Debunked Repeated
mebbe redumbent, but this highlights persist when easy to disprove
myths are resistant to facts/correction bc they have an important function.}:
who/ what is most resistant to correction filter?
see alt faCT/ earth2
see echo/escalator
SEE VOTER FRAUD ~ CATO
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MMA
Nick Shirley rebooted James O’Keefe’s debunked voter fraud myths for a new audience
Shirley’s new California video is little more than a rehashing of O’Keefe’s bogus claims from over a decade ago
Written by John Knefel & Sophie Lawton
Published 02/18/26
Citation
Andrea Austria / Media Matters
A new video by MAGA provocateur Nick Shirley purports to expose voter fraud in California, but in fact it’s little more than a repackaging of false narratives spread over a decade ago by right-wing operative James O'Keefe. In both cases, the right-wing influencers suggest that fraud could exist without actually exposing any, relying on innuendo and hypotheticals rather than evidence.
O’Keefe created the template for undercover videos meant to expose and embarrass liberal organizations and causes. His old videos, like Shirley’s new ones, were frequently debunked in real time, but they nevertheless served a role in providing fuel to conservative content creators hungry to stoke outrage about perceived liberal excesses. Shirley’s repackaging shouldn’t be surprising given the incentives for young, MAGA-aligned influencers to make a name for themselves in a crowded field. But the original claims didn't provoke any policy changes — reasonably so, given that they were bogus — so Shirley's repackaging has little to offer beyond a hope that new consumers take the bait.
Shirley gained prominence in recent months following a so-called investigation into fraud in Minneapolis day care centers. Although there were some real instances of fraud within the city’s social services, local news and prosecutors had already exposed and investigated many instances of wrong-doing. Still, The New York Times referred to Shirley as having “spurred the federal crackdown on Minneapolis.”
Once the right-wing’s most identifiable creator of sting-style — often deliberately misleading — exposés, O’Keefe’s star has since somewhat fallen. In 2010, O’Keefe founded Project Veritas, and over more than a decade the organization produced videos meant to discredit perceived liberal organizations, often through tactics such as manipulation and deceptive editing. According to Rolling Stone, in 2023 O’Keefe “either left or was pushed out of his own company … depending on whom you ask.” He has since tried to reestablish himself in the right-wing media ecosystem, including by creating an award in 2025 for the so-called citizen journalists who have followed in his footsteps. The first recipient was Nick Shirley.
Shirley, like O’Keefe, is promoting the possibility of fraud that he hasn't actually found
Shirley’s is one of many from right-wing influencers, such as Benny Johnson, decrying supposedly rampant voter fraud in California, and it includes many examples and myths that have already been debunked. One of the most prominent narratives in Shirley’s video, which was already debunked when Johnson spread it, is that voters whose registrations list central locations, like an abandoned building, as an address are a clear sign of fraud. However, as Democracy Docket notes, California law “gives people experiencing homelessness the flexibility to use any location to register to vote. As long as unhoused residents can describe the place where they spend most of their time — whether it’s an address, a cross street or a vacant lot — they can legally list it as their address on their voter registration form.”
Another one of Shirley's key examples of “fraud” in the video is a previously reported story about a woman who registered her dog to vote and cast two ballots for him in 2021 and 2022, only one of which was counted. The woman, a registered Republican, self-reported her crimes and is facing six years in prison.
The premise of Shirley’s 20-minute video is that there could be fraud in California without stricter voter ID laws and “with the state receiving millions of illegal migrants, the opportunities for fraud now are even higher.” California does require a valid ID or Social Security number when registering to vote or when voting for the first time after registering by mail, and extensive research has shown that noncitizen voting in U.S. elections is exceedingly rare and extremely unlikely to impact elections. Yet Shirley’s video has been picked up by others in right-wing media, including livestreamer
, former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino, and conspiracy theory website The Gateway Pundit.
Had someone just awoken from a decadelong coma, they might find these types of claims quite familiar. In 2012, O’Keefe attempted to show how easy it was to commit voter fraud in a state without strict voter ID laws via a video titled “Dead people receive ballots in NH primary,” which claims that conspirators could use the names of the deceased to cast fraudulent ballots to steal an election. But, as Media Matters noted at the time, the video “actually demonstrates just how difficult it would be to pull off such a plot.”
