Island. Middletown residents recently packed a meeting to tell town officials how alarmed they are by coyotes boldly stalking neighborhoods, leaping fences into backyards and snatching beloved pets. Action is needed, they demanded, before one of the notoriously sly predators maims or kills a small child. But the solution that the residents convinced the town to approve April 4 -- enlisting the services of a hunter to kill coyotes -- has infuriated others. Several hundred residents have signed a petition opposing the plan. "The Town of Middletown has hired a hunter to begin a systematic mass killing of the coyotes," the petition reads. "What they do not take into consideration is that for every one they kill, the population will replace and usually multiply the numbers," reads the petition. That second part sounded so counter-intuitive -- after all, didn’t we hunt buffalo and wolves to near extinction? -- that we decided to look into it. But first we have to dispense with the statement about the "mass killing" of coyotes in Middletown. As far as we know, no one has suggested that the goal is to kill huge numbers of coyotes. At the April 4 meeting, Police Chief Anthony Pesare said the town would hire just one hunter to target coyotes that have lost their fear of humans. The hunter, he said, would be teamed up with Numi Mitchell, who since 2005 has been running the Narragansett Bay Coyote Study. Had we run this statement through the Truth-O-Meter, it would have rated a False ruling. But we were more interested in the petition’s claim that killing coyotes just leads the animals to "replace and usually multiply the numbers." First we called Shana Gaines, a Newport woman and vintage clothing store owner, who started the petition. She said she based the text on remarks by Mitchell, whose team has been placing radio collars on coyotes and tracking them to better understand their habits. Mitchell, after confirming her advisory role in the Middletown initiative, referred us to several research studies, including those by Frederick F. Knowlton, who spent 45 years studying coyotes and other wildlife with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Service and as a professor at Utah State University. His work, much of it relating to coyote attacks on livestock, is commonly cited in scientific papers. "Local population reduction can provide temporary relief to sheep operators, but only until the local coyote population compensates for the removals and fills vacant territories. … Population reduction as a management option usually requires annual reapplications due to the reproductive capabilities and ease of movement of coyotes," he and his co-authors wrote in one 1999 paper. Kim Murray Berger, another researcher who has studied coyotes, wolves and other predators, wrote in a 2006 paper that although systematic campaigns to kill predators have "threatened" such species as wolves, coyotes "have shown remarkable resilience." The scientific explanation that is commonly given is intriguing. "It’s called responsive reproduction," said Christine Schadler, a wild-canid ecologist and teacher who is the New England representative for the advocacy group Project Coyote. "It seems very mysterious. How can you shoot and shoot and shoot and wind up with more? It doesn’t seem intuitive at all." But here’s what happens, she said. Coyotes typically live in a pack that stakes out, and protects, a territory. Packs are led by an alpha male and female, which are the only breeders among the group. When stressed by a limited amount of food, the females produce litters with fewer pups. But when the size of a pack is reduced, there’s more food for each individual. And breeding becomes more prolific. Their numbers bounce back in a year or two, she said. Coyotes have expanded from western parts of the country, despite attempts to reduce their numbers there, and spread to the East, taking advantage of the decline in wolf populations, a natural territorial competitor. "In a hundred years of trying to control the coyotes, all we’ve done is create millions more," Schadler said. "There’s not a scientific article that can dispute that." A New Hampshire sheep raiser, Schadler "educates" the local coyote pack to feel threatened by humans -- in ways that are not harmful to the animals. That, along with good fences and other deterrents, has prevented her from losing any sheep. All experts on coyotes caution against intentionally or unintentionally providing coyotes a source of food. We searched for someone who might argue that killing coyotes can reduce populations. We called Wildlife Services, a federal agency within the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The office readily acknowledges overseeing the killing of tens of thousands of coyotes every year, much to the chagrin of wildlife advocates. But even Carol Bannerman, a spokeswoman for the agency, would not advocate killing coyotes simply to reduce populations. The agency responds to complaints of damage being caused by coyotes, such as livestock losses, with an "integrated management plan" that emphasizes non-lethal methods to ward off coyotes. Where does that leave us? Bannerman, Middletown officials and Mitchell all appear to embrace the idea, to some degree, that the targeted killing of coyotes too comfortable around humans can help deal with isolated problems. "This is just a short-term solution for a couple of individual coyotes," Mitchell said. Knowlton, the Utah expert, said local reduction programs can provide temporary relief from coyote problems. But, in general, wildlife advocates and scientific studies maintain that coyotes are such prolific breeders that trying to lower their numbers by killing them is ineffective. So it appears the petition, apart from the "mass killing" falsehood, wasn’t feeding us a pack of lies after all. We rate the claim about coyotes replenishing their numbers Mostly True. | null | Online petition | null | null | null | 2011-04-15T00:00:01 | 2011-04-08 | ['None'] |
pomt-05327 | Says President Barack Obama’s finance team is recommending a "1% tax on all transactions at any financial institution." | pants on fire! | /new-jersey/statements/2012/may/16/chain-email/barack-obama-advisers-recommend-one-percent-fee-al/ | Social Security beneficiaries beware: an e-mail hitting local inboxes claims President Barack Obama backs a scheme to tax your monthly check. But the online missive falls short on facts. "President Obama's finance team is recommending a one percent (1%) transaction fee (TAX). Obama's plan is to sneak it in after the November elections to keep it under the radar," the e-mail, which was sent to PolitiFact New Jersey on May 12, said. "This is a 1% tax on all transactions at any financial institution - banks, credit unions, savings and loans, etc. Any deposit you make, or even a transfer within your own bank from one account to another, will have a 1% tax charged." "If your paycheck or your Social Security or whatever is direct deposit, it will get a 1% tax charged for the transaction," the e-mail claims. Don’t empty your bank accounts and plan a life off the grid quite yet. Neither the president nor his financial team are recommending such a measure, PolitiFact New Jersey found. The idea comes from a Pennsylvania congressman’s proposal. U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah, a Democrat, first advanced the concept in the House in 2004 when he introduced a bill that would have required a study on eliminating all federal taxes on individuals and corporations and replacing that revenue stream with transaction fees. The bill had no co-sponsors and died in committee. Fattah introduced similar legislation several times after his first attempt calling for a study. Only one of those bills gained a co-sponsor, but none of them made it out of committee. In 2010, Fattah ditched the calls for a study and introduced a bill -- called the "Debt Free America Act" -- to implement a one-percent transaction fee on "any transaction that uses a payment instrument, including any check, cash, credit card, transfer of stock, bonds, or other financial instrument." Any transactions involving stocks were excluded from the fee. With the fee, the bill "intended to raise sufficient revenue to eliminate the national debt" and "phase out the income tax on individuals." The Debt Free America Act is the legislation the e-mail claims Obama and his financial team are recommending, though it’s the work of one congressman and the proposal never left committee. Since the e-mail, a version of which PolitiFact Rhode Island deemed Pants on Fire in November 2010, started circulating, Fattah reintroduced the legislation. The most recent bill, introduced in March 2011, still applies a one-percent transaction fee, but excludes personal bank account transactions in addition to transactions involving stocks. It has no co-sponsors and was again referred to committee, where it remains. Our ruling An e-mail claims that the president’s finance team recommends a "1% tax on all transactions at any financial institution." That’s ridiculous. A Pennsylvania congressman has sponsored a bill that would levy a one-percent fee on some financial transactions. But nearly every year he has introduced the legislation it gained no support. And none of the bills have ever left committee. Obama -- and his financial team -- have nothing to do with the legislation. We set this e-mail claim ablaze. Pants on Fire! To comment on this story, go to NJ.com. | null | Chain email | null | null | null | 2012-05-16T07:30:00 | 2012-05-12 | ['None'] |
