Quick Take 

A privately owned company called the White House Gift Shop is selling a coin commemorating the second indictment of former President Donald Trump. But, contrary to a misleading tweet from Sen. Bill Cassidy, the online sales company is not affiliated with the White House in Washington, D.C.

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Donald Trump is the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges. Twice.

He was first charged in a New York state court in April for crimes related to hush money payments he allegedly made to a porn actor. Trump has pleaded not guilty.

On June 13, he was charged in federal court in Florida for alleged crimes related to mishandling classified documents and obstructing federal officials who tried to retrieve the files after he left office. Trump has pleaded not guilty.

The day before Trump’s second arraignment, Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Republican from Louisiana, posted a video to his Twitter account admonishing a company called the White House Gift Shop for selling a coin commemorating Trump’s second indictment.

The video was an installment in Cassidy’s recurring Twitter segment called “Outrage of the Week.”

In this installment, Cassidy said: “Outrage of the week — the White House Gift Shop is putting out a commemorative coin for Donald Trump’s indictment. Now, whatever you think about it, whatever party you are, you’ve got to admit it’s poor taste, that it’s capitalizing upon something without his permission, I’m sure. It’s the wrong thing to do. Have a sense of decency, White House Gift Shop.”

Cassidy’s tweet fails to say that the shop is not affiliated with the White House in Washington, D.C., or the federal government, leaving the false impression that the Biden White House is involved.

But the White House Gift Shop is a privately run, web-based retail sales company not affiliated with the White House. We’ve explained this before, when online posts in 2020 criticized the company’s sale of coins commemorating the COVID-19 pandemic and falsely suggested that the shop was affiliated with the White House.

The shop also sold a coin commemorating Trump’s first indictment which, like the coin at the center of the current controversy, sold for $100.

The website describes the coins as “Our Newest Narrative Great Moments in Presidential History in Narrative Coin Art.” It goes on to say, “Epilogue Coin #2 in the Series of the Administration of Presidential Donald J. Trump is a Continuation of the White House Gift Shop’s Historic Moments Original & Unique Global Coin Collection that Chronicles Pivotal Moments in American Presidential & Political History.”

Although Cassidy didn’t explicitly claim that the shop was connected to the executive branch, some social media users understood it that way. “Truly, a politicized White House,” one comment read.

Some other accounts on various platforms have also picked up the claim and repeated it without explaining that the gift shop is not affiliated with the White House. One post on Truth Social, for example, says that Republicans should “insist that the White House Gift shop be closed down immediately under the Biden Cabal.”

We reached out to Cassidy’s Senate office and were referred to his campaign for comment because the video appeared on his campaign Twitter account. We asked his campaign by email if the senator knew that the website isn’t affiliated with the White House and, if so, why he chose to highlight that company’s merchandise. We didn’t get a response.

It’s worth noting that Cassidy, who is not up for reelection until 2026, was one of seven Republicans who voted to find Trump guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors following the former president’s second impeachment after the deadly riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Cassidy has also said he doesn’t think Trump could win the general election in 2024.

So, Cassidy hasn’t always supported the former president, but his suggestion that the executive branch is unfairly targeting Trump with commemorative coins is misleading.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

Waxman, Olivia. “Donald Trump Is the First President Ever Criminally Charged. Others Have Come Close Though.” Time. Updated 30 Mar 2023.

Farley, Robert and D’Angelo Gore. “What’s in Trump’s Indictment?” FactCheck.org. 4 Apr 2023.

Farley, Robert, D’Angelo Gore and Eugene Kiely. “Q&A on Trump’s Federal Indictment.” FactCheck.org. 9 Jun 2023.

Cassidy, Bill (@BillCassidy). “The White House Gift Shop should not be selling a commemorative coin marking Donald Trump’s indictment. This is totally outrageous.” Twitter. 12 Jun 2023.

The White House Gift Shop, Inc. “APPLICATION FOR CERTIFICATE OF AUTHORITY TO TRANSACT BUSINESS IN MICHIGAN.” Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs. 7 Nov 2022.

Fichera, Angelo. “The White House Isn’t Selling Coronavirus Coins.” FactCheck.org. Updated 5 Oct 2020.

Farley, Robert. “How Many Died as a Result of Capitol Riot?” FactCheck.org. Updated 21 Mar 2022.

Kiely, Eugene, et al. “Trump’s Falsehood-Filled ‘Save America’ Rally.” FactCheck.org. 6 Jan 2021.

The post Online Posts Misrepresent Coin Commemorating Trump’s Second Indictment appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie kicked off his campaign for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination with a June 6 town hall in Manchester, New Hampshire. We fact-checked his remarks, which included false or misleading claims about former President Donald Trump, the current Republican front-runner, whom Christie attacked several times.

• Christie was wrong that Trump promised during the 2016 campaign that he would build a border wall “across the entire Mexico border.” On the campaign trail, Trump only ever promised to build a 1,000-mile wall along the nearly 2,000-mile border.

• He blamed Trump for rampant illegal immigration, in part, he said, because Trump “never changed one immigration law.” Trump may not have signed any major immigration bills, but he did institute an unprecedented number of executive policies that transformed the immigration system and made it harder for people to cross the border illegally.

• Christie left the false impression that United States residents were the first to get access to Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine because of the U.S. free-market system. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was first made available to residents in the U.S., Canada and the European Union at about the same time in December 2020.

• Christie repeated the misleading claim that Barack Obama only provided “blankets” and “human rights aid” after Russia invaded regions of Ukraine in 2014. Obama’s administration also provided Ukraine with nonlethal military aid, including training, vehicles and radar equipment.

• He claimed that President Joe Biden initially said that “a small incursion” by Russia into Ukraine in 2022 “probably wouldn’t be a problem.” Biden said “Russia will be held accountable” for an invasion, but the U.S. response would depend on what Russia did.

• Christie also said that Trump didn’t hold any unscripted town halls in New Hampshire during the 2016 campaign cycle. But Trump’s campaign hosted a few events where he appeared to randomly select audience members who could ask him questions.

Trump’s Promised Border Wall

Christie was right that Trump didn’t fulfill his 2016 campaign promise to build a border wall and make Mexico pay for it. But Christie, who called the promise “complete bull,” falsely claimed Trump said his border wall would run “across the entire Mexico border.” On the campaign trail, Trump only ever promised to build a 1,000-mile wall along the nearly 2,000-mile border.

Christie said he regretted not confronting Trump earlier in the 2016 campaign about some of the claims and promises he made.

“Because I knew that so much of what he said was complete baloney,” Christie said. “Like I knew it. ‘I am going to build the greatest, most wonderful wall across the entire Mexico border and Mexico is going to pay for it.’ Well, like, I knew as someone who had governed that that was complete bull.”

As we wrote in our wrap-up on the history of the wall under Trump in December 2020, although the 2016 Republican platform stated, “The border wall must cover the entirety of the southern border and must be sufficient to stop both vehicular and pedestrian traffic,” that’s not actually what Trump talked about during the campaign.

At the time, Trump consistently talked about needing 1,000 miles of wall. For example, during the third Republican primary debate on Oct. 28, 2015, Trump said, “Here, we actually need 1,000 because we have natural barriers. So we need 1,000.” Christie was on the stage at the time. But that’s just one of numerous examples of Trump talking during the 2016 campaign about needing just 1,000 miles of border wall.

After Trump was elected, he began to move the goal posts — from 1,000 miles to 900 to 800 to 700 and even less. In the end, 458 miles of “border wall system” was built during Trump’s term, according to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection status report on Jan. 22, 2021. But most of it, 373 miles worth, was replacement barriers for primary or secondary fencing that was dilapidated or outdated. About 52 miles of new primary wall and 33 miles of secondary wall were built where no barriers had been before.

So Trump never built the length of wall he promised during the campaign, and Mexico never paid for any of the wall that was built. During his presidency, Trump tried to claim that Mexico was paying for the wall through the newly negotiated U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, which was not accurate. Trump later claimed he never meant that Mexico would “write out a check” to pay for the wall. But as we wrote, that wasn’t true either.

Attacking Trump on Immigration

Christie blamed Trump for rampant illegal immigration, in part because Trump “never changed one immigration law.” Trump may not have signed any major immigration bills, but he did institute numerous executive policies that immigration experts said transformed the immigration system and reduced the number of people trying to cross the border illegally.

“And when you watch illegal immigration pouring over our southern border, don’t wonder whose fault it is. It’s his [Trump’s],” Christie said. “It’s his fault, because he never changed one immigration law. In the two years that he had Republicans control the Congress, not one immigration law did he change. He didn’t build the wall like he told us to. And Mexico is laughing at us, at the idea that they were going to pay for a wall on their border.”

It’s true that Congress didn’t pass — and Trump didn’t sign — any major immigration bills. In fact, the last major immigration bill that made it into law happened in 1986. But Christie’s comment ignores the numerous changes Trump instituted simply through executive actions.

According to a February 2022 Migration Policy Institute report: “Over the course of four years, the Trump administration set an unprecedented pace for executive action on immigration, enacting 472 administrative changes that dismantled and reconstructed many elements of the U.S. immigration system. Humanitarian protections were severely diminished. The U.S.-Mexico border became more closed off. Immigration enforcement appeared more random. And legal immigration became out of reach for many. All of this was accomplished nearly exclusively by the executive branch, with sweeping presidential proclamations and executive orders, departmental policy guidance, and hundreds of small, technical adjustments. Congress, which has been deadlocked on immigration legislation for years, largely sidelined itself during this period of incredibly dynamic policy change.”