Although it’s true that making sure ballot rolls are accurate is important, O’Keefe’s stunt only showed that without knowing how many votes were needed, the conspirators would need to engage in a massive plot and subsequent cover-up to make sure they had covered the spread. It would be an enormous undertaking. O’Keefe provided no evidence that such a scheme existed for the simple reason that there was no such plot.
In another one of O’Keefe’s “gotcha” videos on voter fraud, a Project Veritas employee almost obtains a ballot meant for registered voter Eric Holder, then the U.S. attorney general. Project Veritas marketed the video as a slam dunk, claiming it had “proven” fraud occurred while in reality no vote was cast and no fraud occurred. The manufactured stunt, like Shirley’s escapades in California, was another senseless attempt to rally people behind more restrictive voter ID laws.
Though Shirley’s claims about California include some different details from O’Keefe and Project Veritas’ claims, the gist is the same: Both attempt to prove “voter fraud” and fail to show any actual fraud being committed. Such right-wing misinformation has been debunked for years while the truth is still that fraud is just not happening at the scale they claim.
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REBOOT BAND BACK TOGETHER FULTON CTY BALLOTS 2 26
The newly released warrant application behind the FBI raid of 2020 election ballots from Fulton County, Georgia is under new scrutiny. A new report reveals the FBI's criminal investigation originated from a referral sent by a “stop the steal” campaign attorney known for “spreading baseless allegations of election fraud.”
The supporting affidavit for the warrant to search Fulton County election records was unsealed Tuesday, publicly revealing the mechanics behind the invasive search and seizure conducted by President Donald Trump’s politicized FBI.
“The FBI criminal investigation originated from a referral sent by Kurt Olsen, presidentially appointed Director of Election Security and Integrity,” stated an attachment to the application for the warrant approved by U.S. District Court magistrate judge Catherine M. Salinas.
Politico revealed that Olsen is also being furnished with "highly classified material" with few limitations, despite Olsen having no intelligence background or experience. Some of the documents he has received from American spy agencies reportedly includes "sensitive compartmented intelligence programs," which are among the most secretive materials held by intelligence agencies. He also reportedly has a direct line to Trump, and exploits those ties whenever agencies push back against his demands for material.
“Every time he hits a roadblock, he just calls POTUS," An anonymous source told Politico.
Social media slammed the news that the same lawyer receiving highly sensitive voter data is also the source of the warrant that delivered the info.
“A beleaguered election denier — who had already been debunked many times — somehow convinced Trump and Bondi and Patel and Gabbard that there was cheating in Georgia when, in fact, it was disproven many times over,” posted one commenter on X. "Poorest Loser Ever."
“So this is basically a rehash of every single conspiracy about the G.A. elections, filed as an affidavit by an FBI agent,” said another critic on X. “They're even bringing back the ‘folded ballots’ thing. Incredible.”
“Kurt Olsen was one of Kari Lake's attorneys when she kept suing to be the Governor of Az. He was charged with making FALSE STATEMENTS TO THE COURT,” posted yet another commenter.
“Basically, the person who issued the warrant has a big f—— red hat on their head right now,” said another.
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still saying 300 yr get SS but now fixed!
raw 625
Late-night Trump brag shattered by 'damning' report issued just hours later
// an 6 25
An analysis by Washington Post fact checker Glenn Kessler shows the Trump administration is still wheeling out lies months after they’ve been outed.
“This is an example of how, even after falsehoods are exposed, the spin machine keeps working,” wrote Kessler, referring to a March 4 post by President Donald Trump that “government databases list … 3.47 million people from ages 120 to 129, 3.9 million people from ages 130 to 139. 3.5 million people from ages 140 to 149. And money is being paid to many of them.”
In February, the Washington Post published an article documenting the truth of the matter, that Social Security databases rely on an almost 70-year-old computer programming language called COBOL, which doesn’t have a standardized way to store dates.
