CNN
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Former President Donald Trump accepted the Republican presidential nomination on Thursday with the most dishonest speech of the four-day Republican National Convention, making greater than 20 false claims by CNN’s depend.
Many of the false claims had been ones Trump has made earlier than, some of them for years. They spanned all kinds of subjects, together with the economic system, immigration, crime, overseas coverage and elections. Some of them had been wild lies, others smaller exaggerations. Some had been in his ready textual content (like the absurd declare that he left the Biden administration a world at peace), whereas he ad-libbed others (akin to his regular lies that Democrats cheated in the 2020 election and that the US is experiencing the worst inflation it has ever had).
Below is a reality verify of some of Trump’s false or deceptive remarks, plus a reality verify of claims made by different Thursday conference audio system.
Former President Donald Trump claimed that there’s report inflation below President Joe Biden.
Facts First: Trump’s declare is fake. The present inflation fee, 3% in June 2024, is nowhere close to the all-time record of 23.7%, set in 1920.
Trump might pretty say that the inflation rate hit a 40-year excessive in June 2022, when it was 9.1%, however it has since plummeted.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump mentioned Thursday that he “got along with” North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and “we stopped the missile launches from North Korea.”
“But, no, I got along with him,” Trump mentioned, “and we stopped the missile launches from North Korea. Now North Korea is acting up again.”
Facts First: Trump’s declare that he “stopped the missile launches” from North Korea is deceptive. While missile launches did pause from North Korea for a interval of time throughout his administration, they began up once more earlier than he left workplace.
A May 2019 launch of what was assessed to be a short-range ballistic missile was North Korea’s first since 2017, which was seen as an indication of rising frustration from Kim on the state of talks with the US. North Korea later launched two extra missiles in July 2019, a month after Trump’s high-profile meeting with Kim in the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea. North Korea performed four missile tests in 2020.
From CNN’s Haley Britzky
Former President Donald Trump claimed in his RNC speech that “we defeated 100% of ISIS in Syria and Iraq, something that was going to take five years. … We did it in a matter of a couple of months.”
Facts First: Trump’s declare of having defeated ISIS in “a couple of months” isn’t true; the ISIS “caliphate” was declared totally liberated greater than two years into Trump’s presidency, in 2019.
Even if Trump was beginning the clock at the time of his go to to Iraq in late December 2018, as he has advised in previous remarks, the liberation was proclaimed greater than two and a half months later. In addition, Trump gave himself far an excessive amount of credit score for the defeat of the caliphate, as he has earlier than, when he mentioned he defeated the terror group with no caveats or credit score to anybody else. Kurdish forces did a lot of the floor combating, and there was main progress in opposition to the caliphate below President Barack Obama in 2015 and 2016.
IHS Markit, an info firm that studied the altering dimension of the caliphate, reported two days earlier than Trump’s 2017 inauguration that the caliphate shrunk by 23% in 2016 after shrinking by 14% in 2015. “The Islamic State suffered unprecedented territorial losses in 2016, including key areas vital for the group’s governance project,” an analyst there mentioned in a press release at the time.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Donald Trump mentioned Thursday that the Florida federal choose who was overseeing the categorised paperwork case dismissed the felony costs in opposition to the former president, discovering “that the prosecutor and the fake documents case against me were totally unconstitutional.”
Facts first: Trump’s declare is deceptive. District Judge Aileen Cannon wrote in her ruling that the appointment of particular counsel Jack Smith, who was prosecuting the case, violated the Constitution. But Cannon particularly didn’t touch upon the validity of the costs Trump was dealing with, or whether or not Trump’s alleged mishandling of categorised paperwork was correct.
In a 93-page ruling Monday, Cannon mentioned Smith’s appointment violated the Constitution. Cannon mentioned that Smith’s place as particular counsel “effectively usurps” Congress’ “important legislative authority,” as a result of Congress ought to have the authority – not the head of the Justice Department – to nominate such an official.
Cannon additionally mentioned that Smith’s workplace was being funded improperly.
But Cannon additionally particularly famous that she was not deciding any “other legal rights or claims” introduced by Trump or his co-defendants in the case.
The choose additionally mentioned that the Justice Department might doubtlessly revive the case by funding the particular counsel by means of totally different means. Prosecutors from outdoors the particular counsel’s workplace might additionally refile the costs.
From CNN’s Hannah Rabinowitz
Trump on the impression of immigration on Medicare and Social Security
During his Republican National Convention speech, former President Donald Trump once more mentioned that Democrats are harming Social Security and Medicare by letting migrants into the US.
“Democrats are going to destroy Social Security and Medicare because all of these people by the millions are coming in – they’re going to be on Social Security and Medicare and other things, and you’re not able to afford it. They are destroying your Social Security and your Medicare,” Trump mentioned.