pomt-07505 | Says the Beaumont school district’s superintendent is the highest-paid in the state. | half-true | /texas/statements/2011/apr/11/stefani-carter/texas-rep-stefani-carter-says-beaumont-schools-chi/ | Discussing the state budget with three fellow freshman Texas House members and Texas Tribune editor Evan Smith, Republican Stefani Carter of Dallas said she sees room for cuts in the "administrative side" of the state’s public schools. As an example, she highlighted the Beaumont school district, where, she said, "the superintendent is making $356,000 a year." That prompted Smith, who interviewed the freshmen Feb. 16, to interject: "In fact, among the highest-paid if not the highest-paid school superintendent in the state." Carter agreed: "The highest-paid. And it’s a very tiny school district. So, things are out of whack. ... Superintendents should not be paid a salary increase unless the voters say so." We wondered if the Beaumont school chief’s pay is tops in the state. Carter’s chief of staff, Taurie Randermann, pointed us to the Tribune’s superintendent salary database, which indicates that Beaumont ISD leader Carrol Thomas’ base pay has been the highest in the state for the past three school years. This school year, Thomas’ salary is $347,834, according to the database, which was built with information from the Texas Education Agency. The Tribune’s database also calculates each superintendent’s pay per student. This school year, the Beaumont district has about 20,000 students, which means Thomas’ base pay is about $17 per student. Terry Grier — head of the state’s largest school district, Houston ISD, which has about 200,000 students — earns about $1.50 in salary per pupil. Overall, Grier’s $300,000 salary is the sixth-highest in the state, according to the Tribune database. The $283,412 annual salary of Austin district chief Meria Carstarphen ranks No. 10 on the list. That makes her per-pupil pay about $3 a year. We confirmed the Tribune’s salary information with TEA’s own rankings, current as of October 2010. Agency spokeswoman Debbie Ratcliffe told us that the average annual salary for Texas superintendents is $119,080. But that’s the average in a state with more than 1,000 districts, about 80 percent of which have less than 3,000 students. Mary Barrett, assistant director of compensation services at the Texas Association of School Boards, told us that the group’s annual survey of superintendent salaries and benefits found that half of reported salaries are less than $105,000 and 75 percent are less than $138,000. (The association’s report is based on surveys sent to Texas school districts. This year, 79 percent responded. Beaumont was not among them.) How does Thomas’ salary compare with superintendents in similar-sized school districts? According to the association, the average superintendent salary in districts with between 10,000 and 24,999 students this year is $191,316. So, why is the Beaumont superintendent’s salary higher? In a Dec. 17, 2009, news article, the Tribune wrote that Thomas’ "high salary may reflect his uncommon longevity: He’s been leading Beaumont since 1996 — a tenure tantamount to eternity in the hyper-politicized, high-turnover world of urban education." As of this year, Texas superintendents had held their posts an average of five years, Barrett said. A Nov. 17 article in the Beaumont Enterprise said that when Thomas was hired in December 1995, "the district was embroiled in a bitter battle among (school) board members who were split along racial lines, with student performance that was well below the state average." TEA monitors had taken control of the board, according to the article. The article says that Thomas’ initial annual salary was $152,800. That compared with a 1996 average superintendent salary of $103,407 in school districts with 10,000 to 25,000 students, according to Barrett. Ratcliffe told us that the Beaumont district was willing to pay Thomas a high salary because the district was grappling with serious problems when he was hired. "And he’s turned a lot of those schools around, so they’ve given him good raises along the way," she said. His contract, which the district sent to us, provides for a 3.9 percent annual raise dependent on a positive review from the school board. The average superintendent pay raise for this year was 3.3 percent, Barrett said. In a March 25 article, the Tribune reported that "student achievement in Beaumont has climbed steadily for the past 15 years even as the state has moved to the more rigorous Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills tests and required more students to be included in the testing." However, according to the article, Thomas’ salary and the school district’s spending have become issues in Beaumont, where residents in May will vote on an initiative to change election procedures for the school board. But there’s more to superintendent compensation than salary: The district leaders also receive perks — which vary considerably among districts — such as bonuses and car allowances. We wondered how those compare among Texas superintendents with the highest base salaries. That information proved tougher to get. Ratcliffe told us that the education agency doesn’t keep data on superintendents’ total compensation packages. The school board association tracks the most common extras, including allowances for cell phone or home Internet service, bonus payments, professional organization membership dues and car allowances, Barrett told us — but the data is only for use by association members. However, she did say that the top 10 compensation packages ranged from $338,000 to $443,000. Thomas’ salary alone puts him in that group. We attempted to conduct our own total compensation analysis, starting with Thomas. Beyond his $347,834 salary, Thomas’ contract shows that he receives a monthly "supplemental allowance" of $1,000. And Jessie Haynes, a spokeswoman for the district, told us that Thomas’ annual health and dental insurance benefits are about $6,800. The district also pays about $10,500 a year in premiums for his life and professional legal liability insurance and about $1,500 a year in membership dues to professional and civic organizations. That brings Thomas’ total package to about $379,000. How does that compare to his counterparts? Of the superintendents with the highest salaries in Texas, we were able to track down enough information to calculate nearly complete totals for Melody Johnson of the Fort Worth school district (No. 4 in TEA's salary rankings) and Grier of the Houston district (No. 6 in salary). Johnson, whose district has about 80,000 students, earns an annual salary of $328,950 and receives an automobile allowance of $600 per month. According to district spokesman Clint Bond, the district also pays $1,426 per year in membership dues to a professional organization, $4,475 for an annual disability insurance premium and $2,940 for health insurance. Johnson’s total: about $345,000. In addition to his $300,000 salary, Grier receives $1,200 per month for an automobile allowance and $400 per month for a cell phone, according to his contract. The district also pays $2,485 annually for dues and fees to professional and civic organizations, and this year, Grier will get $21,150 in supplemental salary payments. In January, the district paid $30,000 into a special retirement account for Grier, in addition to awarding him a performance-based bonus of $18,001 for the 2009-10 school year. Grier’s total, without health insurance: about $391,000. Our research also indicates that the total compensation package of Dallas school district Superintendent Michael Hinojosa is likely bigger than that of Thomas. Hinojosa’s salary of $332,832 — in a district that serves more than 150,000 students — ranks third on the education agency’s list of superintendent salaries. Add to that $450 per month for his cell phone, $23,464 in extra payments to the Teacher Retirement System of Texas and a $15,000 annuity, and you get more than $376,000. That doesn’t count professional dues, annual premiums for disability and professional liability insurance, performance-based bonuses,and health insurance — all benefits noted in Hinojosa’s contract. We requested that information from the district but had not received any answers as of press time. In the Austin school district, which has about 86,000 students, Carstarphen’s benefits include $12,000 a year for automobile allowance, a $15,000 annuity and $5,377 in health insurance. The district also pays $9,953 per year for a long-term disability insurance policy and $1,046 for a life insurance policy. And in August, Carstarphen was awarded a bonus of $41,500 for meeting performance goals for the 2009-10 school year. (She has waived any bonus tied to this school year.) Her total: about $368,000. Readers may note that none of these compensation packages approaches the $443,000 high-end figure mentioned by Barrett; we’re still awaiting information that would confirm which district is spending that amount. We checked in with lawyer Neal Adams, who, according to the Tribune’s March 25 story, has negotiated most superintendent contracts in the state since 1987 as general counsel for the Texas Association of School Administrators. When we asked him whether he knew of any superintendents with higher compensation packages than Thomas', he said he didn’t have specific numbers but that there were probably some. So, where does that leave us? On the Tribune panel, Carter said the Beaumont schools chief was the highest-paid in Texas. He does have the highest salary, although Carter misquoted the exact figure. But additional perks are a significant portion of superintendents’ compensation and cannot be ignored. In terms of total compensation, Thomas is among the highest-paid, but our research indicates that at least a couple of superintendents get more. We rate Carter’s statement Half True. UPDATE, noon, April, 14, 2011: After our item was published, we received information from the Fort Bend school district, in the southwestern suburbs of Houston, about the 2010 compensation package of Superintendent Timothy Jenney. It exceeded that of the Beaumont schools chief. According to the TEA data, Jenney’s salary of $260,339 ranked No. 24 in the state. In addition to that, according to his contract, he received $9,600 a year for a car allowance and $4,200 for a cell phone and other technology. The district paid about $35,000 that year for Jenney’s life insurance and disability income protection insurance. For the year, Jenney received a performance-based contribution of $36,000 to a retirement plan and a $26,000 supplemental salary payment, plus a $20,000 annuity payment. Sum total: about $390,000. | null | Stefani Carter | null | null | null | 2011-04-11T06:00:00 | 2011-02-16 | ['None'] |