As the report details, Trump increased enforcement along the border, limited asylum eligibility, significantly reduced the admission of refugees and pressured Mexico to increase its own immigration enforcement. In one example, Trump instituted changes to the Migrant Protection Protocols, better known as the “Remain in Mexico” policy, so that asylum seekers were sent to Mexico to await their court appearances in the U.S.

The COVID-19 outbreak afforded Trump further opportunity to check illegal immigration, as his administration started using Title 42, a public health law that allowed border officials to immediately return Mexican migrants caught trying to enter the country illegally. With the pandemic officially over, the Biden administration finally lifted Title 42 in early May.

“The Trump administration was arguably the first to take full advantage of the executive branch’s vast authority on immigration,” the MPI report states. “Despite the relative fragility of executive actions when compared to legislation, the pace and comprehensiveness of the moves taken by Trump and his administration likely ensure that some will have lasting effects on the U.S. immigration system long after his time in office. At the very least, the Trump administration set a precedent for conducting far-reaching immigration changes through executive activism.”

Whether those policies worked is a matter of debate. As we noted in our story, “Trump’s Final Numbers,” the number of apprehensions for illegal border crossings fluctuated wildly during Trump’s presidency. After a steep decrease in his first year in office, apprehensions increased the following two years and were higher in Trump’s final year than all but one of the years under President Barack Obama. However, the number of apprehensions exploded after Biden took office. As we noted in our latest installment of “Biden’s Numbers,” apprehensions rose 342% when comparing the 12 months ending in March to Trump’s last year in office.

Pfizer’s COVID-19 Vaccine

In rejecting price controls on pharmaceutical drugs, Christie left the misleading impression that Pfizer alone had developed a COVID-19 vaccine and U.S. residents were the first to get access to it because Pfizer benefited from the U.S. free-market system.

In fact, Pfizer partnered with BioNTech, a German-based company, on the development of a COVID-19 vaccine, which became available at the same time in several countries, including the U.S., Canada and the European Union’s 27 member countries.

Christie, June 6: When COVID happened, the American people got the treatments first and the vaccines first, because we lived here. Because we have a pharmaceutical industry in this country and that we support in this country that is changing the face of medical treatment here and throughout the world. But we get it first. And we get it first because places like Pfizer invested billions of dollars of their own money, not government money, they didn’t take any government money, billions of dollars of their own money on a technology that they didn’t even exactly know how they were going to use it. And then when COVID came, the mRNA technology they were using turned out to be able to help significantly in getting rid of the pandemic we had in this country.

So I’m very concerned about us going to a system like Canada or Great Britain, where we control prices, fix prices, and we fix profits, because then there’s no reason to take risk.

While it’s true that Pfizer didn’t receive any U.S. government funding for COVID-19 vaccine trials or research and development, its partner did receive government funding from Germany. BioNTech received $445 million from the German government in September 2020 to accelerate development of its COVID-19 vaccine candidates.

Christie didn’t mention BioNTech, but it was the German company that developed the novel messenger RNA, or mRNA, vaccine against COVID-19. “We believe that by pairing Pfizer’s development, regulatory and commercial capabilities with BioNTech’s mRNA vaccine technology and expertise as one of the industry leaders, we are reinforcing our commitment to do everything we can to combat this escalating pandemic, as quickly as possible,” a top Pfizer executive said in a March 2020 statement announcing the collaboration.

Also, Pfizer and BioNTech benefited from years of U.S. government-funded research into the platform used by the companies to successfully develop a COVID-19 vaccine. (Moderna also benefited from the U.S.-funded research for its mRNA vaccine.)

The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, which is within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “has for years invested in the messenger RNA (or mRNA) platform for vaccine development, the technology used in the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines,” the journal Health Affairs wrote in May 2021. “Since 2006, Congress has appropriated hundreds of millions of dollars that BARDA used to develop the scientific infrastructure to produce vaccines in response to the threat of pandemic flu. Thus, the basic research undergirding the COVID-19 vaccines was largely publicly supported.”

Lastly, Christie’s suggestion that Pfizer made the vaccine available to U.S. residents first is incorrect.

On July 22, 2020, Pfizer/BioNTech signed an agreement with the U.S. to deliver up to 600 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine. A press release said, “The U.S. government will pay the companies $1.95 billion upon the receipt of the first 100 million doses, following FDA authorization or approval. The U.S. government also can acquire up to an additional 500 million doses.”

Pfizer/BioNTech soon signed agreements with Canada and the EU. The distribution of the vaccines depended on government authorization of the vaccine. Canada authorized the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine on Dec. 7, 2020, followed by the U.S. (Dec. 11, 2020) and the EU (Dec. 21, 2020).

It was this guarantee of a large market for COVID-19 vaccines that made the development of a vaccine financially attractive and less risky.

Canada and the U.S. started to administer Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines on the same day in Dec. 14, 2020, and the EU began its vaccination program later that month.

Obama’s Aid to Ukraine

While talking about “foreign policy mistakes” made by past U.S. presidents, Christie repeated the claim that Obama only provided Ukraine with “blankets” and “human rights aid” after Russia invaded Ukraine’s Crimea region and began seizing territory in eastern Ukraine in 2014.

“That’s how we get to the next mistake, which was, in my view, Barack Obama allowing the continued encroachment on Ukrainian territory by the Russians and doing nothing,” Christie said. “Nothing but sending them blankets, and, you know, human rights aid. No weapons to defend themselves. Well, the Russians took that as a signal we’re not going to stand up for them.”

Obama did resist calls from Ukraine’s then-President Petro Poroshenko to provide Ukraine with lethal weaponry. But, as we’ve written before, the U.S. did supply the country with hundreds of millions of dollars worth of nonlethal military and security aid. A January 2017 report from the Congressional Research Service said the U.S. gave over $1.3 billion in foreign assistance to Ukraine since armed hostilities with Russia arose in late 2013, including more than $600 million since 2014 in security aid.

Victoria Nuland, the assistant secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs at the time, detailed some of the security aid to Ukraine in March 2016 testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. For example, she said the U.S. had provided military training, communications equipment, vehicles, night-vision goggles and counter-mortar radar to detect incoming artillery fire.

Biden’s ‘Minor Incursion’ Remark

Later, Christie said that another “problem” was Biden’s January 2022 comments about what the U.S. and other NATO allies would do if Russia made a “minor incursion” into Ukraine.

“Joe Biden comes in, who appears weak, and said right in the beginning of his presidency, ‘Well, a small incursion probably wouldn’t be a problem,’” Christie claimed. “Well, here’s the problem everybody: Everybody’s definition of small is different. Vladimir Putin’s definition of small was, ‘I will take it all.’”

Christie was referring to remarks Biden made in a White House press conference about a month before Russia launched its attack on Ukraine in late February.

“I think what you’re going to see is that Russia will be held accountable if it invades,” Biden said. “And it depends on what it does. It’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion and then we end up having a fight about what to do and not do, etc. But if they actually do what they’re capable of doing with the forces amassed on the border, it is going to be a disaster for Russia if they further … invade Ukraine, and that our allies and partners are ready to impose severe costs and significant harm on Russia and the Russian economy.”

When another reporter asked him to clarify his comments, Biden said: “I think we will, if there’s something … where there’s Russian forces crossing the border, killing Ukrainian fighters, etc. — I think that changes everything. But it depends on what he [Putin] does, as to the exact — to what extent we’re going to be able to get total unity … on the NATO front.”

After the press conference, then-White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki released a statement that attempted to further explain what he meant.

“President Biden has been clear with the Russian President: If any Russian military forces move across the Ukrainian border, that’s a renewed invasion, and it will be met with a swift, severe, and united response from the United States and our Allies,” the statement said. It also noted that Russian “aggression short of military action, including cyberattacks and paramilitary tactics … will be met with a decisive, reciprocal, and united response.”

Trump’s New Hampshire Town Halls

Taking another shot at Trump, Christie falsely claimed that Trump, during the 2016 campaign, didn’t have town hall events in New Hampshire like the one Christie did on June 6.

“Did Donald Trump come to New Hampshire seven years ago and stand in the middle of the room, and take any question from anybody without knowing who you were, or what your question was going to be?” Christie asked those in the crowd. “Oh, no! He went over to the hockey arena and stood in front of a large crowd and gave his normal speech. Waited for all of you to cheer and chant his name, and then he left. Got on his airplane and went home to sleep in his apartment in New York.”

But Trump held a few town halls in New Hampshire during his first campaign for president — even if they were not as long as the one Christie did to start his 2024 campaign.

During the GOP primary, Trump took questions at town hall-style events in Rochester and Londonderry. Just before the GOP convention, he had a town hall in Manchester. Then during the general election, he had at least one other in Sandown.

Trump appeared to be selecting people randomly during some of the events. An NBC News story about the town hall in Manchester said “the audience was able to ask unvetted questions.” That resulted in “a number of wild questions” being asked, the story said.

The Sandown town hall was moderated by a conservative radio show host, Howie Carr, who wrote that he “sorted through all the index cards with the questions from the audience, selecting the ones I wanted to use.”

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Quick Take

Officials serving in President Joe Biden’s administration have taken their oaths of office, and most can be seen in videos from their swearing-in ceremonies. But a video circulating on social media falsely suggests that they haven’t been sworn in and are “acting as elected officials without swearing an allegiance to the Constitution.”