Facts First: Trump is unsuitable. In reality, the reverse is true, significantly in the close to time period, a number of specialists say. Many undocumented immigrants work, which suggests they pay much-needed payroll taxes, and this bolsters the Social Security and Medicare belief funds and extends their solvency. Immigrants who’re working legally usually received’t accumulate advantages for a few years. As for individuals who are undocumented, some are working below pretend Social Security numbers, so they’re paying payroll taxes however don’t qualify to gather advantages.
The Social Security Administration checked out the results of unauthorized immigration on the Social Security belief funds. It discovered that in 2010, earnings by unauthorized staff contributed roughly $12 billion on web to the entitlement program’s money move. The company has not up to date the evaluation since, however this 12 months’s Social Security trustees report famous that rising common annual whole web immigration by 100,000 persons improves the entitlement program’s solvency.
“We estimate that future years will experience a continuation of this positive impact on the trust funds,” mentioned the report on unauthorized immigration.
Meanwhile, unauthorized immigrants contributed greater than $35 billion on web to Medicare’s belief fund between 2000 and 2011, extending the life of the belief fund by a 12 months, in line with a examine printed in the Journal of General Internal Medicine.
“Immigrants tend to be younger and employed, which increases the number of workers paying into the system,” mentioned Gary Engelhardt, a Syracuse University economics professor. “Also, they have more children, which helps boost the future workforce that will pay payroll taxes.”
“Immigrants are good for Social Security,” he mentioned.
However, undocumented immigrants who achieve authorized standing that features eligibility for future Social Security and Medicare advantages might finally be a drain to the system, in line with Jason Richwine, a resident scholar at the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for decrease immigration.
“Illegal immigration unambiguously benefits the Social Security and Medicare trust funds, but amnesty (legalization) would reverse those gains and add extra costs,” Richwine wrote in a report final 12 months.
From CNN’s Tami Luhby
Former President Donald Trump claimed that he struck a commerce take care of China, requiring the nation to buy $50 billion price of American merchandise. “They buy $50 billion worth,” he mentioned at the Republican National Convention Thursday.
Facts First: The declare that China purchased $50 billion price of American product in consequence of a commerce deal is fake.
Trump is referring to what’s often known as the Phase One deal he struck with Beijing in December 2019.
While the deal required China to purchase $50 billion worth of American agricultural products by the finish of 2021 – Beijing did not live up to its commitment.
US agricultural exports to China recovered from the commerce warfare however didn’t attain the ranges in the Phase One commitments, in line with a study by the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
From CNN’s Katie Lobosco
Republican nominee and former President Donald Trump described fuel costs inaccurately throughout his keynote speech at the Republican National Convention. He mentioned that “gas prices are up 60%.”
Facts First: The common worth of a daily gallon of gasoline nationwide is $3.51 as of Thursday, according to AAA. That’s up about 47% from the day President Joe Biden was inaugurated, when the common was $2.39, not 60% increased as Trump claimed.
Although the United States has a strategic gasoline reserve, which will be tapped by the White House to ease upward strain on costs, as Biden did in May, fuel costs are nonetheless largely decided by market forces, akin to international petroleum manufacturing and client demand, not solely by the choices of a sitting US president.
From CNN’s Bryan Mena
Former President Donald Trump, whereas recounting a dialog he had with a waitress frightened about the taxes on her ideas, claimed that the authorities lately employed 88,000 IRS brokers to audit people.
Facts First: This declare is fake.
The Inflation Reduction Act – which Congress handed in 2022 with none Republican votes – supplied an about $80 billion, 10-year funding to the IRS. The company plans to rent tens of 1000’s of IRS staff with that cash – however just some can be IRS brokers who conduct audits and investigations. Many folks can be employed for non-agent roles, akin to customer support representatives. And a big quantity of the hires are anticipated to fill the vacant posts left by retirements and different attrition, not take newly created positions.
The 88,000 determine comes from a 2021 Treasury Department report that estimated the IRS might rent 86,852 full-time staff – not solely enforcement brokers – over the course of a decade with a virtually $80 billion funding.
From CNN’s Katie Lobosco
Former President Donald Trump repeated his declare that President Joe Biden needs to hike folks’s taxes by 4 instances.
“This is the only administration that said, ‘We’re gonna raise your taxes by four times what you’re paying now,’” Trump mentioned Thursday in his speech at the Republican National Convention.
Facts First: This is fake, simply because it was when Trump made the identical declare throughout the 2020 election marketing campaign and in early 2024.