READ MORE: 'Stop the foolishness': Susan Collins in the hot seat as she navigates Trump's second term
This means ancient programmers assigned a default date, such as 1875, to people lacking birth information, many of them seniors born before a reliable federal birth recording program was in place. But when Musk’s DOGE team scanned Social Security systems, “they were shocked to find people listed in the system with absurd ages because of the limitations of an old programming language,” writes Kessler.
People familiar with Social Security’s systems were already aware of the issue, of course. The Social Security Administration has automatically terminated the benefits of people once they reach age 115 since 2015. Kessler reports the U.S. Office of Inspector General had recommended a cleanup of the system in 2023, but Social Security deferred the project because it would “divert resources” from other important work and “would have limited or no benefit to the administration.” A 2023 IG report found the vast majority of beneficiaries who lacked a birth date had already died and been purged from the system anyhow. Plus, any major overhaul could introduce new errors to the system.
Still, the notion of wrongdoers scamming Social Security was “an irresistible talking point,” says Kessler, so much so that DOGE bragged of fixing the “problem” late last month on social media: “After 11 weeks, Social Security has finished this major cleanup initiative: ~12.3M individuals aged 120+ have now been marked as deceased.”
“The post was carefully worded,” said Kessler. “It did not claim that 12 million people had received improper payments. Instead, it said that these people had been marked as deceased. In other words, DOGE appears to have implemented the plan suggested by the IG two years ago.”
READ MORE:Swing state voters beg their Republican senator to protect them from the Trump grift-ocracy
Despite that, Kessler said Trump supporters eagerly greeted the news and used it to justify the president's “original false claim.”
Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) was one of many cheerleaders jumping aboard a non-moving train, claiming: "No more 300-year-olds getting Social Security checks because of Elon Musk. Thank God President Trump had the wisdom to put Elon in place."
The train included other personalities such as right-wing entertainer Sean Hannity, and Speaker Mike Johnson.
“… [W]ithin the echo chamber of the pro-Trump universe, a problem that never existed now has been fixed,” Kessler said.
READ MORE: MAGA rhetoric backfires as far-right activist suggests violence against trump admin officials
Read the original Washington Post report at this link.
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mma
How a lie about immigrants and FEMA disaster aid spread across Fox News
Fox’s Jesse Watters and Sean Hannity spread the lie on 5 and 6 straight broadcasts, respectively. Many shows on the network joined in to push similar claims at least once since October 3.
Written by Helena Hind & Alicia Sadowski
Published 10/11/24 mma
Amid the right-wing media onslaught of hurricane-related misinformation, Fox News has latched onto the false claim that the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s relief funds for hurricane victims have been drained by aid to undocumented immigrants. In reality, the funding is separate and unrelated.
Top-rated hosts Jesse Watters and Sean Hannity led the charge in repeating the false claim; Watters’ prime-time show repeated the lie in 5 consecutive broadcasts starting October 3, and Hannity managed 6.
Even though a Fox reporter obtained evidence debunking the lie, the narrative spread to the majority of the network’s opinion and “straight news” programs.