pomt-06725 | The health insurance plan that (members of Congress) have is no different than any other federal employee's in the United States government. | true | /florida/statements/2011/aug/30/steve-southerland/southerland-says-his-health-insurance-no-different/ | U.S. Rep. Steve Southerland, R-Panama City, is just eight months into his first House term. But he's already developed something of a reputation for his blunt comments and bold approach. Southerland paid a visit to a Tallahassee retirement home during Congress' annual August recess, where Westminster Oaks community residents asked Southerland about a variety of topics, including the future of entitlement programs including Social Security and Medicare. Somehow, according to an account provided by the Tallahassee Democrat, the forum turned to the perks (and mythical perks) of being in elected office. Southerland, a funeral home owner before his congressional run, assured the crowd that his salary ($174,000) is not excessive given the amount of hours required of House members. Plus, he said, he had to give up his role in the family business to comply with Congress' conflict-of-interest rules. "And by the way, did I mention? They're shooting at us. There is law-enforcement security in this room right now, and why is that?" he said. "If you think this job pays too much, with those kinds of risks and cutting me off from my family's business, I'll just tell you: This job doesn't mean that much to me. I had a good life in Panama City." His comments about working for the federal government didn't end there. An elderly woman asked if it would help the country's economic problems if more people could get the same health insurance that federal and state employees, including Florida Gov. Rick Scott, enjoy. Her tone was "accusatory," Southerland said in an interview with PolitiFact Florida, and he got defensive in reply. He told her he selected his Blue Cross Blue Shield plan from several options presented to him upon taking office, just like other rank-and-file federal employees. "The health insurance plan that I have is no different than any other federal employee's in the United States government," said Southerland. "I pay my portion." The woman's question wasn't unusual. Southerland said constituents ask him about members' supposed "instant pensions" and free health insurance all the time. Reporters from the Los Angeles Times and our friends at FactCheck.org investigated members' taxpayer-subsidized pay and benefits in summer 2009 as Congress debated health care reform. Southerland's claim about members of Congress getting the same health insurance option as career federal employees presented us with a different take. We wondered if he had it right. A primer about health care plans for federal workers The federal government is the nation's largest employer with more than 2 million employees. That makes its health care program, the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, the largest employer-sponsored health insurance program. About 8 million people -- including most active federal employees, 1.9 million federal retirees, their spouses and children -- obtain private health insurance through enrollment in the federal program. This setup offers many different plans through an insurance exchange and is overseen by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. In 2011, the program offered 207 total plan options, including fee-for-service plans, HMOs and high-deductible health insurance plan options with a tax-advantaged account. The plans cover a variety of services, including hospital visits, surgeries, mental health, prescription drugs, emergency care and "catastrophic" benefits. An employee's plan selection is limited to providers near his or her home (and family). The most popular plan is offered by Blue Cross Blue Shield and covers 62 percent of federal employees and retirees. This year, the bi-weekly employee premium contribution for individual and family plans under standard Blue Cross Blue Shield coverage would cost $199.20. Blue Cross Blue Shield basic coverage would cost $122.53. Taxpayers pick up about 75 percent of the premium, and employees contribute the rest, according to the Office of Personnel Management. It's a process very similar to private industry practice, but private employers generally contribute more toward employees' plans, according to a 2007 study by the Congressional Research Service about congressional health benefits. And federal employees have a wider plan selection than private-sector employees, said Pete Sepp, spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union, a nonprofit organization that scrutinizes government and taxes. "They can buy into HMOs, straight insurance, health savings accounts, all kinds of options," Sepp said. "Whereas in the private sector with a given company, you may only have a handful." The same buffet of plans is available to federal government workers and members of Congress, experts we talked to said. They pick the plan that is best for them, and they pay the same price. In short, there is no discount for members of Congress, or their staffs. Other Congress-only benefits So Southerland is right that he has the same insurance arrangement as all other federal employees. Experts, however, pointed to a couple of things he's leaving out. First, Southerland could have mentioned that federal employees "have one of the most generous health care plans in the country," said David Williams, president of Taxpayers Protection Alliance, a nonprofit group that monitors government spending. For instance, federal employees are not required to have medical examinations and cannot be excluded based on pre-existing conditions. And there are also no waiting periods before their insurance kicks in. "It's a lot more generous than the private sector," Williams said. On top of that, members of Congress do have two optional health perks that not all other federal employees enjoy. One is use of the Office of the Attending Physician, a low-profile Navy clinic on the Capitol's first floor that offers basic medical services to members, Hill staffers and sickness-stricken tourists. The clinic was started in 1928 to respond to accidents and emergencies on the Hill, according to a July 2011 profile of the operation by the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call. Members can opt to regularly access the clinic for services such as X-rays, flu shots and physical therapy at an annual fee of $503. The other is access to medical and emergency treatment at military hospitals. There's no charge for outpatient care at Bethesda Naval Hospital (or at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, though it has closed). Southerland, who entered office in January, said in an interview with PolitiFact Florida he did not know about either service. "I've not needed a doctor since I've been there," he said. As an aside, Southerland's comments about his salary sparked criticism from national Democrats, who said Southerland was out of touch with his Panhandle district. "While he's complaining about only making $174,000, his constituents are struggling to put food on the table, keep a roof over their head or find a job," Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spokesman Adam Hodge said. Southerland told us that the original story about his comments left out the "positive" things he said he enjoyed about being in office. Moreover, he told the audience of retirees that he would answer any question about what life and compensation is like for freshman members. "At no time was I complaining," he said. "I was explaining." Our ruling Back to the claim at hand. Southerland said his health insurance plan is no different from "any other federal employee's" in the country. The key here is his use of the phrase health insurance plan. While Southerland does get some extra health care benefits as a result of being a member of Congress, his choices of insurance plans are the same as every federal employee using the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program. He doesn't get a discount, or free coverage, just because he is a member of Congress. So we rate this claim True. | null | Steve Southerland | null | null | null | 2011-08-30T17:03:14 | 2011-08-24 | ['United_States', 'United_States_Congress'] |