Biden has not proposed quadrupling Americans’ taxes, and there has by no means been any indication that he’s in search of to take action. The nonpartisan Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center suppose tank, which analyzed Biden’s never-implemented funds proposals for fiscal 2024, discovered this: “His plan would raise average after-tax incomes for low-income households in 2024, leave them effectively unchanged for middle-income households, and lower after-tax incomes significantly for the highest-income taxpayers.”
The Tax Policy Center discovered that Biden’s proposal would, on common, have raised taxes by about $2,300 – however that’s a couple of 2.3% decline in after-tax revenue, not the huge discount Trump is suggesting Biden needs. And critically, Tax Policy Center senior fellow Howard Gleckman famous to CNN in May that 95% of the tax hike would have been lined by the highest-income 5% of households.
The very greatest burden below the Biden plan would have been carried by the very richest households; the Tax Policy Center discovered that households in the prime 0.1% would have seen their after-tax incomes decline by greater than 20%. That’s “a lot,” Gleckman famous, however it’s nonetheless nowhere close to the quadrupling Trump claims Biden is on the lookout for. And once more, even this improve would have been just for a tiny subset of the inhabitants. Biden has promised to not elevate taxes by even a cent for anybody making below $400,000 per 12 months.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump touted the “Right to Try” legislation he signed in 2018 in his conference speech Thursday, which gave terminally unwell sufferers simpler entry to experimental drugs that haven’t but obtained approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
Before the measure was handed, Trump claimed, terminally unwell sufferers in the United States must go to overseas nations to hunt experimental therapies or go residence to die in the event that they couldn’t afford it.
“Sounds simple, but it’s not, and I got them to agree that somebody that needs it will – instead of going to Asia or Europe or some place – or if you have no money, going home and dying,” he mentioned.
Facts First: This is deceptive. It just isn’t true that terminally unwell sufferers would merely need to go residence and die with none entry to experimental drugs or must go to overseas nations in search of such therapies till Trump signed the Right to Try. Prior to the legislation, sufferers needed to ask the federal authorities for permission to entry experimental drugs – however the authorities virtually at all times mentioned sure.
Scott Gottlieb, who served as Trump’s FDA commissioner, told Congress in 2017 that the FDA had permitted 99% of affected person requests below its personal “expanded access” program.
‘“Emergency requests for individual patients are usually granted immediately over the phone and non-emergency requests are generally processed within a few days,” Gottlieb testified.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Piper Hudspeth Blackburn
Former President Donald claimed in his RNC speech on Wednesday night that “Russian warships and nuclear submarines are operating 60 miles off our coasts in Cuba. … The press refuses to write about it.”
Facts First: Trump’s present-tense declare that Russian warships and nuclear submarines “are” working near the United States is deceptive. While Russia did have a nuclear-powered submarine visiting Cuba in June together with different Russian Navy vessels, all of the vessels – together with the submarine – have since left.
A bunch of 4 Russian Navy vessels arrived in Cuba on June 12 as half of what Pentagon and State Department officers careworn is a routine exercise and famous that Cuba has hosted Russian ships yearly between 2013 and 2020. A Pentagon spokesperson, Maj. Charlie Dietz, mentioned in June that “given Russia’s long history of Cuban port calls, these are considered routine naval visits, especially in the context of increased US support to Ukraine and NATO exercises.”
The vessels left Havana on June 17.
It can also be not true that media organizations “don’t want to talk about it.” CNN, along with most other major news outlets, reported on the Russian ships’ positioning.
From CNN’s Haley Britzky
Former President Donald Trump repeated his declare, which he has made in speech after speech, that the US left $85 billion price of navy gear to the Taliban when Biden pulled American troops out of Afghanistan in 2021.
Trump mentioned, “And we also left $85 billion dollars’ worth of military equipment.”
Facts First: Trump’s $85 billion determine is fake. While a big amount of navy gear that had been supplied by the US to Afghan forces was certainly deserted to the Taliban upon the US withdrawal, the Defense Department has estimated that this gear had been price about $7.1 billion – a piece of the roughly $18.6 billion price of gear supplied to Afghan forces between 2005 and 2021. And some of the gear left behind was rendered inoperable earlier than US forces withdrew.
As different fact-checkers have beforehand explained, the “$85 billion” is a rounded-up determine (it’s nearer to $83 billion) for the whole quantity of cash Congress appropriated throughout the warfare to a fund supporting the Afghan safety forces. A minority of this funding was for gear.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump claimed Thursday, as many others at the RNC did, that whereas he was president the world was at peace.
“Our opponents inherited a world at peace and turned it into a planet of war,” he additionally claimed later in his speech.
Facts First: Trump’s declare about world peace below his presidency is fake. There had been dozens of unresolved wars and armed conflicts when Trump left workplace in early 2021.