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Members of President Joe Biden’s administration have taken their oaths of office, reciting an oath that swears an allegiance to uphold the Constitution.

The founding document specifies the exact language of the oath only for the president of the United States. But it also says that other officials — including “all executive” officers – “shall be bound” by an oath.

The oaths taken by federal officeholders are seen in recorded swearing-in ceremonies for about a dozen Biden administration officials, contrary to a claim that’s been circulating on social media.

Ann Vandersteel, a conservative commentator and conspiracy theorist whom we’ve written about before, posted on Twitter in April, “BREAKING NEWS! PUBLIC OFFICIALS DEVOID OF OATHS OF OFFICE!” That claim has now been adapted and repeated in a video circulating on Instagram.

The original claim and the adapted video both suggest that without having taken their oaths, the officials are serving illegitimately.

The video uses audio from Vandersteel’s original claim, saying, “Do we have public servants in office who are acting as elected officials without swearing an allegiance to the Constitution?”

The video has garnered comments such as, “Those who have no sworn oaths need to be sent to gitmo for treason,” and, “Clears up a lot. No oath to our constitution then they can’t violate it.”

But the video gives the wrong impression.

First, all the officials named or referenced in the video, except for Vice President Kamala Harris, aren’t elected, as the video says. They were appointed. And those whose nominations were confirmed all took their oaths of office, as seen in videos of their swearing-in ceremonies or reported in press releases and news articles.

Vandersteel’s claim is based on a document labeled “Petition for Writ of Quo Warranto” that says it was submitted to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C.

The petition claims that the named officials may not have properly recorded their oaths of office and, if so, they should be removed.

But the federal statute it cites doesn’t have any bearing on the validity of the officeholder’s appointment. Rather, the statute — 5 U.S. Code, Section 3332 — requires officeholders to file an affidavit swearing that they haven’t paid for or otherwise bought their office.

The statute says that “within 30 days after the effective date of his appointment,” the officeholder must file their affidavit. That’s the key language, said Evan Bernick, an assistant professor at Northern Illinois University College of Law.

“The appointment is ‘effective’ regardless whether the affidavit is filed,” Bernick said in an email to FactCheck.org. (Emphasis is his.) “There is no suggestion here that filing is a condition precedent for taking office or essential to remaining in office.”

That’s also what the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit found when it rejected a similar argument leveled against Kenneth Starr, the independent counsel who led the Whitewater investigation during the Clinton administration. Starr’s authority was challenged because he didn’t file an affidavit, as required by Section 3332.

“Although Congress can impose conditions on an appointee which must be satisfied before that appointee takes office, the affidavit requirement found in 5 U.S.C. section 3332 is not such a condition precedent,” the court said. “In support of this conclusion, we need only refer to the language of section 3332. That language requires that the affidavit be filed ‘within 30 days after the effective date of [the] appointment.’… The use of the word ‘after’ expressly negates the claim that the filing of the affidavit is a condition precedent to Starr’s execution of his duties as Independent Counsel.”

So, Bernick said, “It makes about as much legal sense to say that failure to comply with the Section 3332 requirement results in lack of authority to hold office as it does to say that it results in a fine of a bajillion dollars. The statute provides for neither remedy.”

The only constitutional requirement is that they take an oath, he said, which is codified in Section 3331.

“There’s no argument that they didn’t comply with Section 3331,” Bernick said.

No case related to the petition cited by Vandersteel has been opened, according to our search of federal court records.

The officials named in the petition are:

Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (who recently announced she’ll be stepping down at the end of June). Walensky was sworn in on Jan. 20, 2021.

Janet Yellen, secretary of the Department of the Treasury. Yellen was sworn in on Jan. 26, 2021.

Jennifer Granholm, secretary of the Department of Energy. Granholm was sworn in on Feb. 25, 2021.

Janet Woodcock filled in as the acting commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from January 2021 to February 2022. We found no record of her swearing-in.

Xavier Becerra, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Becerra was sworn in on March 26, 2021.

Pete Buttigieg, secretary of the Department of Transportation. Buttigieg was sworn in on Feb. 3, 2021.

Antony Blinken, secretary of state. Blinken was sworn in on Jan. 27, 2021.

Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Mayorkas was sworn in on Feb. 2, 2021.

Miguel Cardona, secretary of Department of Education. Cardona was sworn in on March 2, 2021.

Gina Raimondo, secretary of Department of Commerce. Raimondo was sworn in on March 3, 2021.

Merrick Garland, attorney general. Garland was sworn in on March 11, 2021.

Robert Califf, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. Califf was sworn in on Feb. 15, 2022.

Marty Walsh, former secretary of the Department of Labor. Walsh was sworn in on March 23, 2021.

Julie Su has been nominated as the secretary of the Department of Labor, but hasn’t yet been confirmed. She is serving as acting secretary, pending her confirmation.

Lloyd Austin III, secretary of the Department of Defense. Austin was sworn in on Jan. 22, 2021.

Kamala Harris, vice president. Harris was sworn in on Jan. 20, 2021.

So, we found that 14 of the 16 officials named in the petition have taken the required oath. Of the other two officials, one was serving as an interim appointee and the other has not been confirmed yet.

As to the petition’s claim that the officials have not properly recorded their oaths of office, Kermit Roosevelt, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Pennsylvania, told us: “This sounds like one of the absurd social media conspiracy theories that float around. There is definitely no requirement in the Constitution that officials have proof that they took the oath of office.”

We reached out to the two lawyers listed on the petition for comment, but haven’t heard back.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

Jones, Brea. “Bogus ‘Sharpiegate’ Claim Resurfaces in Pennsylvania Election.” FactCheck.org. Updated 5 Dec 2022.

Bernick, Evan. Assistant professor, Northern Illinois University College of Law. Email interview with FactCheck.org. 2 Jun 2023.

Stobbe, Mike. “New CDC director takes over beleaguered agency amid crisis.” Associated Press. 20 Jan 2021.

U.S. Department of the Treasury. Press release. “Janet L. Yellen Sworn In As 78th Secretary of the United States Department of the Treasury.” 26 Jan 2021.

U.S. Department of Energy. Press release. “Jennifer M. Granholm Sworn in as 16th Secretary of Energy.” 25 Feb 2021.

U.S. Food & Drug Administration. Janet Woodcock M.D. 17 Feb 2022.

“Health and Human Services Secretary Swearing-in Ceremony.” C-SPAN. 26 Mar 2021.

“Transportation Secretary Buttigieg Swearing-in Ceremony.” C-SPAN. 3 Feb 2021.

“Swearing-In Ceremony for Secretary of State Blinken.” C-SPAN. 27 Jan 2021.

“Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas Swearing-in Ceremony.” C-SPAN. 2 Feb 2021.

“Secretary of Education Cardona Ceremonial Swearing-In.” C-SPAN. 2 Mar 2021.

“Commerce Secretary Ceremonial Swearing-In.” C-SPAN. 3 Mar 2021.

“Attorney General Swearing-In Ceremony.” C-SPAN. 11 Mar 2021.

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Press release. “HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra Welcomes Robert Califf Back to HHS as FDA Commissioner.” 17 Feb 2022.

The White House (@WhiteHouse). “Vice President Harris Ceremonially Swears In Marty Walsh as Secretary of Labor.” YouTube. 23 Mar 2021.

U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions. Nomination of Julie Su to serve as Secretary of Labor. 20 Apr 2023.

U.S. Department of Defense. Swearing In — Lloyd J. Austin III as Secretary of Defense. 22 Jan 2021.

“Kamala Harris Sworn In As Vice President.” C-SPAN. 20 Jan 2021.

Kermit Roosevelt. Professor for the administration of justice, Penn Carey Law, University of Pennsylvania. Email to FactCheck.org. 25 May 2023.

The post Biden Officials Have Taken Oaths of Office, Contrary to Social Media Claim appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Quick Take

An Oregon bill that would eliminate parental consent for minors to access reproductive health care, including abortion, has been criticized by conservatives. But a liberal social media post mischaracterizes their opposition by claiming Republicans said girls “should be allowed to be forced to give birth to their rapist’s baby if the rapist is their father.”

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Oregon Democrats have proposed legislation aimed at removing barriers to abortion and gender-affirming care, while Republican lawmakers have pushed back against the measure, saying it goes too far.

Social media posts from each side have focused on the bill’s proposed change to abortion access laws — in particular, parental consent requirements for some minors.

Current state law is a little unclear about the rules for parental consent for those under 15, but experts generally agree that those older than 15 can seek an abortion without consent from their parents and those younger than 15 cannot.

The law says that a medical provider can give “birth control information and services to any person without regard to the age of the person” and then, in the next paragraph, specifies that only those 15 and older can decide on medical treatment without the consent of a parent.

“Current law is that if someone is under 15, she’ll need to get consent from a parent to get an abortion in Oregon. If she’s 16 or 17, she doesn’t need parental consent to get an abortion in Oregon,” Anna Sortun, an Oregon lawyer who is contributing to a reproductive rights hotline run by the state’s attorney general, said in an email to FactCheck.org.

Similarly, the state Supreme Court wrote in a non-binding 2006 opinion that the current law “authorizes a minor female 15 years of age or older to consent to the performance of an abortion by a physician without the consent of the minor’s parent or guardian. A parent or guardian still must consent to the performance of an abortion for a minor female 14 years of age or younger.”

The proposed change — which has passed the Democrat-led House and is now awaiting a vote in the Democrat-controlled Senate — would definitively establish that people of any age could seek out reproductive health care, including abortion, without parental consent.