FEMA’s disaster relief fund has nothing to do with immigrant aid — and Fox knows it
- FEMA maintains separate funds for disaster relief and aid for immigrants. As a FEMA spokesperson explained, “The Shelter and Services Program (SSP) is a completely separate, appropriated grant program that was authorized and funded by Congress and is not associated in any way with FEMA's disaster-related authorities or funding streams." Newsweek, [10/4/24]
- Donald Trump alleged that the Biden administration “stole the FEMA money” for undocumented immigrants during an October 3 campaign rally, prompting a fact check from FEMA. An October 3 entry in FEMA’s “Hurricane Rumor Response” page explained: “FEMA’s disaster response efforts and individual assistance is funded through the Disaster Relief Fund, which is a dedicated fund for disaster efforts. Disaster Relief Fund money has not been diverted to other, non-disaster related efforts.” The Daily Beast, [10/3/24; Federal Emergency Management Agency, 10/3/24]
- Fox News knows that FEMA disaster money is not going towards aid to undocumented immigrants. On October 8, senior congressional correspondent Chad Pergram posted on X that Fox News obtained a GOP memo saying there is “no funding connection between” the migrant shelter program and the Disaster Relief Fund. When Pergram appeared on the network after posting about the memo, he failed to discuss the part of the document that debunks the lie that the federal government spent disaster relief funds on migrant aid. . Media Matters, [10/10/24, 10/9/24, 10/9/24]
- ### Jesse Watters's Fox show repeated the false claim in 5 consecutive broadcasts
- Watters first repeated the smear on the October 3 edition of his eponymous show, saying “the Biden-Harris administration spent a billion dollars of FEMA money on illegal aliens,” without providing context about the separate funds. Watters continued, “When American citizens, the ones who were born here and pay taxes, deserve help, Biden and Harris are saying, ‘Ah, sorry, we gave it all away to the people who broke into the country.’” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [10/3/24]
- The next day, after FEMA published a fact-check debunking the claim on its webpage, Watters repeated the lie: “After blowing a billion dollars on migrants and with Mayorkas saying they ran out of money, FEMA clearly has been mismanaged, either through corruption or incompetence.” Watters then called for the immediate firing of FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell. Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [10/4/24; FEMA, 10/3/24]
Watters doubled down the next Monday, October 7: “FEMA’s broke. … Where’d the money go? More than a billion dollars went to welcoming Biden's migrants.” Watters also said that White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre “lied” after she debunked the claim on October 4. Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [10/7/24]
- On October 8, during a segment criticizing Vice President Kamala Harris’ approach to Hurricane Milton relief, Watters’ guest Stephen Miller accused Harris of “divert[ing] all the FEMA funds to illegal aliens.” Miller ranted, “Now FEMA is broke, they can't help Americans. Why? Because Kamala cares about illegals more.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [10/8/24]
* As Hurricane Milton made landfall on October 9, Watters doubled down again: “Mayorkas said FEMA was going to run out of money for hurricane season. And FEMA admitted they wasted a billion on migrants. Now, I'm not great at math… but if you spend too much money on one thing and don't have enough money for another thing, that means you messed up.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [10/9/24]
* ### Sean Hannity repeated the lie in 6 consecutive broadcasts of his Fox News show
- Hannity began repeating the lie on his prime-time show on October 3, alleging the Biden administration “took over $1 billion of FEMA funds supposed to be available for national emergencies to help you, the American people, … and they spent all of that money on their 11.5 million unvetted illegal immigrants from over 180 other countries.” Hannity falsely claimed disaster money was used for “free food, housing, health care, education, sex change surgeries, debit cards, four-star hotels for illegal immigrants.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [10/3/24]
- The next day, Hannity lamented that FEMA is “taking money for Americans and giving it to their illegal immigrants that they are obsessed with.” He added, “It is unconscionable. It is soulless,” and maintained that FEMA “should be focused on emergency management, not illegal immigration.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [10/4/24]
- The following Monday, October 7, Hannity persisted with the smear, saying that FEMA is “bankrupt” because “over a billion dollars went to Harris-Biden unvetted illegal immigrants.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [10/7/24]
- On October 8, Hannity demanded that the Biden administration “not steal the money from FEMA and give it to your unvetted illegal immigrants from 180 countries, because their illegal immigrants seem to be prioritized that are way more important than the American people.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [10/8/24]