US troops had been nonetheless deployed in fight missions in Afghanistan and Iraq; civil wars in Syria, Yemen and Somalia continued, as did the warfare in Ethiopia’s Tigray area; the Israeli-Palestinian battle was additionally ongoing, as had been the conflicts between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, between Israel and Syria and between Israel and Iran; Islamist insurgents continued their combat in Africa’s Sahel area; there was main violence in Mexico’s long-running drug wars; combating continued between Ukraine and pro-Russian forces in Ukraine’s Donbas area; and there have been heaps of different unresolved wars and conflicts round the world.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks armed battle in nations round the world, mentioned in a June e mail that it estimates there have been energetic armed conflicts in 51 worldwide states in 2020 and once more energetic armed conflicts in 51 worldwide states in 2021.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump mentioned Thursday at the Republican National Convention that “in Venezuela, crime is down 72%” as a result of overseas governments are sending their nations’ criminals to the US.
Facts First: Trump enormously overstated the Biden-era decline in crime in Venezuela, not less than in line with the restricted statistics which can be publicly out there.
And whereas it’s sure that not less than some criminals have joined law-abiding Venezuelans in a mass exodus from the nation amid the financial disaster of the final decade, there isn’t any proof Venezuela’s authorities has intentionally emptied prisons for migration functions or deliberately despatched ex-prisoners to the United States.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump claimed Thursday that immigrants are “coming from prisons, they’re coming from jails, they’re coming from mental institutions and insane asylums. … Terrorists are coming in at numbers we’ve never seen before.”
Facts First: There isn’t any proof for Trump’s declare that jails round the world are being emptied out in order that prisoners can journey to the US as migrants, nor for his declare that overseas governments are additionally emptying out psychological well being amenities for this objective. Last 12 months, Trump’s marketing campaign was unable to supply any proof for his narrower declare at the time that South American nations particularly had been emptying their psychological well being amenities to by some means dump sufferers upon the US.
Representatives for 2 anti-immigration organizations informed CNN at the time they’d not heard of something that may corroborate Trump’s story, as did three specialists at organizations favorable towards immigration. CNN’s personal search didn’t produce any proof. The web site FactExamine.org additionally discovered nothing.
Trump has typically tried to help his declare by making one other declare that the international jail inhabitants is down. But that’s unsuitable, too. The recorded international jail inhabitants elevated from October 2021 to April 2024, from about 10.77 million folks to about 10.99 million folks, in line with the World Prison Population List compiled by specialists in the United Kingdom.
In response to CNN’s 2023 inquiry, Trump marketing campaign spokesman Steven Cheung cited one supply for Trump’s declare about prisons being emptied for migration functions – a 2022 article from right-wing web site Breitbart News a couple of supposed federal intelligence report warning Border Patrol brokers that Venezuela had finished this. But that imprecise and unverified declare about Venezuela’s actions has by no means been corroborated.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump claimed at the Republican National Convention Thursday that “our crime rate is going up, while crime statistics all over the world are going down.”
Facts First: Trump’s declare a couple of dramatic improve in the crime fee is fake. Official knowledge printed by the FBI reveals violent crime dropped significantly in the US in 2023 and in the first quarter of 2024, although there have been will increase in some communities; violent crime is now decrease than it was in 2020, President Donald Trump’s final calendar 12 months in workplace.
Preliminary FBI knowledge for 2023 showed a roughly 13% national decline in murder and a roughly 6% nationwide decline in general reported violent crime in comparison with 2022, bringing each homicide and violent crime ranges beneath the place they had been in 2020. And preliminary FBI knowledge for the first quarter of 2024 confirmed a good steeper drop from the identical quarter in 2023 – a roughly 26% decline in homicide and roughly 15% decline in general reported violent crime.
There are limitations to the FBI-published knowledge, which comes from native legislation enforcement – the numbers are preliminary, not all communities submitted knowledge, and the submitted knowledge usually has some initial errors – so these statistics could not exactly seize the dimension of the current declines in crime. But these statistics and different knowledge sources make it clear crime has indeed declined to some extent nationally, although not all over the place.
Crime knowledge skilled Jeff Asher, co-founder of the agency AH Datalytics, mentioned that if the remaining 2023 figures present a decline in homicide of not less than 10% from 2022, this might be the quickest US decline “ever recorded.” And he famous that each the preliminary FBI-published knowledge from the first quarter of 2024 and likewise “crime data collected from several independent sources point to an even larger decline in property and violent crime, including a substantially larger drop in murder, so far this year compared to 2023, though there is still time left in the year for those trends to change.”
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
During his RNC speech, former President Donald Trump claimed that the Biden administration has finished nothing to curb unlawful immigration to the US.
