| The freedom of the press is crucial to the Fact Checker. No one likes getting Pinocchios, but we hand them out every weekday to the most powerful politicians and organizations in the United States — on both sides of the aisle. Celebrate World Press Freedom Day, and our ability to call out false claims, with a subscription to The Washington Post. Just $29 gets you a full year of unlimited access to everything The Post publishes, from our Pulitzer Prize-winning climate team to our book reviews to all of our Opinions columnists. Click here to subscribe now. Four Pinocchios for the New York Post and Fox News The story was "too good to check." The New York Post reported that migrant children from Central America were being greeted at a federally run shelter in Long Beach, Calif., with "welcome kits" that included a children's book published by Vice President Harris in 2019. The article ran on the New York Post's front page on April 24, along with a photograph of a single copy of Harris's book, "Superheroes Are Everywhere," placed on a cot at the Long Beach shelter. How did a photo of one book become "Kamala swag for all the kids"? Fox News quickly picked up and amplified the New York Post's story. It spread to other parts of right-wing media and eventually became Twitter fodder for top Republicans including Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel, both of whom suggested Harris might be enriching herself with taxpayer funds. All based on a single photograph of a single book. When we reached out to Long Beach officials, they told us only one copy of the children's book had been donated during a citywide book-and-toy drive organized for the migrant children. We published a fact-check on Tuesday, awarding Four Pinocchios. Little did we know a chain reaction would ensue. First, the New York Post took down two articles with the false claim about "welcome kits." Then, the articles were restored with corrections. The reporter who had written the original New York Post article resigned, claiming on Twitter that she had been "ordered" to write an "incorrect" story about the vice president. Fox News eventually appended a correction to its own article (after flogging it for two days on TV). It's a good example of how misinformation spreads on right-wing media and gets amplified by Republican leaders. The claim had begun to spread like wildfire, even forming the basis of a Fox News question at a White House press briefing, before we debunked it. Enjoy this newsletter? Forward it to someone else who'd like it! If this email was forwarded to you, sign up here. Did you hear something fact-checkable? Send it here; we'll check it out. Biden's 100-day scorecard After four years of Donald Trump and his gusher of falsehoods, President Biden has brought back a semblance of normalcy at the White House. But he still makes Pinocchio-worthy statements on occasion, flubbing talking points or pitching his plans with misleading lines or arguments missing some context. Among the most notable falsehoods of Biden's first 100 days in office was his claim — which he made three times — that Georgia's controversial Republican-backed election law had shortened voting hours. He earned Four Pinocchios. More typical for Biden, when he uttered a false statement, was some subtle truth-stretching. He spun that if Congress passed his infrastructure plan, "the economy" would create 19 million additional jobs; only 2.7 million of those jobs could be attributed to the proposal itself. He asserted that as vice president he helped craft an $800 billion strategy to help Central America; it was $750 million. Through April 29, his 100th day, Biden made 78 false or misleading statements, according to a Washington Post Fact Checker analysis of every speech, interview, tweet or public statement made by the president. That compares to 511 such statements in Trump's first 100 days. We're always looking for fact-check suggestions. You can reach us via email, Twitter (@GlennKesslerWP, @rizzoTK, @mmkelly22) or Facebook. Read about our process and rating scale here, and sign up for the newsletter here. Scroll down for this week's Pinocchio roundup. | By Glenn Kessler, Salvador Rizzo and Adriana Usero ● Read more » | | | By Glenn Kessler, Adrián Blanco and Tyler Remmel ● Read more » | | | | 
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