- On October 9, Hannity complained that “the agency distributed more than a billion dollars to house and feed Harris and Biden unvetted illegal immigrants.” “Secretary of Homeland Security Mayorkas said, ‘Yeah, FEMA is apparently in shambles financially and we probably don't have enough money for hurricane season,’” Hannity ranted. “Then, we discovered on FEMA’s own website that the agency distributed more than a billion dollars to house and feed Harris and Biden unvetted illegal immigrants.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [10/9/24]
- On October 10, Hannity continued to claim that at FEMA, “over a billion dollars was diverted to help their unvetted illegal immigrants.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [10/10/24]
- ### After Watters and Hannity seeded the lie, the narrative then spread onto Fox’s opinion programming
- On Fox & Friends First, former NFL player and conservative activist Jack Brewer cited “FEMA money going to illegal immigrants” as a reason that the Biden-Harris administration has to change the “way that we deal with natural disasters.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends First*, [10/8/24]
- While discussing Hurricane Helene relief, Fox & Friends host Steve Doocy attacked Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for allegedly having “millions and millions and millions of dollars” and choosing to spend the money not on Americans, but on “processing people who are in this country illegally.” Co-host Ainsley Earhardt responded that the money should instead “go toward these American families that have lost everything.” Doocy suggested the Biden administration should remedy the budget crisis by announcing a “pause on all the people coming into the country illegally” and should instead “reprogram that money to take care of the people here in the United States.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [10/3/24]
Outnumbered* co-host Kayleigh McEnany falsely claimed that the “reason why” FEMA was facing a budget shortfall was because the agency spent “almost a billion dollars” on “illegal immigrants in migrant shelters.” Emily Compagno reiterated the sentiment by alleging that the “federal government wasted the taxpayer money that these Americans invested” and that Americans were entitled to the money over undocumented immigrants. “FEMA's funds are their funds that they paid into, that they are now being withheld from to pay for illegal migrants,” she complained. Fox News, *Outnumbered*, [10/4/24]
- The Five co-host Greg Gutfeld used a false analogy to compare FEMA funding to a bank account to allege aid to undocumented immigrants was taken at the expense of disaster relief aid: “It’s all the same thing. So, if you've got to spend money here, it is going to be taken away from here.” He asked, “Why do Americans have to wait in line for the stuff they pay for?” Fox News, *The Five*, [10/9/24]
* Laura Ingraham stated that “Democrats are prioritizing the needs of noncitizens … ahead of the people that our leaders are supposed to be serving.” Ingraham called the allocation of money for undocumented immigrant aid “disgraceful” and claimed it resulted in Americans facing inflation and debt to “give gobs of money to liberal special interests.” Fox News, *The Ingraham Angle*, [10/3/24]
- Repeat Gutfeld! guest and antisemitic right-wing media personality Bryan Sharpe complained The New York Times was not addressing “FEMA not having money because they spent it on illegal migrants” Fox News, *Gutfeld!*, [10/8/24; Media Matters, 9/9/22, 10/3/23]
- ### Some of the network’s “straight news” programs spread the narrative or failed to contextualize FEMA appropriations for undocumented aid
- Fox anchor Dana Perino highlighted DHS Secretary Mayorkas’ “warning” that “FEMA does not have the funds to make it through hurricane season” despite “Mayorkas' DHS having $640 million — now that’s designated money — to help communities support illegal migrants.” Fox correspondent Chad Pergram took the blame off Congress: “Congress made sure FEMA had more than $20 billion in last week's emergency spending bill ahead of the storm.” Fox News, *America’s Newsroom*, [10/3/24]
- Even though the Shelter and Services Program is distinct from FEMA’s disaster response, Fox News contributor Kellyanne Conway said that “they want us to believe that that’s not so and those funds wouldn't be fungible anyway.” Fox News, *The Faulkner Focus*, [10/9/24; Media Matters, 10/9/24]
Fox anchor John Roberts}: asked why the federal government did not use the $66 billion FEMA spent “taking care of the illegal immigration problem” to pay for hurricane relief. Fox News, *America Reports*, [10/3/24]|
- Former Vivek Ramaswamy communications director Tricia McLaughlin claimed, “We know that $670 million have gone to efforts under FEMA's umbrella to house migrants.” She asked, “Why is the focus on noncitizens in this country and not on the recovery efforts for Americans?” Fox News, *Fox News @ Night*, [10/9/24]
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mma
Fox News misrepresented ICE data on immigration and crime in over 50 segments
85% of Fox segments about the Immigration and Customs Enforcement statistics included misrepresentations of the data even after multiple Fox personalities attempted to debunk the falsehoods
Written by Rob Savillo
Research contributions from Tyler Monroe & Harrison Ray
Published 10/01/24
Since September 27, when GOP Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX) released data on immigration and crime that he requested from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Fox News has misrepresented the meaning of the statistics over and over: In 53 of 62 segments about the data (or 85%), Fox spun the information to promote a number of falsehoods about immigration and crime in the U.S.