“The greatest invasion in history is taking place right here in our country—they are coming in from every corner of the earth, not just from South America, but from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East,” Trump mentioned, “they’re coming at levels we’ve never seen before it is an invasion indeed and this administration does nothing to stop them.”
Facts First: Trump’s declare that the Biden administration is doing “nothing” is wrong. Illegal crossings at the US border dropped in June and the Biden administration has imposed important restrictions on asylum together with different measures to curb unlawful immigration.
Arrests alongside the US southern border dropped 29% in June, in line with new data launched by US Customs and Border Protection, following the Biden administration’s order severely limiting asylum-seeker crossings.“Recent border security measures have made a meaningful impact on our ability to impose consequences for those crossing unlawfully,” CBP Acting Commissioner Troy A. Miller beforehand mentioned in a press release.
Last month, the Biden administration invoked an authority to shut off access to asylum for migrants who cross the US-Mexico border illegally, a significant attempt to deal with one of the president’s greatest political vulnerabilities. It was the administration’s most dramatic transfer on the US southern border, utilizing the identical authority former President Donald Trump tried to make use of in workplace.
From CNN’s Holmes Lybrand
Former President Donald Trump claimed Wednesday that groceries are up 57% throughout the Biden administration.
Facts First: Trump’s claims of grocery costs being up 57% are false and will use some context.
Inflation’s rapid ascent, which started in early 2021, was the end result of a confluence of factors, together with results from the Covid-19 pandemic akin to snarled supply chains and geopolitical fallout (particularly Russia’s invasion of Ukraine) that triggered meals and power worth shocks. Heightened consumer demand boosted partly by fiscal stimulus from each the Trump and Biden administrations additionally led to increased costs, as did the post-pandemic imbalance in the labor market.
Inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022, hitting a 41-year excessive, and has slowed since (the Consumer Price Index was at 3% as of June 2024). However, it stays elevated from historic ranges. Three-plus years of pervasive and extended inflation has weighed considerably on Americans, particularly lower-income households making an attempt to afford the requirements (meals, shelter and transportation).
Food costs, particularly grocery costs, did outpace general inflation for a lot of 2022 and 2023, pushed increased by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Still, grocery costs didn’t rise to the extent that Trump claims. Annual meals and grocery inflation peaked at 11.4% and 13.5% in August 2022, respectively. Since Biden took workplace, the CPI “food at home” index is up 21%, which is increased than its 9% typical rise in current historical past over a 54-month interval, however it’s not 57%.
Through the 12 months that led to June, general meals and grocery costs had been up simply 2.2% and 1.1%, respectively.
Certain meals classes noticed a lot higher inflation: Notably, egg prices were up 70% annually in January 2023. However, the underlying cause of that sharp increase was a extremely contagious, lethal avian flu. Food costs are extremely risky and will be influenced by a range of elements, particularly illness, extreme weather events, international provide and demand, geopolitical occasions, and once-in-a-lifetime pandemics.
From CNN’s Alicia Wallace
Former President Donald Trump claimed that the US was “energy independent” throughout his presidency however that this modified below President Joe Biden.
Facts First: This is deceptive. “Energy independent” is a political phrase, not a literal phrase, that may be outlined in varied methods – and, below Biden, the US has continued to fulfill the identical definitions it glad below Trump. US manufacturing of oil and fuel have set data below Biden.
“Energy independent” doesn’t imply the US makes use of no overseas power or that it’s untethered from international power markets; this wasn’t the case below Trump and nonetheless isn’t below Biden. Experts in power coverage are inclined to scoff at the time period “energy independence,” with three specialists telling CNN in 2022 that it’s a “horrible term,” “ridiculous term” and “stupid term,” respectively.
But if the time period is outlined as the US exporting extra crude oil and petroleum merchandise than it imported, that has happened in every year under Biden after occurring below Trump in 2020 for the first time in decades. (In reality, the US surplus in petroleum commerce has grown under Biden as US crude oil production and exports have hit new highs) And if the time period is outlined as the US producing extra power than it consumes, that has additionally continued to happen under Biden after happening under Trump in 2019for the first time in many years.
You can learn here about the varied financial causes the US has imported overseas power below each Trump and Biden regardless of its so-called “energy independence.”
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former President Donald Trump as soon as once more claimed that he signed the largest tax cuts in historical past throughout his administration.
“We got credit for the war, and defeating ISIS, and so many things. The great economy, the biggest tax cuts ever, the biggest regulation cuts ever, the creation of Space Force, the rebuilding of our military. We did so much,” Trump mentioned in his speech at the Republican National Convention on Thursday.
Facts First: This is fake. Analyses have discovered that Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was not the largest in historical past, both in share of gross home product or inflation-adjusted {dollars}.