Under this bill, “a minor of any age can make that determination,” Lori Anne Sills, of the nonpartisan legislative counsel’s office, explained at an April 13 meeting of the Joint Committee on Ways and Means, which is made up of members from both chambers.

At that meeting, Republican state Sen. Tim Knopp asked Sills, “a 10-year-old could make that decision on their own, then?”

“Yes,” Sills said. “Let me clarify… under the House Bill 2002, a minor of any age can make reproductive health care decisions and that includes undergoing an abortion.”

“Alright, well, that’s just shocking,” Knopp said.

Knopp, the Senate Republican leader, released a joint statement with the Republican leader of the House later that day highlighting that point, saying, “10-year-olds would be able to get abortions without parental knowledge under the legislation.”

The official Twitter account for the Oregon House Republicans then emphasized that part of the bill on May 1, calling the measure “too extreme.”

But a popular liberal Twitter account run by Brian Tyler Cohen later misleadingly claimed on May 2: “Oregon Republicans are arguing that 10-year-old girls should be allowed to be forced to give birth to their rapist’s baby if the rapist is their father.”

But none of the Republicans had suggested that a 10-year-old should be forced to give birth. Rather, they argued that parents should be involved in medical decision-making for minors.

For example, the conservative-leaning organization Oregon Right to Life, which opposes the bill, submitted written testimony that said, in part, “Although we can agree that not every parent is a good parent (such as in cases of abuse), we recognize that parental involvement is wise in every other major decision in a child’s life. Removing parental involvement prior to making a life-changing decision significantly changes how minors consent to abortions. Parents should be empowered to help and support their children during a vulnerable and confusing time, not removed from the equation.”

Addressing Parental Permission

During the April 13 committee meeting, Democratic state Sen. Elizabeth Steiner — who is a doctor and a sponsor of the bill — responded to criticism that the change would cut out parents from major health decisions.

“While I firmly believe that every person in this room would have compassion on their 14-year-old child and want to engage with them on this conversation in a loving and caring way,” she said, “I can tell you from deep personal experience that, unfortunately, not every parent is like that.”

In most cases, though, a physician would encourage parental involvement, Steiner said.

“There is no desire to separate children from their parents in this,” she said.

The Oregon Attorney General’s Sexual Assault Task Force — which is a statewide non-profit that works to prevent and respond to sexual violence and is not part of the Department of Justice, as is suggested by the name — favors the legislation.

“If we want survivors of abuse and violence to have access to meaningful support services, we need to support reproductive health care,” the organization’s interim executive director, Bethany Walmsley, wrote in testimony submitted in support of the bill. “If we want to prevent abuse and violence from happening in the first place, we need to ensure people have access to health services without barriers.”

It’s rare for those under 15 to seek abortion, regardless of whether or not they are required to have parental permission.

In 2021, there were 14 abortions performed on patients younger than 15 in the state, according to the Oregon Health Authority. In the year before, there were 20 abortions.

That accounts for 0.3% of the state’s abortions in 2021, which is on par with the rates for that age group in other states regardless of parental consent laws, according to national data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Parental consent laws vary by state, with some requiring consent from one parent, a grandparent or other adult relative. According to the Guttmacher Institute, 36 states require parental consent and/or notification or the involvement of a family member, although a minor can obtain court approval for an abortion in all but one of those states.

We don’t know how many 10-year-olds would likely be affected since there is no data available for that age group and the bill’s primary sponsors didn’t answer our email seeking clarification. But few would likely be affected given the relatively low number of abortions and the similarly low number of births among those under 15. (There were 11 births in that age group in Oregon in 2021 and 10 in 2020.)

Hannah Kurowski, spokeswoman for the Oregon House Majority Office, which is Democratic, told us, “No minor in Oregon is ever alone in making these decisions.”

“Medical providers, who are trained to screen for abuse and protect the health and wellbeing of their patients, will always work with minor patients to ensure they have a network of safe adults to support them, especially when they are making significant medical decisions,” she said. “This bill does not change that.” (Emphasis is Kurowski’s.)

So, the focus among Republicans on the effect of the bill for that young age exaggerates its impact.

But the response from the liberal Twitter account mischaracterizes the point Republican opponents were making.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

Oregon Legislative Information. HB 2002 B. Accessed 8 May 2023.

Oregon Revised Statutes. ORS 109.640. Accessed 9 May 2023.

Sortun, Anna. Partner, Tonkon Torp. Email to FactCheck.org. 12 May 2023.

Oregon State Legislature. Joint Committee On Ways and Means. 13 Apr 2023.

Knopp, Tim and Vikki Breese-Iverson. Press release. “Oregon Democrats Pass Most Extreme Abortion and Gender-Altering Bill in Nation’s History Out of Committee.” 13 Apr 2023.

Anderson, Lois. Oregon Right to Life. Public testimony. 20 Mar 2023.

Oregon Health Authority. Induced Termination of Pregnancy in Oregon, 2015-2021. Accessed 8 May 2023.

Kortsmit, Katherine, et al. Abortion Surveillance — United States, 2020. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. 25 Nov 2022.

Oregon Health Authority. Oregon Annual Trends in Birth & Pregnancy 2010-2021. Accessed 9 May 2023.

Kurowski, Hannah. Spokeswoman, Oregon House Majority Office. Email to FactCheck.org. 10 May 2023.

The post Post Mischaracterizes GOP Opposition to Oregon Bill on Reproductive Health Care for Minors appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Q: Does a proposed law in Washington state say that the government can take children away from parents who don’t agree to gender transition surgery?

A: No. Under the bill, licensed youth shelters no longer have to report the location of a runaway child to the child’s parents if the child is seeking gender-affirming or reproductive care. Instead, the shelters must notify the state’s child services department.

FULL QUESTION

Is it true that SB-5599 say[s] that the government can take away minors from parents if they refuse to agree to gender Transition Surgery[?]

FULL ANSWER

A bill in the state of Washington that would allow licensed youth and homeless shelters to notify the state’s child services department in lieu of a parent in cases where a minor has left home in order to pursue gender-affirming or reproductive care is moving toward passage.

Critics say that it would interfere with parental rights, while advocates say it’s a necessary change to keep runaway minors safe and off the streets.

The bill has passed both houses of the legislature and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a Democrat, has signaled that he is likely to sign the legislation.

“We believe it is better to have a young person in a shelter with some adult supervision than having them out living on the streets — maybe being trafficked, sexually trafficked, maybe being exposed to drugs,” Inslee said at an April 13 press conference.

The proposed law would affect about a dozen minors each year, the office of state Sen. Marko Liias, who sponsored the bill, told us in an email.

“It’s not like kids are coming by the thousands or even by the hundreds,” Jarel Sanders — who is on the board of directors at Equal Rights Washington, which has lobbied for the bill — told FactCheck.org in a phone interview.

As it stands now, licensed shelters in Washington can contact the children’s services department instead of parents if there are “compelling reasons” to do so. The compelling reasons include circumstances in which notifying a parent would subject the minor to abuse or neglect, which is defined as sexual abuse or exploitation, injury, or negligent treatment or maltreatment.

The bill would add the pursuit of “protected health care services” to the list of “compelling reasons.” Protected health care services would include reproductive health care, meaning contraception and abortion, and gender-affirming care, which we’ll explain further below.

The law would still — as it currently does — require the children’s department to make a good faith attempt to notify a parent after a minor is referred for care and it must “offer services designed to resolve the conflict and accomplish a reunification of the family.”

That would be handled through the department’s Family Reconciliation Services, Nancy Gutierrez, a spokeswoman for the state’s Department of Children, Youth & Families, told FactCheck.org in an email.

FRS offers short-term family counseling and referrals for mental health care, among other services, with the aim of keeping families together.

“We would focus on offering services designed to resolve familial conflicts and accomplish reunification as directed by the legislation,” Gutierrez said.

Mike Faulk, a spokesman for Inslee, told us the same thing in an email.

“DCYF’s main role is to offer services designed to resolve family conflicts and accomplish a reunification of the family,” he said.

But online posts have misrepresented the proposed legislation, prompting confusion.

For example, Donald Trump Jr. wrote on Twitter, “Washington passes bill allowing the state to TAKE CHILDREN AWAY FROM PARENTS that do not consent to their child’s gender transition surgeries…”

And the conservative website 100 Percent Fed Up posted a headline claiming: “BREAKING: State of Washington Passes Bill Allowing Government to Take Minor Children Away From Parents If They Refuse To Agree to Gender Transition Surgery.” The site shared that story with its 1.5 million Facebook followers.

Those claims misleadingly exaggerate the bill’s impact.

No Change to Medical Consent Laws

The online claims suggest that the bill would create a new exception allowing minors to undergo major medical procedures without parental consent. But the bill doesn’t change the state’s medical consent laws.

Under state law, those under age 18 don’t generally have the right to make medical decisions without parental consent.

There is, however, an exception that was introduced in 2022 that allows homeless youth — as defined by the federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act — to get consent from a school nurse, school counselor or homeless student liaison for “nonemergency, outpatient, primary care services, including physical examinations, vision examinations and eyeglasses, dental examinations, hearing examinations and hearing aids, immunizations, treatments for illnesses and conditions, and routine follow-up care customarily provided by a health care provider in an outpatient setting, excluding elective surgeries.”

Kim Justice, executive director of Washington’s Office of Homeless Youth Prevention & Protection Programs, told FactCheck.org in an email: “SB 5599 does not make any changes to the types of health care available to homeless youth or how they access that care. The bill only pertains to situations in which the Department of Children, Youth, and Families would be notified instead of a parent regarding a youth’s admission to a shelter or host home program.”