goop-02612 | Justin Bieber Did Say “Pedophiles Run The ‘Evil’ Music Industry,” | 0 | https://www.gossipcop.com/justin-bieber-pedophiles-music-industry-bible-study-class-fake-news/ | null | null | null | Shari Weiss | null | Justin Bieber Did NOT Say “Pedophiles Run The ‘Evil’ Music Industry,” Despite Fake News Story | 2:56 pm, August 3, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-09147 | The 2000 Census cost $4.5 billion. The 2010 Census is set to cost up to $14.5 billion. | half-true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2010/jun/11/glenn-beck/glenn-beck-takes-shot-census/ | On his Fox News Network program on June 7, 2010, host Glenn Beck took a few shots at the 2010 U.S. Census. It began as a knock on reports about job gains this quarter, which Beck rightly noted was mostly due to a surge of temporary, taxpayer-funded census jobs. "Does anybody think spending $14.5 billion on temp census workers is good for the country in the long run?" Beck asked. "What would our grandparents say?" Beck then took issue with the cost of the 2010 Census. "The 2000 Census cost $4.5 billion," Beck said. "The 2010 Census is set to cost up to $14.5 billion." That'd be more than a 200 percent increase, and so we decided to check it out. Beck was accurate about the cost of the 2010 census. But that's not a one-year expense. It's the accumulation of 10 years worth of census work. At the U.S. Census, they talk about the "life cycle" cost of their decennial census counts, because each is the product of years and years of work. According to the U.S. Census Bureau's budget estimates presented to Congress in February, 2010 -- after factoring in appropriations from 2002 through 2009 plus the president's budget request for 2010 -- the estimated life cycle cost of the 2010 Census program is $14.8 billion. That includes census funds in the economic stimulus package passed in 2009. But Beck is off on the cost of the 2000 Census. Adjusted for inflation (the only fair way to compare costs over time), the life cycle cost of the 2000 census was $8.2 billion. Still, that's a pretty hefty jump -- about 80 percent. Some context, however, is in order. For starters, there were simply more homes to count in 2010 than in 2000. In 2000, there were 117.5 million housing units; and in 2010 there were an estimated 133.8 million. That's a nearly 14 percent increase. But there's more to the story than just adjusting for inflation and growth in the population that needs to be accounted for. The budget report notes that the cost of conducting a census has historically gone up over time. Even adjusted for inflation, the cost per housing unit went from $14 in 1970; to $29 in 1980; to $40 in 1990; and to $70 in 2000. The estimated cost per household in 2010 was $111. "Several factors that are independent of programmatic methodology contribute to this phenomenon," the report states. "For example, a desire for accurate coverage of a growing and increasingly diverse population adds complexity to each census. Also, experience reveals that people have become more resistant to answering surveys and providing information to the government. Adding to these difficulties is increased immigration and its diversity of languages and cultures, which creates challenges in maintaining a wholly inclusive census." The report notes that the average percentage increase in unit cost for the three previous census cycles was 71.5 percent. But the percentage increase for the 2010 Census was 58.5 percent. Officials with the U.S. Census Bureau make one other point about the increased cost of the 2010 Census. It incorporated two major shifts in responsibility. Starting in 2005 (which again is all part of the 2010 Census "life cycle") the Census Bureau began conducting an annual American Community Survey, in which it collects detailed household information that used to only be collected once every decade from those who got the census' long form. And the Census Bureau began a multi-year effort that includes the use of global positioning system (GPS) technology to modernize and enhance the capabilities of the nation's road map. In other words, the mission of the 2010 Census was different than it was in decades past. And while we're fact-checking the change in the cost of the census from 2000 to 2010, Census Bureau spokeswoman Shelly Lowe couldn't let Beck's comment about "spending $14.5 billion on temp census workers" go unchallenged. In fact, she said, the cost of the temporary workforce was slightly more than $2 billion. Beck's overall point that the cost of the 2010 Census went up considerably from 2000 to 2010 is accurate. But adjusted for inflation, it didn't go up as dramatically as he said. Using Beck's numbers, the change was more than 200 percent. But when you balance the cost to account for inflation and the fact that there were more homes to count, the increased cost was just under 60 percent. The Census Bureau also works differently than it did in past decades. For one, it now does an annual American Community Survey. Those kinds of details are important for an apples-to-apples comparison. And so we rate Beck's statement Half True. | null | Glenn Beck | null | null | null | 2010-06-11T15:51:18 | 2010-06-07 | ['None'] |
pomt-14558 | Obama spent $7 billion to bring electricity to Africa, failed miserably. | pants on fire! | /global-news/statements/2016/feb/11/daniel-greenfield/blogger-mangles-info-african-electification-aid-pr/ | Critics of American foreign aid often say the dollars are wasted. Daniel Greenfield, a fellow with the David Horowitz Freedom Center, a conservative think tank, put that argument at the top of an article that appeared on one of the center’s websites. "Obama spent $7 billion to bring electricity to Africa, failed miserably," went the headline in Greenfield’s piece, which was originally published July 31, 2015, but has continued to make the rounds. Greenfield then offered a copy-and-paste of several paragraphs from an op-ed written by two researchers at the University of California-Berkeley. Their point was that even if African nations were able to produce more power, millions of people would still lack service because the electric grid doesn’t reach them. We’ll get to problems of the grid and reliability in a bit, but the larger issue, and the focus of this fact-check, is whether the Obama administration has actually spent $7 billion to boost electric capacity in Africa. We reached out to Greenfield and did not hear back. The Power Africa initiative In June 2013, President Barack Obama unveiled Power Africa, a broad partnership among many donors, private companies and Sub-Saharan African nations to double access to power in the region. The lack of reliable service, or simply any electricity at all, is a major stumbling block to enterprise in this part of the world. According to the International Energy Agency which represents 29 countries dependent on foreign oil, two-thirds of the people in Sub-Saharan Africa don’t have power. Obama’s initiative aims to add 10,000 megawatts of generating capacity and make electricity more available to 20 million households and businesses. To make that happen, the administration said it would commit more than $7 billion over five years. The lion’s share of the total -- $5 billion -- would come from the Export-Import Bank, which offers both direct loans and insurance to back-up the deals American companies make with overseas buyers. Another government body, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, would provide about $1.5 billion in direct loans or loan guarantees to do much the same thing. For example, if General Electric built power plants in Ghana, Ghana would be required to pay for the project, and U.S. insurance would make sure General Electric got its money should Ghana fall short. The Power Africa initiative is the starting point for statements about Obama spending $7 billion on electric projects in Africa. The key flaw in Greenfield’s assertion is the program has been slow to get off the ground. When Greenfield wrote his piece, only about a quarter of the total funds had been committed. The status of Power Africa According to the U.S. Agency for International Development, as of August 2015, about $1.7 billion in aid had been obligated. That includes over $1 billion in project financing aid from the Export-Import Bank and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation and about $600 million in technical assistance from USAID. Whether all of that $1.7 billion (or $2.1 billion if you include a new project announced in October) represents actual spending lies somewhat in the eye of the beholder. The Export-Import Bank generates a return on its loans and its default rate is low. In 2014, it delivered over $670 million in profits to the U.S. Treasury. Point being, money comes back. But even under the broadest definition of spending, Power Africa has spent much less than half of its earmarked money while it’s now about two and a half years into a five-year effort. Deborah Brautigam directs the International Development Program at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Brautigam told PolitiFact that a big part of the problem was the congressional battle in 2014 over reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank. "When Congress didn’t reauthorize the Ex-Im Bank, they couldn’t initiate any new projects," Brautigam said. Some Republicans criticized the bank as a case of the government picking winners and losers, which was out of step with free-market principles. The bank’s authorization lapsed at the end of September 2014, and a deal to put it back in business didn’t emerge until December 2015. Another problem was Power Africa relies on private companies to decide it makes sense to invest in a given African country. Brautigam said the government can’t force firms to move forward. Producing power vs. getting it to people The op-ed piece that Greenfield cited was focused on a specific part of the electricity puzzle in Africa. The challenge isn’t simply to generate electricity. The power grid to move it around is sorely underdeveloped, too. The researchers who wrote that item studied the situation