The act made quite a few everlasting and momentary modifications to the tax code, together with lowering each company and particular person revenue tax charges.
In a report launched in June, the federal authorities’s nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office checked out the dimension of previous tax cuts enacted between 1981 and 2023. It discovered that two different tax minimize payments have been greater – former President Ronald Reagan’s 1981 bundle and laws signed by former President Barack Obama that prolonged earlier tax cuts enacted throughout former President George W. Bush’s administration.
The CBO measured the sizes of tax cuts by taking a look at the income results of the payments as a share of gross home product – in different phrases, how a lot federal income the invoice cuts as a portion of the economic system – over 5 years. Reagan’s 1981 tax minimize and Obama’s 2012 tax minimize extension had been 3.5% and 1.7% of GDP, respectively.
Trump’s 2017 tax minimize, in contrast, was estimated to be about 1% of GDP.
The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonprofit, present in 2017 that the framework for the Trump tax cuts can be the fourth largest since 1940 in inflation-adjusted {dollars} and the eighth largest since 1918 as a share of gross home product.
From CNN’s Tami Luhby
Former President Donald Trump mentioned Thursday that inflation didn’t exist throughout his presidency – drawing a distinction between his administration and that of President Joe Biden, whose early years in workplace had been stricken by decades-high inflation.
“We had no inflation,” Trump mentioned in his speech at the Republican National Convention.
Facts First: Trump’s remark is fake. Inflation was low, however not nothing.
The Consumer Price Index, a typical measure of inflation, rose about 8% throughout Trump’s 4 years in workplace. In January 2021, his remaining partial month in workplace, it elevated 1.4% from a 12 months earlier, in line with the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
From CNN’s Tami Luhby
Trump repeats frequent declare about oil drilling and fuel costs
As he has finished repeatedly on the marketing campaign path, Former President Donald Trump claimed Thursday that below a brand new Trump administration, the United States would “drill, baby, drill, … by doing that, we will lead to a large-scale decline in prices.”
Facts First: Trump’s frequent marketing campaign declare that the US can decrease fuel costs by producing extra home oil is deceptive.
Under President Joe Biden, US oil manufacturing has reached a brand new report this 12 months, even surpassing output below Trump’s administration. The Energy Information Administration expects crude oil manufacturing to hit successive data this 12 months and subsequent, powered by an oil growth in the Permian Basin. As CNN has reported, the US presently produces extra oil than every other nation on the planet, at about half one million barrels per day greater than the prior annual report set in 2019.
Prices at the pump in the US are extremely depending on the international oil market and the US can’t be really power unbiased in the case of fuel costs, power specialists have informed CNN. Oil is a worldwide commodity; the international worth of oil determines US fuel costs and it’s merely unimaginable to separate that worth from shifting international dynamics like Russia’s warfare on Ukraine or OPEC’s current choices to chop oil manufacturing.
“Whether we’re drill baby, drilling has more to do with what the price of crude oil is, how healthy is the economy,” Bob McNally, president of Rapidan Energy Group, and a former George W. Bush White House official, informed CNN lately. “These things are outside of a president’s direct control.” There’s additionally the undeniable fact that the US consumes a unique sort of oil than it produces, McNally informed CNN final 12 months. McNally in contrast the mild crude the US produces to champagne, and the heavy crude it imports to espresso. US oil refineries are particularly constructed to separate out the “heavy and gunky” crude we devour, McNally mentioned.
From CNN’s Ella Nilsen
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claimed on Thursday that President Joe Biden “won’t even talk about the fact that Americans are still being held” in Gaza.
“And now of course a second war in Gaza. President Biden won’t even talk about the fact that Americans are still being held there by the Iranian regime,” Pompeo mentioned.
Facts First: The declare that Biden “won’t even talk about” the American hostages in Gaza is fake. Biden has spoken about the Americans held in Gaza in the wake of Hamas’ invasion of Israel a number of instances since October.
Recently on May 31, talking a couple of proposed deal for Israel and Hamas, Biden mentioned American hostages can be launched in the first part of the deal: “[W]e want them home.”
On October 25, Biden mentioned his administration was working “around the clock together with our partners in the region to secure the release of hostages including American citizens … left behind.”
On November 26, he spoke extensively about the launch of an Israeli American little lady who was held hostage and mentioned he was urgent for extra Americans to be launched, including, “we will not stop working until every hostage is returned to their loved ones.”
Most lately, at the NATO Summit in DC last week, Biden talked about hostages broadly, saying the US “has been working to secure a ceasefire in Gaza, to bring the hostages home, to create a path for peace and stability in the Middle East.”
From CNN’s Haley Britzky
Trump biographical video consists of false and deceptive claims
The Republican National Convention performed a biographical video about former President Donald Trump earlier than Trump started his personal speech. The video included false and deceptive claims.