A Range of Gender-Affirming Care

A related suggestion from the online posts is the emphasis on “gender transition surgeries,” as if surgery is the primary type of treatment.

But gender-affirming care is much more encompassing than just surgery. The Washington bill uses this definition: “[A] service or product that a health care provider… prescribes to an individual to support and affirm the individual’s gender identity.”

The World Health Organization has explained that “gender-affirmative health care can include any single or combination of a number of social, psychological, behavioural or medical (including hormonal treatment or surgery) interventions designed to support and affirm an individual’s gender identity.”

In addition, gender–affirming surgery — which includes facial surgery, surgery to either reduce or augment breasts and genital surgery — is generally performed on adults.

“Although current protocols typically reserve surgical interventions for adults,” says the American Academy of Pediatrics’ policy statement on care for transgender children and adolescents, “they are occasionally pursued during adolescence on a case-by-case basis, considering the necessity and benefit to the adolescent’s overall health and often including multidisciplinary input from medical, mental health, and surgical providers as well as from the adolescent and family.”

So surgical procedures are uncommon for minors in general, and that’s expected to be the case for those who would be affected by the Washington bill.

Some medical options for gender-affirming care for minors include puberty blockers and hormone therapy, the effects of which are either reversible or partially reversible.

The most recent standards of care published in 2022 by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health advise that adolescents, their parents and their doctors should understand the evidence for both medical and surgical interventions before starting treatment.

“It seems reasonable that decisions to move forward with medical and surgical treatments should be made carefully,” the association says. “Despite the slowly growing body of evidence supporting the effectiveness of early medical intervention, the number of studies is still low, and there are few outcome studies that follow youth into adulthood.”

The Washington bill would largely provide transgender youth with doctors who offer a safe and understanding environment — calling patients by their preferred pronouns, for example — and connecting them to counselling, Sanders said.

“Surgeries are not the majority,” he said, explaining that the bill is much more about social and therapeutic services. The goal is really to reduce suicide attempts, Sanders said.

Gender-affirming care, which can reduce that risk, is supported by more than two dozen major medical organizations, including the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the Endocrine Society and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

“Evidence has demonstrated that forgoing gender-affirming care can have tragic consequences,” the AMA wrote in a recent letter urging governors to reject bans on gender-affirming care. The letter cited heightened incidences of mental health disorders among transgender people, which, it said, “is widely thought to be a consequence of minority stress, the chronic stress from coping with societal stigma, and discrimination because of one’s gender identity and expression. Because of this stress, transgender minors also face a significantly heightened risk of suicide.”

“Transgender children, like all children, have the best chance to thrive when they are supported and can obtain the health care they need,” the letter said. “Studies suggest that improved body satisfaction and self-esteem following the receipt of gender-affirming care is protective against poorer mental health and supports healthy relationships with parents and peers. Studies also demonstrate dramatic reductions in suicide attempts, as well as decreased rates of depression and anxiety.”

Providing Safe Shelter

Another major claim in the online posts is that the bill would impact laws regarding the removal of children from their homes.

That’s not the case, said Laurie Lippold, director of public policy at Partners for Our Children, housed at the University of Washington, which researches the child welfare system.

Current state law requires Child Protective Services to initiate a process overseen by the courts to remove a child in the case of abuse or neglect.

This bill doesn’t propose changes to those laws.

It wouldn’t change any child abuse reporting laws or justification requirements for removing children from homes, Lippold said.

Rather, the bill is designed to ensure that minors who have left home have access to safe shelter.

So, the claims that Washington has passed a sweeping new bill that will result in teens being taken from their homes to undergo surgery are vastly overstating the reality. The proposed law would likely affect about a dozen vulnerable transgender minors each year by providing them with housing if they have left home in order to pursue certain types of gender-affirming or reproductive care.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org does not accept advertising. We rely on grants and individual donations from people like you. Please consider a donation. Credit card donations may be made through our “Donate” page. If you prefer to give by check, send to: FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, 202 S. 36th St., Philadelphia, PA 19104.

Sources

Johns, Michelle M., et al. “Transgender Identity and Experiences of Violence Victimization, Substance Use, Suicide Risk, and Sexual Risk Behaviors Among High School Students — 19 States and Large Urban School Districts, 2017.” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. 25 Jan 2019.

Herman, Jody L., Taylor N.T. Brown and Ann P. Haas. “Suicide Thoughts and Attempts Among Transgender Adults.” UCLA School of Law Williams Institute. Sep 2019.

Paley, Amit, et al. “2022 National Survey on LGBTQ Youth Mental Health.” Trevor Project. Accessed 22 Apr 2023.

Washington State Legislature. Bill Information — SB 5599. Accessed 21 Apr 2023.

Liias, Marko and Joe Nguyen. “What the right has wrong about caring for trans youth.” Seattle Times. Updated 24 Feb 2023.

Inslee, Jay (@GovJayInslee). “WATCH: Governor Inslee Media Availability.” YouTube. 13 Apr 2023.

Sanders, Jarel. Board of directors, Equal Rights Washington. Telephone interview with FactCheck.org. 20 Apr 2023.

Health and Human Services, Office of Population Affairs. Gender-Affirming Care and Young People. Accessed 21 Apr 2023.

Hut Erin. Spokeswoman, Sen. Marko Liias. Email to FactCheck.org. 26 Apr 2013.

Gutierrez, Nancy. Spokeswoman, Washington Department of Children, Youth & Families. Email to FactCheck.org 1 May 2023.

Faulk, Mike. Spokesman, Gov. Jay Inslee. Email to FactCheck.org. 1 May 2023.

Cleveland Clinic. Gender Affirmation (Confirmation) or Sex Reassignment Surgery. Reviewed 3 May 2021.

Liang, Fan. “Gender Affirmation Surgeries.” Johns Hopkins Medicine. Accessed 24 Apr 2023.

Rafferty, Jason, et al. “Ensuring Comprehensive Care and Support for Transgender and Gender-Diverse Children and Adolescents.” American Academy of Pediatrics. 1 Oct 2018.

Justice, Kim. Executive director, Washington’s Office of Homeless Youth Prevention & Protection Programs. Email to FactCheck.org. 1 May 2023.

Coleman, E., et al. “Standards of Care for the Health of Transgender and Gender Diverse People, Version 8.” International Journal of Transgender Health. 15 Sep 2022.

Smith, Timothy M. “What to know about gender-affirming care for younger patients.” American Medical Association. 21 Dec 2021.

American Psychiatric Association. “Position Statement on Access to Care for Transgender and Gender Diverse Individuals.” Jul 2018.

Endocrine Society. Transgender Health — An Endocrine Society Position Statement. 16 Dec 2020.

Revised Code of Washington. RCW 26.28.015. Age of majority for enumerated specific purposes. Accessed 25 Apr 2023.

Washington State Legislature. Bill Information — SB 5883. Accessed 25 Apr 2023.

Revised Code of Washington. RCW 7.70.065. Informed consent—Persons authorized to provide for patients who do not have capacity—Priority—Unaccompanied homeless minors. Accessed 25 Apr 2023.

Lippold, Laurie. Director of public policy, Partners for Our Children. Telephone interview with FactCheck.org. 20 Apr 2023.

Washington State Department of Children, Youth & Families. Placement Out-of-Home and Conditions for Return Home. Updated 20 Oct 2022.

The post Online Claims Misrepresent Washington Bill Aimed at Runaway Transgender Youth appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Quick Take

There’s no evidence the White House aided or had prior knowledge of the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago in August 2022. By law, the White House requested access for the FBI to review the classified documents that former President Donald Trump turned over seven months earlier. That doesn’t mean the White House was “involved” in the “raid” that came later and “lied” about it, as a conservative commentator claimed.

Full Story

The National Archives and Records Administration negotiated with representatives for former President Donald Trump throughout 2021 for the return of presidential records that should have been given to NARA when Trump left office. NARA was finally able to get back 15 boxes of materials from Trump’s team in January 2022.

When NARA noticed hundreds of pages of classified documents in the boxes, NARA’s Office of the Inspector General on Feb. 9, 2022, referred the matter to the Department of Justice. The DOJ then launched its criminal investigation into Trump’s handling of the documents, which were taken to Mar-a-Lago – his private club and residence in Palm Beach, Florida — when Trump’s presidency ended.

So that the FBI and other intelligence officials could review the boxes of documents that were transferred to NARA’s custody, the DOJ, as authorized by federal law, asked the White House to submit a “special access request” to NARA, the official custodian of presidential records. NARA said the White House submitted the request in April 2022 and access was subsequently granted to the FBI by NARA’s acting archivist.

The request for access to those particular documents doesn’t have anything to do with other classified documents that were later seized from Trump’s Florida estate on Aug. 8, 2022, when the FBI executed a search warrant that was obtained from a federal judge. FBI officials sought the warrant after Trump and his representatives failed to return additional classified documents and presidential records that were still at Mar-a-Lago.

However, some conservative commentators and groups have falsely claimed or suggested that recently obtained communications discussing the access request from last spring show that the White House was directly involved in, or had prior knowledge of, the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago last summer.

“It appears the White House used this special access request, where the White House says, ‘Hey, we need to get access to the prior administration’s stuff to make a decision now.’ They pulled that stunt to get this Mar-a-Lago raid … so that they could go in there,” Dan Bongino, a conservative political commentator, said in a video posted to his website’s Facebook page on April 12. 