- The falsehoods Fox aired included claims that most or all of the migrants with criminal convictions entered the country during the Biden administration, suggestions that migrants with criminal convictions are moving freely within the U.S., suggestions that most or all migrants entered the country with prior criminal convictions from elsewhere, and claims that the total number of migrants with criminal convictions grew dramatically under Biden.
- Video file
Video
Media Matters found at least two instances of Fox News personalities or reporters attempting to debunk the false claims about the ICE statistics that were spread widely on the network: one from The Five co-host Jessica Tarlov and another from Los Angeles-based correspondent Bill Melugin. Both instances occurred the same day the data were released.
Moreover, the Department of Homeland Security subsequently issued a statement to media outlets September 28, which was included in a fact check by CNN the following day, properly contextualizing the numbers from ICE:
The data in this letter is being misinterpreted. The data goes back decades; it includes individuals who entered the country over the past 40 years or more, the vast majority of whose custody determination was made long before this Administration. It also includes many who are under the jurisdiction or currently incarcerated by federal, state or local law enforcement partners.
- News outlets soon followed with their own fact checks on the ICE statistics, but that didn't stop Fox News personalities and guests from ignoring clarifications on the data and repeating false claims. The network included such context in less than half of total segments in the study period: 30 segments, or 48%.
When Fox did include the proper context from DHS or ICE — or even from their own reporters — the network continued to push false narratives about immigration and crime. Fox personalities and guests downplayed, undermined, or dismissed the clarifications in more than half of such segments: 17 segments, or 57%.
* Right-wing media ran with those false characterizations of the data, and they were bolstered by former President Donald Trump's misrepresentations in several social media posts.
Trump posted the false claim that “13,000 convicted murderers entered our Country during her [Kamala Harris'] three and a half year period as Border Czar,” followed up with another falsehood, “almost 14,000 MURDERERS to freely and openly roam our Country,” and finally double-downed on both false statements with another post, writing, “14,000 CONVICTED thugs and slimeballs who have committed MURDER have been allowed to enter our Country, totally unvetted and unchecked, and roam free.”
Such rhetoric is not only false and misleading; it intentionally stokes unwarranted fears about immigrants and crime, specifically those who have crossed the southern U.S.-Mexico border. The Trump campaign has been using these misrepresentations to unfairly attack Vice President Kamala Harris' record — despite the fact that immigrants in general are more law-abiding than native-born Americans and that studies have consistently shown that undocumented immigrants do not commit more crime than U.S. citizens.
- ## Methodology...
actully prolly most debunked but this laBELLED SO
- environment.” Media Matters, [8/6/24]
- ## Right-wing media figures have repeatedly promoted debunked claims about election fraud alongside conspiracy theories and misinformation
- Right-wing media and Trump continue to claim that widespread election fraud influenced the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.Election denier organization True the Vote, created by former Tea Party members, has stated that it will be offering local sheriffs' offices help with “camera equipment” to monitor mail-in ballot drop boxes during the 2024 election cycle. According to Brennan Center for Justice, “most reported incidents of voter fraud are actually traceable to other sources, such as clerical errors or bad data matching practices.” Media Matters, [9/9/24; 8/6/24; Brennan Center for Justice, accessed 9/17/24]
- Echoing the white nationalist “great replacement” conspiracy theory, right-wing media figures have claimed that Democrats are encouraging undocumented people to vote during the 2024 election and using the DMV to facilitate noncitizen voting. Ahead of the 2024 election, Trump and his allies in right-wing media have recycled this theory in fearmongering that undocumented immigrants will vote in November. Election experts have asserted that noncitizen voting in both state and federal elections is “vanishingly rare.” Media Matters, [9/11/24, 7/11/24; Brennan Center for Justice, accessed 9/17/24]
- Right-wing media claim that Russian interference in the presidential election is a hoax created by the “deep state.” According to a recent federal indictment, several right-wing and MAGA media pundits have been implicated in receiving money from “a content creation company that was a front for Russian propagandists.” Media Matters, [9/5/24, 9/5/24, 9/5/24, 9/6/24, 9/6/24]
- An edited photo of pop star Taylor Swift purporting to show that she endorsed Trump in this election cycle circulated throughout right-wing media. The photo, originating from a September 2023 NFL game between the Chicago Bears and the Kansas City Chiefs, was intentionally altered to add a Trump flag. FactCheck.org, [2/2/24]
- Following the September 4 mass shooting at a Georgia high school, Trump ally and conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer said, “I don't think it's a coincidence. I think it's really bizarre how every single time there's a major election, there's always a school shooting.” There is no evidence to suggest that school shootings are strategically timed to correspond with major elections; since 2021, there have been at least 150 incidents of gunfire on school campuses each year. Media Matters, [9/5/24; Everytown Research & Policy, accessed 9/17/24]
Fox News’ Jesse Watters cites debunked claim to argue that climate scientists fabricated US temperature data
Special ProgramsClimate & Energy
Written by Helena Hind
Published 02/01/24
On January 31, Fox News host and serial climate denier Jesse Watters pushed debunked misinformation to argue that climate scientists are “cooking the books.”