The Trump tax cuts
The video featured a narrator making a declare that Trump himself frequently utters. The narrator mentioned, “The Trump tax cuts: largest in America’s history.”
This is fake. Analyses have discovered that Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was not the largest in historical past, both in share of gross home product or inflation-adjusted {dollars}. You can learn an in depth reality verify here.
Global battle below Trump
The video’s narrator additionally delivered a model of one other declare Trump has made repeatedly, saying Trump’s “strength and resolve” produced “a stable world at peace.”
This declare about world peace below Trump is fake, too. There had been dozens of unresolved wars and armed conflicts when Trump left workplace in early 2021.
US troops had been nonetheless deployed in fight missions in Afghanistan and Iraq; civil wars in Syria, Yemen and Somalia continued, as did the warfare in Ethiopia’s Tigray area; the Israeli-Palestinian battle was additionally ongoing, as had been the conflicts between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, between Israel and Syria and between Israel and Iran; Islamist insurgents continued their combat in Africa’s Sahel area; there was main violence in Mexico’s long-running drug wars; combating continued between Ukraine and pro-Russian forces in Ukraine’s Donbas area; and there have been heaps of different unresolved wars and conflicts round the world.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks armed battle in nations round the world, mentioned in a June e mail that it estimates there have been energetic armed conflicts in 51 worldwide states in 2020 and once more energetic armed conflicts in 51 worldwide states in 2021.
Americans’ incomes
While attacking President Joe Biden’s dealing with of the economic system, the video featured on-screen textual content that mentioned, “U.S. incomes fall for third straight year,” attributing these phrases to a Wall Street Journal article in 2023. An picture of Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris was proven on display screen at the identical time.
This mixture of phrases and pictures is deceptive. The video didn’t acknowledge that the first of the three straight years wherein the Wall Street Journal article reported that inflation-adjusted median family revenue went down was 2020, when Trump was president. (The Covid-19 pandemic performed a significant position in the decline.)
Real median family revenue fell from $78,250 in 2019 to $76,660 in 2020 (all below Trump), then edged right down to $76,330 in 2021 (largely below Biden) and fell extra considerably to $74,580 in 2022 (all below Biden). Figures for 2023 and 2024-to-date are usually not out there.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Eric Trump’s false claims about the economic system and US international standing in 2016
Eric Trump informed the crowd at the RNC Thursday that the “economy was struggling, jobs were scarce” and the US had poor standing on the international stage when his father was elected president in 2016.
Facts First: Eric Trump’s claims are false. When Donald Trump took workplace in 2017, he inherited a powerful economic system, together with a sturdy labor market, and a nation that was seen favorably on the international stage.
In 2016, the US added a median of almost 194,000 jobs per 30 days, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. In the two years earlier than, these common good points had been even increased: 226,000 in 2015 and almost 250,000 in 2014.
Job good points remained above historic averages in 2017 by means of 2019, with 177,000 jobs added on common per 30 days.
Eric Trump’s claims that jobs had been scarce in 2016 weren’t correct. In reality, the US labor market skilled its longest growth on report beginning in 2010 and persevering with till March 2020 when the Covid-19 pandemic crippled international economies, together with that of the US.
In addition to inheriting a labor market in fine condition, the economic system was rising when Trump took workplace. Real gross home product – the widest measure of financial exercise – usually grows between 2% and 3%, and it averaged 2.4% between 2014-2016 after which almost 2.7% throughout the first three years of Trump’s presidency, according to Bureau of Economic Analysis data.
Also, the US was properly regarded internationally when Barack Obama left workplace, and people sentiments plunged at the starting of Trump’s presidency, according to the spring 2017 Global Attitudes Survey performed by the Pew Research Center.
From CNN’s Alicia Wallace
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claimed at the Republican National Convention Thursday that the US-Mexico border was “closed” throughout Donald Trump’s presidency.
Facts First: Pompeo’s declare is fake.
While Trump tightened the border throughout his tenure, unlawful crossings into the US from Mexico nonetheless numbered in the tens of thousands each month main as much as when he left workplace. At the begin of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Trump administration limited non-essential travel on the US-Mexico border and prohibited migrants from crossing it in an effort to mitigate the unfold of the virus. President Joe Biden later extended the restrictions.
The former president’s greatest effort to “close” the border was met with resistance by federal courts, and the Supreme Court later gave Biden the green light to finish the controversial “Remain in Mexico” coverage.