Bongino, whose Facebook video had received roughly 99,000 views as of April 18, based his claim on information obtained by the conservative group America First Legal. He said the information “reveals that the Biden White House was involved with the Mar-a-Lago raid, and that the NARA, the National Archives, misled Congress” about its own participation.

America First Legal, which was started by former Trump White House advisers, made the same claim in the headline of an April 10 press release about emails and other records it recently procured from NARA through a request under the Freedom of Information Act.

But the FOIA documents do not show that the White House was behind the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago last year, or that President Joe Biden and other White House officials were “lying” about not having advance notice that Trump’s home would be searched, as Bongino and others also claimed.

The Press Release

America First Legal’s press release highlighted an Aug. 23, 2022, email it obtained from NARA. In the email, NARA’s general counsel, Gary Stern, informed his NARA colleagues that the Washington Post had published a story mentioning an email he sent to Trump’s representatives about a “special access request for the 15 Trump boxes” months earlier.

“On April 12, an Archives official emailed [former White House deputy counsel Pat] Philbin and John Eisenberg, another former deputy White House counsel, to tell them the Justice Department, via the Biden White House, had made the request,” the Post’s Aug. 23 story said. “The email offered the lawyers the opportunity to view the documents as well, but said the documents were too sensitive to be removed from the agency’s secure facility.”

In its press release, America First Legal went on to say, “It appears that the Biden White House and DOJ coordinated to obtain the Trump records and perhaps create a pretext for the law enforcement raid by way of a ‘special access request.’”

But as we said, the White House’s request for access was about allowing the FBI to review the 15 boxes of documents that NARA took possession of in January 2022 – not any classified documents that would later be recovered from Mar-a-Lago.

The ‘Special Access Request’

Once NARA discovered the boxes contained classified national security information, its Office of the Inspector General notified the Justice Department, which launched a criminal investigation.

The DOJ then asked the Biden White House to request that NARA provide the FBI with access to the boxes. That’s because, under the Presidential Records Act of 1978, executive branch departments and agencies, under certain conditions, can request special access to records in NARA custody through the sitting president, not through NARA.

The Presidential Records Act is the same federal law that says presidential records are the property of the government and requires the archivist of the U.S. to take custody of all such records when a president leaves office.

The White House, through its counsel’s office, formally asked NARA on April 11, 2022, to “provide the FBI access to the 15 boxes” that came from Mar-a-Lago, according to Debra Steidel Wall, the acting archivist. The following day, NARA informed Trump’s representatives that the agency would be making the documents available during the week of April 18, 2022.

But Trump’s team then proceeded to block the FBI from gaining access by requesting extensions to review the documents to determine if any were covered by executive privilege.

On April 29, 2022, the DOJ’s national security division explained to Trump’s representatives why it needed access to the documents.

“There are important national security interests in the FBI and others in the Intelligence Community getting access to these materials,” the DOJ’s national security division told the Trump team.

The national security division added: “According to NARA, among the materials in the boxes are over 100 documents with classification markings, comprising more than 700 pages. Some include the highest levels of classification, including Special Access Program (SAP) materials. Access to the materials is not only necessary for purposes of our ongoing criminal investigation, but the Executive Branch must also conduct an assessment of the potential damage resulting from the apparent manner in which these materials were stored and transported and take any necessary remedial steps.”

Finally, on May 10, Steidel Wall wrote to Evan Corcoran, one of Trump’s representatives, and said that Biden, given Trump’s executive privilege claims, had deferred a final ruling on the matter to her. Steidel Wall then explained that, after consulting with the assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel, she determined there was no reason to further delay granting access to the FBI, rejecting the former president’s assertion of executive privilege. 

She informed Corcoran that the FBI would be able to review the boxes within days.

America First Legal has argued that the special access request may have been used illegally in this case.

“The special access statute authorizes special access requests to an incumbent president only when the records in question are needed for ‘the conduct of current business’ of the White House,” its press release said. “Providing documents to the DOJ for purposes of a criminal investigation is not the ‘current business’ of the White House.”

In addition, Bongino’s video featured a clip of Jeff Clark, director of litigation for the conservative Center for Renewing America, who argued that the DOJ should have requested access to the documents via a subpoena, which is another option for gaining special access to presidential records.

However, in her letter, Steidel Wall said that the conditions for granting access via a request from the White House were “satisfied here” because, as the DOJ’s security division explained to Trump’s team, access also was necessary to “conduct an assessment of the potential damage” to national security “and take any necessary remedial steps.”

When they examined the contents in mid-May, FBI agents identified “184 unique documents bearing classification markings, including 67 documents marked as CONFIDENTIAL, 92 documents marked as SECRET, and 25 documents marked as TOP SECRET.”

Steidel Wall’s letter detailing the access request is not new information, as some have suggested. For example, the Bongino Report’s Facebook post had the headline: “EXPLOSIVE FOIA Request Exposes Biden Lie About Mar-a-Lago Raid.”

The request for FBI access has been public information for more than seven months.

John Solomon, a conservative writer and another one of Trump’s representatives to NARA, obtained the text of Steidel Wall’s letter and published it on his Just The News website on Aug. 22, 2022. NARA published the letter on its own website the next day, and the letter received press coverage at the time — including the Washington Post story mentioned in the email that America First Legal featured in its press release.

The Search of Mar-a-Lago

Furthermore, the White House’s request also was not the reason the Justice Department launched its investigation of Trump that led to the FBI searching Mar-a-Lago.

“Until the White House did this, this was an administrative dispute between the Archives and Trump,” Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, a conservative nonprofit organization, said in an April 12 interview with Glenn Beck. A clip of the exchange between Fitton and Beck has been viewed about 32,000 times on Facebook and over 49,000 times on Twitter.

“The Biden White House intervened to allow a criminal investigation of Trump by the Justice Department. It wouldn’t have happened but for White House intervention,” Fitton said.

But the access request came after the DOJ’s investigation had already begun.

That was made clear in the affidavit that the FBI filed to convince a federal judge to issue the warrant that allowed agents to search Trump’s property. A redacted version of the affidavit, which was unsealed weeks after the search, says:

FBI affidavit, Aug. 5, 2022: After an initial review of the NARA Referral, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) opened a criminal investigation to, among other things, determine how the documents with classification markings and records were removed from the White House (or any other authorized location(s) for the storage of classified materials) and came to be stored at the PREMISES; determine whether the storage location(s) at the PREMISES were authorized locations for the storage of classified information; determine whether any additional classified documents or records may have been stored in an unauthorized location at the PREMISES or another unknown location, and whether they remain at any such location; and identify any person(s) who may have removed or retained classified information without authorization and/or in an unauthorized space.

In fact, on May 11, 2022, as part of the FBI’s investigation, Trump’s office received a separate grand jury subpoena for additional classified records that the government believed were still stored at Trump’s Florida residence. That happened before the FBI was finally able to review the first 15 boxes of documents about a week later.

After requesting and being granted additional time to comply with the subpoena, a lawyer for Trump met with a DOJ lawyer and FBI agents who traveled to Mar-a-Lago on June 3. Trump’s representatives gave the officials an envelope containing dozens of additional classified documents that were found by Trump’s team in a storage room. 

According to a DOJ court filing, Trump’s representatives, in a certification letter, told the agents that a “diligent search was conducted” for “all documents that are responsive to the subpoena.” Counsel for Trump also told the agents “there were no other records stored in any private office space or other location” inside Mar-a-Lago, the DOJ recounted in the court filing.

Following the meeting, however, government authorities “developed evidence” that more classified documents remained at the Florida property, according to a subsequent DOJ court filing. The FBI eventually requested the warrant to conduct its own search, and the search warrant was signed and approved by a federal judge in Florida on Aug. 5.

According to the redacted affidavit, the FBI argued there was probable cause to believe classified documents and other presidential records remained at Mar-a-Lago, and that a search would yield evidence of multiple crimes, including obstruction. 

FBI agents executed the search warrant on Aug. 8, seizing 13 additional boxes that “contained documents with classification markings, and in all, over one hundred unique documents with classification markings … more than twice the amount produced on June 3, 2022, in response to the grand jury subpoena,” according to another DOJ court filing.

White House Denials

On Aug. 9, the day after the FBI’s search, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a press briefing that White House officials learned of the search from news reports and that “no one at the White House was given a heads up,” including the president. “No, that did not happen,” she said.

Biden later said himself that he did not have advance notice of the FBI’s plans. “None. Zero. Not one single bit,” he said while taking questions from White House reporters on Aug. 25.

But in the video from his show, Bongino said the information America First Legal got through a FOIA request showed that Jean-Pierre and the White House were caught “lying” about being “stunned by the “Mar-a-Lago raid.” 

That information is not evidence that the White House knew the FBI search was going to happen.

As Jean-Pierre said in an Aug. 29, 2022, press briefing, the access request for the FBI, which was mentioned in Steidel Wall’s letter and Stern’s email, is “completely different” from the search that happened later.

The request was for the review of a separate set of documents than those recovered from Mar-a-Lago by FBI agents in August, and the request came after the Justice Department had already opened its criminal investigation into Trump’s handling of presidential records after leaving office.

None of that means the White House used the special access request “to get this Mar-a-Lago raid,” as Bongino said, or that the FBI search “wouldn’t have happened” otherwise, as Fitton claimed. The FBI was merely following the law when it requested special access to records in NARA custody through the White House.