in Kenya. They found that just 30 percent of Kenyans are connected to the grid, and in rural areas, only 5 percent of households and 20 percent of businesses within a half-mile of the grid are connected. They didn’t criticize Power Africa so much as describe its limitations. Co-author Edward Miguel, an economist at the University of California-Berkeley, said Greenfield’s piece distorted the Kenyan research. "It is a bit disappointing, to say the least, when someone runs with your research and writing and grossly misinterprets it," Miguel said. "I would prefer for Power Africa to focus on some different areas, but much of the funding appears to be going into investments that are useful." Rudy Gharib, spokewoman for Power Africa, said many of the early projects focused on boosting generating capacity "because of the long lead time needed to get those deals online and because most countries are facing capacity shortages and it is not possible to connect large numbers of new customers without addressing the issue of there not being enough power on the grid." Our ruling Greenfield said that Obama had spent $7 billion and failed to bring electricity to Africa. The projected dollar total was correct, but the statement missed the reality that as of August 2015, only about $1.7 billion had been committed. And a lot of the money that will be committed will be in the form of loans or loan guarantees, not gifts. How can you declare failure on a project that isn't yet completed? We rate this claim Pants on Fire. | null | Daniel Greenfield | null | null | null | 2016-02-11T10:00:00 | 2015-07-30 | ['Africa', 'Barack_Obama'] |
pomt-13141 | Says Donald Trump wants to deport "our Dreamers." | mostly true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2016/nov/01/priorities-usa-action/pro-clinton-pac-says-trump-wants-deport-millions-i/ | An ad by a political action committee supporting Hillary Clinton spotlights Donald Trump’s comments on deporting undocumented immigrant families. The ad, launched by Priorities USA Action on Sept. 28, is narrated in Spanish and includes snippets of media interviews in which the Republican presidential candidate firmly said he would deport people in the country illegally. It starts with Trump’s voice saying "this is a country where we speak English, not Spanish" over an image of a woman and two children sitting at a dining table. "Donald Trump wants to see us disappear," a female voice says in Spanish. It then cuts to a November 2015 MSNBC interview where Trump said "you are going to have a deportation force." "Trump will capture and deport millions, even our Dreamers," the narrator says in Spanish as images of a family and what appears to be a student fade away. Trump has not been consistent on his deportation plans. But in his immigration speech in Arizona on Aug. 31, Trump emphasized deportation priorities and the removal of "at least 2 million" "criminal aliens." He also said those who are here illegally and want lawful status, "will have one route and only one route: to return home and apply for re-entry." There’s an estimated 11 million people living illegally in the United States. For this fact-check, we focused on whether or not Trump wants to deport people in the country illegally who arrived in the United States as children, a subset of the undocumented population referred to as Dreamers. Who are Dreamers? "Dreamers" is a term used by advocates for potential beneficiaries of the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act, or the DREAM Act, which has stalled in Congress. President Barack Obama’s administration in 2012 announced a program to help this group of undocumented immigrants, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA. It allowed those who met certain guidelines to apply for work permits and for deportation reprieve for two years, subject to renewal. Pew Research Center in 2012 estimated there were 4.4 million unauthorized immigrants ages 30 and under, and that up to 1.7 million were potentially eligible for DACA. Data through June 2016 shows 741,546 individuals nationwide have been approved for DACA. Obama in 2014 sought to offer deportation relief to more people through two more programs: an expanded version of DACA, and a new program, Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents, or DAPA. While the initial deferred-action program is still active, the expansions are on hold after a Supreme Court deadlock. About 5 million people might be eligible for the halted initiatives, or just less than half of the nation’s undocumented population. Trump’s position Trump would "immediately terminate President Obama’s two illegal executive amnesties," according to his 10-point immigration plan. (Neither program granted citizenship, but deferred deportation and allowed immigrants to apply for permission to work.) Trump’s plan says his administration would enforce all immigration laws and set priorities — including the removal of criminals, gang members and visa overstays. "Anyone who has entered the United States illegally is subject to deportation — that is what it means to have laws and to have a country," his plan says. It is not clear if Trump would cancel the existing deferred-action program or just not issue any new ones, said Steven Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors stricter immigration policies. Toward the end of his immigration speech, Trump also said that after building a wall, ending illegal immigration, and accomplishing enforcement and deportation goals, "then and only then will we be in a position to consider the appropriate disposition of those individuals who remain." Priorities USA led us to a July 2015 CNN interview between Trump and Dana Bash, where she asked him specifically whether or not he would deport Dreamers. Trump responded with a mixed message. "It's a tough situation," Trump said. "We're going to do something. And one of the things we're going to do is expedite. When somebody is terrific, we want them back here. They have to be legally." Bash asked if they have to leave. "They're with their parents. It depends. But look, it sounds cold, and it sounds hard," Trump said. "We have a country. Our country is going to hell. We have to have a system where people are legally in our country." A Priorities spokesperson noted other media reports saying Trump would deport all immigrants in the country illegally, including Dreamers, that he would rescind Obama’s deferred action programs, and that undocumented immigrants seeking relief from Obama’s executive actions "could expose themselves to Trump’s mass deportation plan." Hypothetically, Trump could revoke the deferred action status of DACA recipients, which in turn would terminate their employment authorization and render them subject to removal, said Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhia, an immigration law expert and professor at Pennsylvania State University. "However the biggest impediment to deporting this cohort of immigrants would be the resources it would take to apprehend, detain, charge, try and remove so-called Dreamers," Wadhia said. "If he wanted to, he could target the vast majority of Dreamers for removal but it would not be easy or quick — it would likely take years to implement." Our ruling A Priorities USA Action ad said, "Trump wants to deport millions, even our Dreamers." Trump has made clear he would deport millions. More recently in the campaign, Trump said he would set priorities, starting with at least 2 million "criminal aliens." He has given mixed messages on the timeline of deportations for people who don’t pose safety threats. Trump has also said he would terminate Obama administration programs that defer deportation for undocumented people who arrived in the United States as children. If that happens, Dreamers may be subject to deportation. In interviews, Trump has been slightly more sympathetic to this group, calling their situation "tough." At the same time, he has consistently said all immigrants here illegally will have to go, but "terrific" ones could have their return expedited. We rate the ad’s statement Mostly True.https://www.sharethefacts.co/share/c63d89f6-100c-4245-ad3d-6cfa953e39ac | null | Priorities USA Action | null | null | null | 2016-11-01T12:04:21 | 2016-09-28 | ['None'] |