In an effort to disprove that 2023 was the hottest year on record, Watters repeated a bogus claim that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s placement of thermometers on urban concrete skewed temperature data.
“Concrete and asphalt attract heat and retain heat a lot more than the countryside,” Watters said. “No wonder we think the earth’s warming. We’re literally cooking the books."
Video
CitationFrom the January 31, 2024, edition of Fox News' Jesse Watters Primetime
Watters then cited a post from X user @_ClimateCraze claiming that “improperly located” thermometers “produce unrealistic warming through the Urban Heat Island effect.” Conveniently, Fox News cropped out a portion of the post — a link to a debunked “study” from junk science blogger and climate denier Anthony Watts. The 2022 report, produced by fossil fuel-funded think tank the Heartland Institute, falsely claims that 96% of U.S. climate data is “corrupted” due to thermometer placement

Multiple news outlets and fact-checkers have disproved the Heartland Institute’s bogus study as it spread across social media, with Agence France-Presse noting that past claims about biased data from urban temperature monitoring sites have been “thoroughly refuted.”
PolitiFact pointed out that Heartland’s false claim that the data is corrupted “ignores key facts” including:
First, climate scientists know that weather station data can be impacted by poor siting, and they adjust data accordingly.
Second, climate change analysis focuses on changes over time.
Further, PolitiFact noted that the scientific community has rejected this claim:
"The correct approach is to write a scientific paper and submit it to a scientific journal," said Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist currently serving as research lead at Stripe, a San Francisco-based technology company. "In this specific case, the author of the report, Anthony Watts, submitted a paper on the topic around 10 years ago, but was unable to successfully convince other scientists of the validity of his findings and to pass the peer review process."
Watters’ reliance on climate misinformation is no surprise; Fox News has repeatedly proved itself to be a shameless climate denial machine.
- ## Anti-migrant misinformation has permeated right-wing media coverage, amplifying xenophobic rhetoric
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not sure repeated
09/09/24 mma
Fox anchor Bill Hemmer falsely stated that Kamala Harris said she met with Vladimir Putin
08/23/24 mma
===
7 24
Will David Barton Fill Oklahoma’s Curriculum With Lies and Disinformation?
By Kyle Mantyla | July 22, 2024 rww
Earlier this month, Oklahoma’s Christian nationalist state superintendent of education Ryan Walters announced that he was creating an executive review committee to overhaul the state’s social studies curriculum and that it would be stocked with far-right activists and ideologues.
Among those appointed to the committee was Christian nationalist pseudo-historian David Barton, a longtime religious-right activist who has repeatedly misrepresented his academic credentials and whose scholarship is so shoddy that one of his books was pulled off the marked by his own publisher in 2012 after it concluded that “basic truths just were not there.”
Barton is notorious for misrepresenting history in order to bolster his right-wing political agenda and for continuing to repeat his false claims long after they have been debunked. Both of these tendencies were on display when Barton appeared on “The War Room” over the weekend.
David Barton Discusses President Trump's "Providential" Head Turn
“According to University of Houston, they did a 10 year study,” Barton said. “They collected the writings the Founding Fathers in the founding era—15,000 they used—and they found in those 3,154 direct quotes. They said, ‘All right, now let’s see who the Founding Fathers quoted.’ The number one source for their quotes was the Bible. Thirty four percent of all those political quotes came out of Bible verses, and the number one Bible book [was] the book of Deuteronomy.”