Other fact-checkers have previously written about similar false social media claims.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

Kiely, Eugene. “Timeline of FBI Investigation of Trump’s Handling of Highly Classified Documents.” FactCheck.org. 30 Aug 2022.

Kiely, Eugene, et al. “Q&A on the FBI’s Search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Home.” FactCheck.org. 9 Aug 2022, updated 13 Aug 2022.

Steidel Wall, Debra, acting archivist, National Archives and Records Administration. Letter to Evan Corcorcan. 10 May 2022.

United States District Court, Southern District of Florida. “Affidavit in Support of an Application Under Rule 41 for a Warrant to Search and Seize.” Redacted copy. 5 Aug 2022, filed 9 Sep 2022.

United States District Court for the District of Columbia. “Emergency Application for Order Pursuant to FED.R.CRIM.P.6(E)(3)(e)(i) for Disclosure of Matter Occurring Before a Grand Jury.” Redacted copy. 29 Aug 2022, filed 2 Sep 2022.

United States District Court, Southern District of Florida, West Palm Beach Division. Trump v United States of America. Case No. 22-CV-81294-CANNON. “United States’ Response to Motion for Judicial Oversight and Additional Relief.” 30 Aug 2022.

National Archives and Records Administration. “April 12, 2023, statement.” 12 Apr 2023.

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Stuessy, Meghan. “The Presidential Records Act: An Overview.” Congressional Research Service. 17 Dec 2019.

Solomon, John. “Biden White House facilitated DOJ’s criminal probe against Trump, scuttled privilege claims: memos.” Just the News. 22 Aug 2022.

Whedon, Ben. “Full text of National Archives letter to Trump on classified documents.” Just the News. 22 Aug 2022.

Dawsey, Josh, et al. “FBI’s Mar-a-Lago search followed months of resistance, delay by Trump.” Washington Post. 23 Aug 2022.

Cheney, Kyle, et al. “Documents recovered at Mar-a-Lago were among government’s most classified, letter shows.” Politico. 23 Aug 2022.

White House. “Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.” Transcript. 9 Aug 2022.

White House. “Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.” Transcript. 29 Aug 2022.

White House. “Remarks by President Biden Announcing Student Loan Debt Relief Plan.” Transcript. 25 Aug 2022.

Cercone, Jeff. “Document doesn’t prove Biden ‘lied’ about Mar-a-Lago probe.” PolitiFact. 31 Aug 2022.

Marcelo, Philip. “Judge’s order doesn’t show Biden ordered FBI search.” Associated Press. 6 Sep 2022.

America First Legal. “America First Legal’s Investigation Reveals the Biden White House Was Involved With the Mar-a-Lago Raid and that NARA Misled Congress; AFL Launches Additional Investigation.” Press release. 10 April 2022.

Bongino Report. “EXPLOSIVE FOIA Request Exposes Biden Lie About Mar-a-Lago Raid.” Video. Facebook. 12 Apr 2023.

Judicial Watch. “Biden White House IMPLICATED In Trump Raid!” Video. Facebook. 14 Apr 2023.

Glenn Beck (@glennbeck). “Judicial Watch’s @TomFitton  tells me the FBI would nave NEVER raided Mar-A-Lago if it wasn’t for the Biden White House: ”Special access’ means we want the feds to go after Trump.'” Twitter. 12 Apr 2023.

The post FBI Access Request Is Not Evidence White House ‘Lied’ About Not Being ‘Involved’ in ‘Mar-a-Lago Raid’ appeared first on FactCheck.org.

SciCheck Digest

Public health organizations have explained that the reason there were far fewer cases of the flu in 2020 and 2021 was likely due to measures adopted to slow the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19, such as handwashing and social distancing. But a post on social media has spread the false claim that the dip in flu cases suggests that COVID-19 was a hoax.

How is COVID-19 transmitted?

Full Story

Measures adopted to slow the spread of COVID-19 — such as wearing masks, keeping six feet apart, washing hands frequently and staying home — also slowed the spread of viruses that cause the flu.

That’s likely the reason that recorded cases of influenza dropped dramatically in 2020 and 2021, as explained by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization, and many other researchers and scientists.

The flu is caused by influenza viruses that spread mostly through respiratory droplets, similar to the way the virus that causes COVID-19 spreads. Since the 2011-2012 flu season, the number of flu cases in the U.S. has been around 30 million each year with about 40,000 deaths, according to the CDC, which did not give estimates for the 2020-2021 season because of the low rates of infection.

But a post has gone viral on social media showing a graph from the WHO that demonstrates the dip in cases of the flu. The post includes text that references a well-worn but false claim that COVID-19 was a hoax, saying, “One of the greatest mysteries of COVID-19: Where did the flu go in 2020 and 2021?”

Social media users responded with comments such as, “Pretty much they repackaged that year’s flu strain as the rona & took away your civil liberties & destroyed the lives and businesses of thousands, if not millions of people.”

The post originated on Twitter, where it has amassed more than 7 million views, according to the site, and elicited a comment — “good question” — from Twitter CEO Elon Musk. It then spread as a screenshot meme to other platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, where it generated such inaccurate comments as “COVID is basically the influenza Flu.”

We’ve already addressed similar claims that have spun the falsehood that cases of the flu were wrongly counted as or confused with COVID-19.

A WHO spokesperson told us in an email on April 12 that the current claim is also “not accurate,” adding, “the surveillance systems/testing for the two are entirely different.”

That’s because the flu and COVID-19 are different illnesses caused by different viruses. As we said, the flu is caused by various types of influenza viruses. COVID-19, however, is caused by a specific type of coronavirus that was first identified at the end of 2019 — SARS-CoV-2. That virus spreads more easily than viruses that cause the flu, and COVID-19 has killed 1.1 million people in the U.S. since it emerged just over three years ago, which dwarfs the annual 40,000 killed by the flu.

COVID-19 killed more than 260,000 people in the U.S. in 2022, according to the CDC. In 2021 it killed more than 470,000 and in 2020 it killed more than 354,000, making it the third-leading cause of death in both years — behind heart disease and cancer — according to the National Institutes of Health. It’s likely to be the third leading cause of death again in 2022, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, although official figures haven’t yet been released.

The WHO spokesperson also reiterated the point that’s been made widely by public health organizations and scientists for years: “One of the postulated reasons for the low levels of influenza activity was the effect of lockdowns and travel restrictions during that period.”

In fact, the level of recorded influenza cases for one strain of flu virus was so low in that period that researchers thought it may have disappeared entirely.

So, it’s wrong to suggest that the dip in recorded cases of the flu during the pandemic is a mystery or that COVID-19 is a hoax. The reduction in flu cases isn’t a mystery, and it’s been explained as the result of widely adopted measures that affect the spread of viruses.

Editor’s note: SciCheck’s articles providing accurate health information and correcting health misinformation are made possible by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The foundation has no control over FactCheck.org’s editorial decisions, and the views expressed in our articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the foundation.

Sources

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) — How to Protect Yourself & Others. Archived 22 Oct 2020.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2020-2021 Flu Season Summary. 25 Oct 2021.

Karlsson, Erik, et al. “Review of global influenza circulation, late 2019 to 2020, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on influenza circulation.” Weekly Epidemiological Records. World Health Organization. 25 Jun 2021.

Rubin, Rita. “Influenza’s Unprecedented Low Profile During COVID-19 Pandemic Leaves Experts Wondering What This Flu Season Has in Store.” Journal of the American Medical Association. 25 Aug 2021.

World Health Organization. Influenza Laboratory Surveillance Information — Virus detections by subtype reported to FluNet. Accessed 11 Apr 2023.

Fichera, Angelo. “Instagram Post Distorts Facts on COVID-19 Death Reporting.” FactCheck.org. 16 Dec 2020.

Gambardello, Joseph A. “Doctors in Video Falsely Equate COVID-19 With a ‘Normal Flu Virus.’” FactCheck.org. 21 Oct 2020.

Spokesperson, World Health Organization. Email to FactCheck.org. 12 Apr 2023.

Mole, Beth. “COVID may have pushed a leading seasonal flu strain to extinction.” Ars Technica. 30 Sep 2022.

The post Fewer Cases of Flu Due to Pandemic Precautions, Contrary to Viral Claim appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Quick Take  

Social media posts and former President Donald Trump are sharing an edited video of President Joe Biden to make the unfounded claim that Biden “is coordinating these Trump indictments.” Biden’s comments, made in 2022, were related to international concerns about American democracy, not Trump’s legal battles.

Full Story

Following the 2022 midterm elections, President Joe Biden spent about an hour speaking to and answering questions from reporters at the White House.

Now, a 16-second clip from that Nov. 9 press conference is being used to support former President Donald Trump’s claim that the criminal charges brought against him in New York amount to “election interference” orchestrated by top Democrats.

Rogan O’Handley, a conservative influencer who goes by the online moniker “DC_Draino,” posted the clip to Truth Social on April 3 with text that said, “Biden all but confirmed that his team is coordinating these Trump indictments to ‘stop Trump from taking power again.'”

Trump then amplified the post, sharing it with his 5 million followers.

Social media users on mainstream platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, have been sharing copies of the claim, too.

O’Handley’s post went viral a day before the indictment against Trump was unsealed, revealing that Manhattan prosecutors have accused Trump of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to alleged hush-money payments during his 2016 presidential campaign.

