How 'Cheapfake' Biden videos enrapture right-wing media A particularly effective attack on a political candidate can come in the form of a video snippet that appears to reinforce an existing stereotype. The social media feed of the Republican National Commitee regularly churns out misleading clips of President Biden, 81, intended to show that he is too old for the job. Biden's Republican opponent, former president Donald Trump, turned 78 last week, but polls show there is less concern about his physical and mental fitness for office. So there is an incentive for the Republicans to keep hammering away at a perceived vulnerability for Biden. We examined two widely circulated video clips of Biden — one where he supposedly wandered off from other Group of Seven leaders and another in which the RNC claimed he appeared to freeze at a White House concert. As we demonstrated with video clips that showed the full story, both were highly misleading. But the RNC's dismal track record — which we have highlighted on multiple occasions — has not stopped right-leaning outfits, such as the New York Post and Britain's Telegraph newspaper, from echoing the RNC's framing and reinforcing its narrative that Biden has lost a step. To read our full report and find out the Pinocchio rating, please click the link. 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. Previewing likely debate falsehoods We've spent much of the week getting ready for next week's presidential debate by assembling pre-written fact checks on claims that we think each candidate would be tempted to make during the debate. We've learned over time that rarely do presidential contenders come into a debate with a new assertion; they've been road-testing claims for months, seeing what gets the best audience reaction. It's the equivalent of fine-tuning a play in regional theaters before bringing it to Broadway. Here's a list of statements we think are likely to be used in the debate, with links to previous fact checks. Readers are welcome to create their own bingo or drinking game. We'll report next week what our batting average was. - "I had the biggest tax cut in history" (Trump) — The 2017 tax cut ranks eighth in the past century.
- "I've cut the federal deficit by over 1 trillion dollars." (Biden) — The post-pandemic deficit already was supposed to go down, and Biden's policies increased the debt
- "Biden's let in 15 million people over the border" (Trump) — This number is three times too high
- "Billionaires pay an average tax rate of 8.2 percent" (Biden) — This is a White House-generated statistic for taxes under a hypothetical tax system
- "Almost 100 percent of new jobs have gone to illegal aliens" (Trump) — There have been 6.8 million new jobs for native-born workers under Biden
- "Jobs are the highest in American history." (Biden) — That's because the population is bigger
- "There were no terrorist attacks when I was president" (Trump) — There were two tied to Islamist militants that resulted in fatalities.
- "We lost over 1,200,000 people because of his slow start." (Biden) — More than 60 percent of these covid deaths took place in Biden's presidency.
- "We left behind $85 billion in military equipment in Afghanistan" (Trump) — The real number is about $7 billion.
| We're always looking for fact-check suggestions. You can reach us via email, Twitter (@GlennKesslerWP and @AdriUsero) or Facebook. We're also on TikTok. Read about our process and rating scale here, and sign up for the newsletter here. About the cats: It's a Friday and sometimes our fact checks deal with heavy or depressing subjects. So we hope to bring a smile to your face. Scroll down to read other election-related fact checks |
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