pomt-03305 | A provision of the Senate immigration bill would require you to have government permission to get a second job. | half-true | /georgia/statements/2013/jul/30/charles-kuck/immigration-claim-about-second-jobs-doesnt-really-/ | The U.S. Senate passed its version of an overhaul of U.S. immigration law late last month, and debate over the legislation has been nonstop. (The U.S. House plans to take up its immigration bill in the fall.) Georgia immigration attorney Charles Kuck discussed provisions of the bill during a forum at a northwest Georgia college last month. The bill would affect the entire nation, not just the 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States, he said. But it was Kuck’s comments about the E-Verify mandate, captured in The Rome News-Tribune, that caught our attention. "When you want to get a second job, you’ll get what’s called a ‘tentative nonconfirmation’ that says somebody’s used this ID to work somewhere else," Kuck said. "So you have to have government permission to get a second job." We at PolitiFact Georgia have been known to moonlight outside our fact-checking assignments, so we decided to investigate Kuck’s claim about needing approval for more work. Kuck supports changing immigration law, is a board member of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials and is a frequent commentator on national news programs. He told us his statement was based on the experiences of two of his Atlanta-area clients. When they applied for second jobs and their personal information was run through the E-Verify system, they were told by their potential employers that the identifications associated with their Social Security numbers were being used elsewhere. In this case, the identifications were being used by the men at their first jobs, so there was no fraudulent activity. But the mandate could cause unintended consequences for all workers, Kuck said. The Senate immigration bill includes a provision mandating employers enroll in the federal E-Verify program within five years. Just what is E-Verify? E-Verify is a federal Internet-based system that allows employers to verify that their workers are authorized to work in the United States. The system compares information from a worker’s employment verification form with federal data records to confirm employment eligibility. When the information doesn’t match, potential workers receive a "tentative nonconfirmation" from the government, which they can contest within eight days. The system is meant to prevent ineligible people from getting jobs, and it can also catch fraudulent activity, including identity theft. Although not nationally mandated for private employers, some have voluntarily enrolled in the program for more than a decade. Georgia requires all but the smallest private employers to use the online work authorization program. Before the Senate bill’s passage, there was criticism about potential problems E-Verify could create for legal workers. Testimony in April 2011 by officials from the U.S. Government Accountability Office officials noted that agencies have improved the program but challenges remained. Based on a report of fiscal 2009 data, the government reduced the number of eligible employees not automatically confirmed by E-Verify from about 8 percent to 2.6 percent. Of that lower figure, slightly more than one out of every 10 of those people were determined to be work-eligible after they contested the "tentative nonconfirmation" ruling and fixed errors in their records. The remainder, or 189,000 people, were never able to resolve their problems. It was unclear whether they were notified by their employers of their right to contest the ruling, whether they independently decided not to contest it or whether they were not eligible to work. Statistics found on the federal E-Verify website show that the number of people not automatically confirmed to work has dropped to 1.35 percent. Nearly one in five of those people contested and fixed the initial ruling. The rest weren’t able to resolve their problems or didn’t contest the findings. Critics, such as Chris Calabrese of the American Civil Liberties Union, say that even with a relatively low error rate, E-Verify imposes a burden on those Americans who will be wrongfully denied an opportunity to earn a living. We checked with several immigration experts about the possible employment problems with the E-Verify system. In theory, Kuck’s argument appears to be correct, said Carolina Antonini, an immigration attorney and professor at Georgia State University. None of her clients has experienced issues similar to Kuck’s clients. It would probably depend on the circumstances, said John Feere, a legal policy analyst with the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies, which favors tighter immigration controls. In terms of using E-Verify as a mechanism to prevent identity theft, "it would make sense that if the government saw that I was taking on several other jobs, then the government would alert me," he said. "Does it happen as soon as a person applies for a second job? I’m not sure." Philip Wolgin, an immigration expert at the liberal Center for American Progress, said Kuck may be confusing another provision of the Senate bill that allows people to lock their own Social Security number to prevent identity theft. "There is nothing in the (Senate) bill or in the E-Verify program that flags people who apply for multiple jobs as tentatively nonconfirmed," Wolgin said, "and there is certainly nothing that forces people to ask the government for permission to work a second job." So is Kuck correct that you would need government permission to get a second job? The Senate bill includes a mandate for all employers to begin using the electronic employment verification system E-Verify within four years. That system flags workers whose employee data doesn’t match federal documents. But program and independent data show that most workers are automatically confirmed in the E-Verify system. It is possible that an employee whose Social Security number, for example, being used for one job could be flagged when that same number is used to secure another job. But it would most likely occur with multiple uses of the same information. Kuck’s statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details. We rated his claim Half True. | null | Charles Kuck | null | null | null | 2013-07-30T10:29:15 | 2013-07-13 | ['None'] |
pomt-13226 | Says Hillary Clinton's "plan is going to raise taxes and even double your taxes." | mostly false | /truth-o-meter/statements/2016/oct/20/donald-trump/donald-trump-predicts-hillary-clinton-will-double-/ | One of the planned topics for the third presidential debate in Las Vegas was the economy, so tax policy came up in the face-off between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. At one point, Trump said of Clinton’s tax proposal, "Her plan is going to raise taxes and even double your taxes." Is that correct? Independent experts who have modeled the candidates’ tax proposals said that would be the exception rather than the rule. First, a quick summary of Clinton’s tax plan, which includes tax increases for the wealthy. Clinton proposes a 4 percent surcharge on income earned in excess of $5 million as well as a minimum tax rate of 30 percent for those earning more than $1 million. She would also limit certain exemptions and deductions to 28 percent; she would tax carried interest, a type of income typically earned by hedge fund managers, as ordinary income; and she would permanently reduce the tax threshold for estates to $3.5 million, or $7 million for married couples, while increasing the top estate tax rate to 45 percent. The general impact of these changes will be to raise taxes on the richest Americans. An analysis by the Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center concluded that "in 2017, taxpayers in the top 1 percent of the income distribution -- those with incomes above $730,000 in 2015 dollars -- would see their tax burdens increase more than $78,000." However, taxpayers in the bottom 95 percent of the income spectrum -- those earning less than $300,000 -- "would see little change in average after-tax income," the Tax Policy Center found. The Tax Foundation, which generally favors lower taxes, broadly concurred in its own analysis. Without accounting for the plan’s impact on the broader economy, "Clinton’s tax plan would raise taxes on the top 20 percent of taxpayers and cut taxes for taxpayers in all other income quintiles," the foundation’s analysis said. Trump spokesman Steven Cheung told PolitiFact that "Clinton will double tax rates on short-term capital gains." The campaign pointed to an article from Fox Business that explained Clinton’s proposal to levy higher taxes on investments held for a short period of time than on investments held for longer periods. "Under Clinton’s proposal, investments held between one and two years would be taxed at the normal income-tax rate of 39.6 percent, nearly double the existing 20 percent capital gains rate," the article said. However, Trump said "your taxes," suggesting that lots of Americans would be hit by Clinton’s tax increases. That’s a stretch, since, as noted in the Fox Business article the Trump camp pointed to, "only the top 0.5 percent of taxpayers would be impacted by the plan." We asked representatives of both groups whether they thought Trump’s comment was broadly accurate. "It may be possible to find a very specific case where this is true, but her plan would only raise taxes modestly and would actually cut taxes for many people," said Kyle Pomerleau, director of federal projects at the Tax Foundation. Roberton Williams, a fellow at the Tax Policy Center, said that if you parse his group’s analysis, it shows that, on average, the top 0.1 percent of taxpayers would see their effective tax rate go up from 34.4 percent to 41.5 percent -- almost a 21 percent increase. That’s a significant bump, but it’s far from double. Meanwhile, the bottom 80 percent would see tax cuts, he said, while those in the 80th to 95th percentiles would get small tax increases, on the order of about 0.1 percent, Williams said. "I suppose some cases could be imagined where taxes would rise a lot," Williams said. "Perhaps a person who has carried interest could see their tax rate go from the 23.8 percent top capital gains rate to a 47.4 percent marginal tax rate on income in excess of $5 million. With enough of that type of income, that person's taxes would go up a lot." Also, Clinton’s proposed minimum tax rate of 30 percent for those earning more than $1 million -- commonly known as the Buffett Rule -- could conceivably double taxation for people who are lucky enough to be paying a rate under 15 percent today, he said. (The Buffett Rule is named after Warren Buffett, who has criticized the fact that he is often taxed at a lower rate than his secretary.) But both of those scenarios are "very rare" cases, Williams said. Our ruling Trump said that Clinton’s tax proposal "is going to raise taxes and even double your taxes." Independent analyses found that the vast majority of taxpayers would see tax cuts or no change to their tax bill under the Clinton plan. The richest taxpayers would see increases -- and the very richest could see significant increases -- but even the typical rich taxpayer would not see their taxes double. Analysts said it’s possible that specific wealthy taxpayers with a certain confluence of income streams might see their taxes double, but that would be the exception that proves the rule. We rate Trump’s statement Mostly False. https://www.sharethefacts.co/share/67b81a1f-6064-4072-a9af-b6ee7c595bbd | null | Donald Trump | null | null | null | 2016-10-20T00:00:36 | 2016-10-19 | ['None'] |