Trump is also facing several other potential legal actions, including an investigation into his handling of classified documents, a criminal inquiry into his attempted interference with the 2020 election results in Georgia, a civil inquiry in New York into his family’s business practices, and the continuing investigation into his role in instigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Trump has continued to dismiss his mounting legal troubles as a conspiracy among Democrats to botch his run for president in 2024. “It’s a new way of cheating on elections,” Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity in a March 27 interview. “It’s called election interference.”

But Biden’s November remarks aren’t a confirmation that “his team is coordinating these Trump indictments.”

Here’s what the original video showed:

CNN’s chief White House correspondent, Phil Mattingly, asked Biden a multipart question over the course of about five minutes. The question centered on how world leaders should view the potential of Trump running again for office.

In his answer, Biden referred to the first G7 meeting he attended after taking office, where he told world leaders, “America is back.”

“One of them turned to me and said, ‘For how long,'” Biden said at the press conference, explaining that other leaders had expressed concern about the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, in which Trump’s supporters tried to stop the certification of Biden’s presidential victory.

“They want to know: Is the United States stable,” Biden said.

“They’re very concerned that we are still the open democracy we’ve been and that we have rules and the institutions matter. And that’s the context in which I think that they’re looking at: Are we back to a place where we are going to accept decisions made by the court, by the Congress, by the government, et cetera,” he said.

Biden was referring to Trump’s failed attempt to remain in power by trying to carry out what the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol described as an “unconstitutional and illegal theory.”

Trump had pressured then-Vice President Mike Pence — who had a ministerial role in the official congressional counting of the electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021 — to reject certified electors from some states that Trump lost and allow Republican-controlled legislatures in those states to send Congress new slates of Trump electors. “If Vice President @Mike_Pence comes through for us, we will win the Presidency,” Trump tweeted on Jan. 6, 2021.

After Biden answered his question, Mattingly followed up by asking about Trump’s future: “The entire genesis of that G7 conversation was tied to your predecessor, who is about to launch another campaign. So how do you reassure them, if that is the reason for their questioning, that the former president will not return or that his political movement, which is still very strong, will not once again take power in the United States?”

To which Biden responded: “Well, we just have to demonstrate that he will not take power by — if we — if he does run. I’m making sure he, under legitimate efforts of our Constitution, does not become the next President again.”

Those last two sentences from Biden are the only part of his answer that’s included in the clip circulating on social media.

As we said, the clip doesn’t show that Biden “all but confirmed” his team is coordinating the various investigations facing Trump. It shows that Biden responded to a reporter’s question in 2022 about international views on the former president’s political future and suggested that, unlike Trump, he wouldn’t attempt to use unconstitutional means to remain in power.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

“President Biden News Conference on Midterm Election Results.” C-SPAN. 9 Nov 2022.

Farley, Robert and D’Angelo Gore. “What’s in Trump’s Indictment?” FactCheck.org. 4 Apr 2023.

Farley, Robert and Eugene Kiely. “Q&A on Stormy Daniels’ Payment.” FactCheck.org. Updated 27 Feb 2019.

Bragg, Alvin. Manhattan District Attorney. Press release. “District Attorney Bragg Announces 34-Count Felony Indictment of Former President Donald J. Trump.” 4 Apr 2023.

Madhani, Aamer. “Biden declares ‘America is back’ in welcome words to allies.” Associated Press. 19 Feb 2021.

House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Final report. 22 Dec 2022.

Kiely, Eugene, et al. “Trump’s Falsehood-Filled ‘Save America’ Rally.” FactCheck.org. 6 Jan 2021.

Trump, Donald (@realDonaldTrump). “If Vice President @Mike_Pence comes through for us, we will win the Presidency. Many States want to decertify the mistake they made in certifying incorrect & even fraudulent numbers in a process NOT approved by their State Legislatures (which it must be). Mike can send it back!” Twitter. 6 Jan 2021.

White House. Remarks by President Biden in Press Conference. 9 Nov 2022.

The post Biden’s 2022 Remarks Not Related to Trump Indictment, Contrary to Online Posts appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Quick Take  

A tweet posted years ago by the late comedian Norm Macdonald has been altered to falsely claim that he’d commented on the possibility of a transgender school shooter back in 2016. A search of Macdonald’s account shows he didn’t write that transphobic tweet.

Full Story

Among the flotsam circulating on social media after the deadly shooting at a Christian elementary school in Nashville is a manipulated tweet attributed to the late comedian Norm Macdonald.

Macdonald, who died of cancer in 2021, portrayed the “Weekend Update” anchor on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” from 1994 to 1998, offering comments on news of the day.

But he did not forecast a school shooting carried out by a transgender person in 2023.

Purveyors of disinformation, though, including conspiracy theorist Stew Peters, have been sharing a bogus tweet made to look like it came from Macdonald’s Twitter account in December 2016.

The phony tweet says: “What terrifies me is if a tranny were to shoot up a school full of children and kill a bunch of innocent kids. Imagine the pain when they’re misgendered by the media?”

Peters, for example, shared that fake tweet in a post on Truth Social with a message that said, “Norm was ahead of his time.”

Others shared the fabricated tweet on Instagram.

But Macdonald’s Twitter account shows that on Dec. 16, 2016 at 12:53 a.m. — the same timestamp in the memefied fake tweet — he wrote: “What terrifies me is if ISIS were to detonate a nuclear device and kill 50 million Americans. Imagine the backlash against peaceful Muslims?”

Also, a search of the account shows that no other tweet exists using the language now being shared.

Even though the account no longer has a blue verification badge, we know that it was Macdonald’s Twitter account because it had been verified while he was alive, as is shown in the Internet Archives’ Wayback Machine. Also, the account — which has more than a million followers — had been tagged over the years by other major accounts, including the publisher of Macdonald’s book.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

Wegner, Rachel. “‘I want to go home’: Nashville shooting 911 calls capture terror inside Covenant School.” The Tennessean. 30 Mar 2023.

Genzlinger, Neil. “Norm Macdonald, ‘Saturday Night Live’ Comedian, Dies at 61.” New York Times. Updated 3 Oct 2021.

Macdonald, Norm (@normmacdonald). “What terrifies me is if ISIS were to detonate a nuclear device and kill 50 million Americans. Imagine the backlash against peaceful Muslims?” Twitter. 16 Dec 2016.

Macdonald, Norm (@normmacdonald). Twitter account. Accessed 30 Mar 2023.

The post Bogus Norm Macdonald Tweet Circulates in Aftermath of Nashville Shooting appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Quick Take  

False claims about the shooter at a Christian elementary school in Nashville have been swirling on social media. Police shot and killed the suspect, whom they identified as 28-year-old Audrey Elizabeth Hale. The person was not named “Samantha Hyde” — a reference to a long-running internet hoax.

Full Story

Police have identified 28-year-old Audrey Elizabeth Hale as the shooter who killed six people — including three 9-year-old children — at the Covenant School, a Christian elementary school in Nashville, Tennessee, on March 27.

The shooting took place at about 10 a.m., and by 10:30 a.m. officers had shot and killed Hale inside the school, according to the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department.

The department reported the shooting on Twitter at noon and by 2 p.m. it had announced that the shooter was a “28-year-old Nashville woman.”

Officials released the shooter’s name about an hour later.

In the meantime, though, internet trolls adapted a well-worn hoax that follows many mass shootings.

Since 2015, some social media users have spread false claims that a comedian named Sam Hyde is the suspect in the immediate aftermath of a mass shooting.

In this case, claims began circulating that “Samantha Hyde” was the suspect.

But, as we said, the name released by police was Audrey Hale, and the latest take on the Sam Hyde hoax is just that — a hoax.

Other social media users appeared to be confused about the gender identity of the suspect, which may be due to the lack of clarity in what was a rapidly developing story.

John Drake, chief of the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department, said at an afternoon press briefing on March 27 that “she [Hale] does identify as transgender.” Later at the same press conference, Drake appeared to again mistakenly say that Hale was a transgender woman.

So some social media accounts have posted claims that Hale was a “TransGender female” or that Hale was “a biological male,” which is not correct.

Don Aaron, a police spokesman, later clarified Drake’s remarks in a statement to the Washington Post. “Audrey Hale is a biological woman who, on a social media profile, used male pronouns,” Aaron told the newspaper.

Many details about the shooting and the shooter are yet to be released by authorities. But what we know so far is that police have identified the suspect as Audrey Hale, not “Samantha Hyde,” and that they have said Hale was transgender.

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial content.

Sources

Metropolitan Nashville Police Department. Press release. “Investigation Continuing into Today’s Active Shooter Murders at Covenant School.” 27 Mar 2023.

Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (@MNPDNashville). “An active shooter event has taken place at Covenant School, Covenant Presbyterian Church, on Burton Hills Dr. The shooter was engaged by MNPD and is dead. Student reunification with parents is at Woodmont Baptist Church, 2100 Woodmont Blvd.” Twitter. 27 Mar 2023.

Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (@MNPDNashville). “UPDATE: 3 students & 3 adult staff members from Covenant School were fatally shot by the active shooter, who has now been identified as a 28-year-old Nashville woman.” Twitter. 27 Mar 2023.

USA Today (@USATODAY). “Watch: Nashville school shooting press conference held.” YouTube. 27 Mar 2023.

Hicks, Liza. “Why Sam Hyde Goes Viral After Every Mass Shooting.” BuzzFeed. Accessed 28 Mar 2023.

Mueller, Kim, et al. “Nashville school shooter who killed 6 was heavily armed, left ‘manifesto.’” Washington Post. 27 Mar 2023.

The post Old Hoax Shows Up in Posts About Nashville School Shooter appeared first on FactCheck.org.