From CNN’s Devan Cole
For the fourth straight night, the Republican National Convention performed a video wherein former President Donald Trump urged Republicans to make use of “every appropriate tool available to beat the Democrats,” together with voting by mail. Trump relentlessly disparaged mail-in voting throughout the 2020 election, falsely claiming it was rife with fraud, and he has continued to sharply criticize it throughout the present marketing campaign
But Trump’s feedback in the conference video additionally included some of his common false claims about elections. After claiming he would “once and for all secure our elections” as president, Trump once more insinuated the 2020 election was not safe, saying, “We never want what happened in 2020 to happen again.” And he mentioned, “Keep your eyes open, because these people want to cheat and they do cheat, and frankly, it’s the only thing they do well.”
Facts First: Trump’s claims are nonsense – barely vaguer variations of his usual lies that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen and that Democrats are serial election cheaters. The 2020 election was extremely safe; Trump misplaced truthful and sq. to Joe Biden by an Electoral College margin of 306 to 232; there isn’t any proof of voter fraud even near widespread sufficient to have modified the consequence in any state; and there’s no foundation for claiming that election dishonest is the solely factor at which Trump’s opponents excel.
The Trump administration’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, half of the Department of Homeland Security, said in a post-election November 2020 assertion: “The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history.”
From CNN’s Daniel Dale
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo mentioned on Thursday night that below former President Donald Trump’s administration, “not a single Chinese spy balloon flew across” the US.
“We’d begun on an honorable exit from Afghanistan, and not a single Chinese spy balloon flew across the United States of America,” Pompeo mentioned.
Facts First: The declare that there have been no spy balloons below Trump is fake.
Three suspected Chinese spy balloons transited over the continental US throughout the Trump administration, however they weren’t found till after President Joe Biden took workplace. Gen. Glen VanHerck, then commander of US Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command, said in 2023 {that a} “domain awareness gap” allowed the balloons to journey undetected.
From CNN’s Haley Britzky
Linda McMahon, who served in the Trump administration as the Small Business Administrator, advised at the Republican National Convention Thursday that China paid the tariffs that the former president placed on roughly $300 billion of Chinese-made items. “Instead of taxing American corporations, Donald Trump put tariffs on China that raised billions of {dollars} and guarded American industries,” she mentioned.
Facts First: This characterization of Trump’s tariffs is deceptive.
It’s true that Trump’s tariffs on China raised billions of {dollars} for the US authorities, however the duties had been paid by US corporations – not China.
Study after study, together with one from the federal authorities’s bipartisan US International Trade Commission (USITC), has found that Americans have borne virtually the whole price of Trump’s tariffs on Chinese merchandise.
Once an importing firm pays the tariff, it might probably resolve to eat the price or go all or some of it to the purchaser of its items – whether or not that’s a retailer or a client.
Many economists agree that tariffs act as a tax on American customers.
“A tariff is just a form of a tax,” Erica York, a senior economist and analysis director at the conservative-leaning Tax Foundation, told CNN earlier this year.
Tariffs can profit some corporations by elevating the costs of competing foreign-made items, however the duties can damage different corporations by elevating part elements they should manufacture.
For instance, Trump’s tariffs had been imposed, partly, to spice up the US manufacturing sector – however that business misplaced jobs.
Federal Reserve economists discovered a web lower in manufacturing employment because of the tariffs in 2019. That’s largely as a result of items grew to become costlier to US customers. Plus, retaliatory tariffs placed on American-made items made different US producers much less aggressive when promoting overseas.
From CNN’s Katie Lobosco
RNC video that includes Reagan’s voice misleadingly twists journal article
A video performed on the remaining night of the Republican National Convention tried to assault President Joe Biden by that includes quotes from then-candidate Ronald Reagan’s well-known rhetorical questions on the President Jimmy Carter period at a presidential debate against Carter in 1980.
At one level, the video featured Reagan’s voice asking if, in comparison with 4 years in the past, “Is America as respected throughout the world as it was?” On-screen textual content answered the query with the phrases “allies no longer trust the United States,” attributing them to a September 2021 article in Foreign Affairs journal.
Facts First: This quote is deceptive. The article in Foreign Affairs didn’t really declare that allies now not belief the United States. Rather, the article famous that “critics of President Joe Biden” make the “claim” that allies now not belief the US after Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan – however the article then went on to argue that “these concerns about credibility are overblown.”
The conference video additionally featured Reagan’s voice asking, “Is there more or less unemployment in the country than there was four years ago?” But when you return exactly 4 years from the most up-to-date unemployment fee, the reply is: much less unemployment. The current unemployment rate is 4.1% for June 2024; 4 years prior, in June 2020, the unemployment fee was 11.0% amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
There is an inexpensive foundation for this half of the video, although, when you interpret “four years ago” extra broadly to check with any time in 2020. Before the pandemic, in the first two months of 2020, the unemployment charges had been 3.6% and 3.5%.
From CNN’s Daniel Dale