goop-02126 | Bella Hadid, Miguel “Hot Couple” After “Flirty Moment” At Victoria’s Secret Fashion Sho | 1 | https://www.gossipcop.com/bella-hadid-miguel-couple-flirting-victorias-secret-fashion-show/ | null | null | null | Shari Weiss | null | Bella Hadid, Miguel NOT “Hot Couple” After “Flirty Moment” At Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show | 9:09 am, November 29, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
pose-00585 | I will ensure these offices (local economic development offices) have the right resources and trained specialists so they can assist their local businesses obtain state and federal grants, and to comply with state and local regulatory processes in the least costly manner. | promise broken | https://www.politifact.com/florida/promises/scott-o-meter/promise/609/put-grant-writing-and-regulatory-specialists-in-lo/ | null | scott-o-meter | Rick Scott | null | null | Put grant-writing and regulatory specialists in local economic development offices | 2010-12-21T09:36:20 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-10291 | McCain's attacks on Obama are 'not true,' 'false,' 'baloney,' according to media outlets. | half-true | /truth-o-meter/statements/2008/aug/14/barack-obama/off-on-the-wrong-footnotes/ | An Obama TV ad called "Low Road" begins with an image of McCain and the announcer stating, "He's practicing the politics of the past." The ad then takes a page from movie trailers that steal snippets from movie reviews as part of their advertising campaign. As the image of McCain speaking at a lectern freezes in black and white, the narrator says "His attacks on Obama...'Not True'" as the citation, MSNBC 7/28/08, flashes on the screen. The announcer keeps reading, "'False' (FactCheck.org 7/28/08)...'Baloney' (USA Today Editorial 7/29/08)...'the low road' (New York Times Editorial) 7/30/08...'baseless' (Time 7/30/08). We decided to look at these citations to see if they say what the Obama campaign says they do. Let's take them one by one. The first quote, from MSNBC, relates to a McCain campaign ad which criticized Obama for his last-minute decision to cancel a visit with wounded troops in Germany during a recent tour of Europe. "He made time to go to the gym, but canceled a visit with wounded troops," an announcer in the McCain ad states. "Seems the Pentagon wouldn't allow him to bring cameras." We at PolitiFact looked into this claim at the time and concluded that the McCain ad was stretching the truth. We called it Barely True. In a July 28 television interview with Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., MSNBC reporter Andrea Mitchell called the McCain ad "literally not true" and said that she could attest - as a member of the traveling press corps - that Obama had no intention of bringing cameras with him to visit wounded troops. The second snippet, "False," from FactCheck.org also refers to this same alleged snubbing of wounded troops in Germany. "McCain's facts are literally true, but his insinuation — that the visit was canceled because of the press ban or the desire for gym time – is false," the item states. The last quote — "baseless" — from Time also refers to this same issue. Reporter Karen Tumulty, in the magazine's Swampland blog, wrote "So how many more times are the McCain campaign and the Republicans going to repeat what is a thoroughly baseless charge?" The "baloney" quote from a USA Today editorial (and the Obama camp gets points for noting that it was an editorial), relates to a McCain campaign ad that suggests Obama is to blame for the high price of gas. "Even by the elastic standards of political ads, this is more than a stretch," the editorial states. "It's baloney." The final quote — "the low road" — comes from a New York Times editorial (again, the ad notes that it is an editorial). Actually, the phrase is borrowed from the headline, "Low-Road Express." The editorial takes McCain to task for a litany of what it characterizes as false charges against Obama. Among them, "that Mr. Obama opposes 'innovation' on energy policy; that he voted 94 times for 'higher taxes'; and that Mr. Obama is personally responsible for rising gasoline prices." We don't take issue with the fact that these sources used the words that were quoted in the ad. They do. But the ads take evaluations of very specific McCain claims and give them a more far-reaching import. As presented, the ad essentially states, for example, that "His (McCain's) attacks on Obama (are) false," according to FactCheck.org. Jamieson, who works at the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School of Communication, which produces FactCheck.org, said she felt like the quote was a distortion, and traded on FactCheck.org's reputation. "I saw that and said, 'FactCheck should fact-check that,'" Jamieson said. No media outlet has a problem with being accurately quoted, she said, but the ad leaves the impression that FactCheck.org has made a blanket determination that "everything Sen. McCain has said is false." The article took issue with just one McCain campaign ad. The nonpartisan fact-checking site has found some McCain statements to be true, some false; and the same for statements from Obama. How would Obama like it if McCain ran the same ad with the exact same setup and source citation? she asked. To suggest that these sources have concluded that the entirety of the McCain campaign is deceptive, well, that's deceptive, Jamieson said. We agree. With the exception of the New York Times editorial, which faults the McCain campaign for a number of alleged distortions and its overall tone, the snippets refer to very specific statements made by McCain about Obama. We realize that some details must go in a 30-second ad, but the shorthand presents an overall impression that the these media outlets have judged McCain's ad campaign much more broadly than they really have. We rule the source citations Half True. | null | Barack Obama | null | null | null | 2008-08-14T00:00:00 | 2008-07-30 | ['Barack_Obama', 'John_McCain'] |
hoer-01221 | Charles Manson Granted Parole | fake news | https://www.hoax-slayer.net/hoax-charles-manson-granted-parole/ | null | null | null | Brett M. Christensen | null | Fake-News: Charles Manson Granted Parole | July 17, 2017 | null | ['None'] |
pomt-04117 | Obamacare includes "a $63 charge every American will begin paying (in 2013) as a way to cover some of the increased costs associated with providing health insurance to those with pre-existing conditions." | mostly false | /ohio/statements/2013/jan/10/jim-renacci/jim-renacci-says-every-american-will-pay-63-fee-pa/ | Rep. Jim Renacci has never been a fan of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In fact, the Ohio Republican won a pair of congressional elections after lambasting the Democrats he defeated for backing it. Renacci, of Wadsworth, continued his crusade against the health care reform law in a Dec. 21 column published in The Daily Record of Wooster, Ohio, where he said that "many of the fees and penalties in the President’s health care law will begin to take effect" on Jan. 1, 2013. "One of them is a $63 charge every American will begin paying as a way to cover some of the increased costs associated with providing health insurance to those with pre-existing conditions," his column said. "For many, this new fee will be paid for by their employer. While that's good news for many American families, whose budgets are already stretched tightly, it is problematic for business of all sizes. For large businesses, this new fee could equal tens of millions of more dollars being shipped to Washington." In an email relayed by his press spokesman, Renacci elaborated on his criticism, noting that businesses won’t be able to use the money they pay for those fees to "hire expand or make capital investments." "If you want a real world example of how unfriendly to business the President’s health care law will be, look no further," Renacci said in the email. "Now is certainly not the time to make it more expensive to do business in America." PolitiFact Ohio decided to look into his claim about the fee. Details about the fee emerged last month when the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released proposed regulations that would impose a three-year temporary assessment on employer sponsored health plans, starting in 2014. HHS estimated the fee would amount to $5.25 each month for every covered beneficiary, which works out to $63 per year. The fee is designed to raise $25 billion over three years to cushion health insurance companies from unexpected costs they’ll begin to encounter in 2014 when the law bans them from refusing to cover people who are already ill. According to the Associated Press, the fee would be assessed on all "major medical" insurance plans, including those provided by employers and those purchased individually by consumers. Most of the money would go into a fund administered by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The U.S. Treasury would get $5 billion to offset the cost of shoring up employer-sponsored coverage for early retirees. The per-person amount of the fees would diminish each year before phasing out in 2017. The fees are designed to raise $12 billion in 2014, $8 billion in 2015 and $5 billion in 2016. The law firm McDermott, Will & Emery analyzed the proposed regulations and said the yearly contributions that an employer pays would be based on the number of individuals covered under its plan, not the number of employees who participate. For example, a family of four covered under an employee’s insurance plan would be regarded as four "covered lives" and the employer would have to pay the fee for four people. The payments would be tax deductible to employers as an ordinary and necessary business expense. HHS spokesman Fabien Levy described the fee as one component of a comprehensive legislative package that’s designed to save money for consumers and businesses. Other money-saving changes have already gone into effect, including prescription drug savings for senior citizens and allowing adults under age 26 to remain on their parents’ insurance plans. "The health care law will help bring down costs and save money for American families," Levy said. "This program will help ensure employers no longer have to shoulder the cost of caring for the uninsured, which has raised businesses’ health care costs for decades." But the fee Renacci targeted has not been finalized, Levy said. Comments on the proposed regulation were due at the Department of Health and Human Services on Dec. 31. In an email, Renacci spokesman Shawn Ryan said Renacci’s date error was an "honest mistake," that wasn’t an attempt to mislead anyone. Although the rule has not been finalized, Ryan said that the Obama administration, through HHS, "has made it very clear - even by just proposing the rule - that they fully intend to implement it." In a news release, Columbus-area Republican Rep. Patrick Tiberi, the chair of the House Ways and Means Committee subcommittee on Select Revenue Measures, called the fee a "hidden tax" that would be imposed on 190 million Americans who are enrolled in health care plans. He also provided feedback to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. His Dec. 21 letter to Sebelius said the fee would discourage employers from insuring their workers. "While we understand the importance of ensuring those with pre-existing conditions have access to affordable care, this regulation could cause some people to lose their health care coverage altogether," said the letter that Tiberi sent with other Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee. So where does this leave Renacci’s claim? There is an element of truth in his statement. The Department of Health and Human Services has indeed proposed a new $63 fee on every insured person that would be used to cover some costs associated with extending health insurance coverage to people with pre-existing medical conditions. But his claim scrambles the details on some critical facts. The fee is part of a recently proposed rule that has not been finalized. If the proposal takes effect as it is currently written, the fee would be assessed beginning in 2014, not in 2013, as Renacci stated in his column. The fee would diminish over time before phasing out in 2017. Renacci’s column mentions how much the fees could raise in three years, but does not explain that it will end. Describing it as "$63 charge every American will begin paying," as he does in his column, is inaccurate. It would affect only those covered by major medical health insurance plans. On the Truth-O-Meter, his claim rates Mostly False. | null | Jim Renacci | null | null | null | 2013-01-10T06:00:00 | 2012-12-21 | ['United_States'] |
pomt-06271 | Says Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker "slashed" pensions and benefits for public employees. | half-true | /wisconsin/statements/2011/nov/25/mike-tate/top-democrat-says-gop-wisconsin-gov-walker-slashed/ | On the day the campaign to remove Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker from office was launched, talk show host Al Sharpton asked Wisconsin Democratic Party chairman Mike Tate to tell MSNBC viewers "why it is so important that Walker be recalled." Sharpton wanted Tate to explain the budget-repair bill that Walker proposed a month after taking office in January 2011 -- the one that, because it curtailed collective bargaining for most state and local government employees, spurred weeks of public protests and national media attention. In the Nov. 15, 2011 interview, Tate replied that Act 10, "effectively eliminated collective bargaining rights for all of our public employees, our schoolteachers and our public service workers. "And beyond that," Tate continued, the Republican governor "slashed their pension and benefits." It is well established that Walker’s initiative, approved by the GOP-controlled Legislature, limited collective bargaining for all but a few groups of public employees. And it’s well known the law forces them to pay more for their pensions and health insurance -- giving the state and local governments flexibility, Walker argued, to balance their books. But did Walker also reduce -- or "slash," to use Tate’s word -- the pensions and benefits themselves? Walker’s treatment of public employees could be a key issue in a recall election, which would be held sometime in 2012 if the Democratic Party and other groups leading the recall campaign can gather enough signatures. So let’s evaluate Tate’s statement, in two parts. Pensions Before the budget-repair law -- which exempts police, state troopers and firefighters -- public employees contributed less than 1 percent of their pay toward their pensions; some made no contribution at all. For 2011, most workers covered by the law pay 5.8 percent and some pay 6.65 percent, according to the Office of State Employment Relations. Tate argued that employees "are effectively being asked to take a pay cut by contributing more of their own wages towards their defined benefit package." Indeed, many employees might view the higher pension contributions they have to make as a reduction in their pension benefit: In terms of their total compensation, their take-home pay is being reduced in order to fund the same pension benefit they’re already getting. No pension payments to workers at retirement are actually being reduced. But going forward, a relatively small number of public workers will earn a smaller pension benefit. The reduction affects about 1,500 public employees, primarily elected officials in local government, said Shawn Smith, spokeswoman for the state Department of Employee Trust Funds. The department administers retirement and other benefit programs for state and local government employees and retirees. That’s less than 1 percent of the more than 266,000 public employees who participate in the state retirement system, Smith said. For the 1,500, the "multiplier" used to calculate their pension was reduced from 2 percent to 1.6 percent for years of service logged after the budget-repair bill was enacted. Going forward, those employees will earn a somewhat lower pension, given that the multiplier is used along with average salary and years of service to determine the pension amount. So, for all public employees affected by the budget-repair law, the pension benefit, in a general sense, is reduced because they are paying more for it. But the pension benefit that ultimately will be earned by current employees will be lower only for a small number of them. Benefits Regarding the benefits part of Tate’s statement, Walker’s budget-repair law requires state employees, as well as local government workers who get their health insurance from a state plan, to pay at least 12 percent of the premiums. In arguing that the benefits themselves were cut, Tate cited a September 2011 memo from the state Department of Employee Trust Funds. It notes that the budget-repair law mandated a 5 percent reduction in the cost to the state of health plans. That was achieved, said Smith, by requiring the nearly 184,000 public employees and their dependents who are covered by a state plan to pay 10 percent co-insurance for certain medical services, up to $1,000 per year per family. That means the state now pays 90 percent, rather than 100 percent, for care that stems from an illness or injury, as opposed to preventative care. (Co-insurance, which requires the employee to pay a percentage of the cost of certain services, is different from a co-payment, which is a fixed amount that employees pay for certain services. Both are common in the private sector.) So, this is a double-hit to all state employees covered by Walker’s budget-repair law. They are paying more for their health insurance and getting less, given that the state is paying only 90 percent of the cost of many services rather than 100 percent. Our conclusion Tate said Walker "slashed" the pensions and benefits of state and local government employees. While the two benefits themselves are not being "slashed," the reductions along with the higher amounts the employees must pay for their benefits are significant. The PolitiFact definition for Half True is "The statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details or takes things out of context." That’s what we rate Tate’s statement. | null | Mike Tate | null | null | null | 2011-11-25T09:00:00 | 2011-11-15 | ['Scott_Walker_(politician)'] |
tron-02296 | Coach K Criticizes President Obama’s Military Strategy | truth! & outdated! | https://www.truthorfiction.com/coach-k-criticizes-president-obamas-military-strategy/ | null | military | null | null | ['Trending Rumors'] | Coach K Criticizes President Obama’s Military Strategy | Apr 11, 2015 | null | ['None'] |
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