“So, this is not hyperbole,” Barton insisted.
While it might not be “hyperbole,” Barton’s statement is certainly misleading, as Right Wing Watch has pointed out time and again:
This claim is a deliberate misrepresentation of a 1984 study conducted by professor Donald S. Lutz of the University of Houston that sought to identify which writers and sources of ideas were most cited in “the political writings of Americans published between 1760 and 1805.” Lutz found that the Bible was cited most frequently solely because many of the pamphlets included in the research were sermons that had been reprinted for mass distribution. Once the sermon pamphlets were excluded, Lutz reported that quotes from the Bible appeared no more frequently in the political writings of the era than citations of the classical or common law.
More importantly, Lutz also noted that when the focus was solely on the public political writings from 1787 to 1788, when the U.S. Constitution was written and ratified, “the Bible’s prominence disappears” almost completely.
Undaunted, Barton continued to spread claims that were debunked years ago.
“I was involved in 13 cases at the U.S. Supreme Court,” Barton stated later in the interview. “Even [former Supreme Court Justice] Stephen Breyer said, ‘We all know the due process rights of the Constitution came out of the Bible.”
“The right to confront your accusers comes out of John 8:10,” Barton insisted. “The right to compel witnesses in your behalf comes out of Proverbs 18:17. The right to speak in your own defense [comes out of] Acts 22:1. If you don’t know scriptures, you’re not going to understand how the Constitution works.”
Right Wing Watch first debunked this claim nearly a decade ago, pointing out that what Breyer actually said in his 1999 concurrence in Lilly v. Virginia was merely that “the right of an accused to meet his accusers face-to-face is mentioned in, among other things, the Bible, Shakespeare, and 16th and 17th century British statutes, cases, and treatises.”
The Court’s effort to tie the Clause so directly to the hearsay rule is of fairly recent vintage, compare Roberts, supra, with California v. Green, 399 U.S. 149, 155—156 (1970), while the Confrontation Clause itself has ancient origins that predate the hearsay rule, see Salinger v. United States, 272 U.S. 542, 548 (1926) (“The right of confrontation did not originate with the provision in the Sixth Amendment, but was a common-law right having recognized exceptions”).
The right of an accused to meet his accusers face-to-face is mentioned in, among other things, the Bible, Shakespeare, and 16th and 17th century British statutes, cases, and treatises. See The Bible, Acts 25:16; W. Shakespeare, Richard II, act i, sc. 1; W. Shakespeare, Henry VIII, act ii, sc. 1; 30 C. Wright & K. Graham, Federal Practice and Procedure §6342, p. 227 (1997) (quoting statutes enacted under King Edward VI in 1552 and Queen Elizabeth I in 1558); cf. Case of Thomas Tong, Kelyng J. 17, 18, 84 Eng. Rep. 1061, 1062 (1662) (out-of-court confession may be used against the confessor, but not against his co-conspirators); M. Hale, History of the Common Law of England 163—164 (C. Gray ed. 1971); 3 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *373. As traditionally understood, the right was designed to prevent, for example, the kind of abuse that permitted the Crown to convict Sir Walter Raleigh of treason on the basis of the out-of-court confession of Lord Cobham, a co-conspirator. See 30 Wright & Graham, supra, §6342, at 258—269.
Needless to say, there is absolutely no historical evidence to support Barton’s claims that our due process rights came out of John, Acts, or Proverbs. More importantly, Barton has never even bothered to cite any historical record to support his claim, nor has he ever had any incentive to do so. And this is because Barton has built his career on exploiting the biblical and historical ignorance of his own audiences, knowing that they are unprepared to question his assertions and will get no traction even if attempt to do so.
Now that Barton has been tapped to overhaul the academic standards in Oklahoma, it is entirely possible that these sorts of bogus claims will work their way into the state’s social studies curriculum, indoctrinating future generations with a Barton-esque Christian nationalist worldview that is built on lies and intentional misinformation.
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SOME RUBBER GLUE DEFLECTION FROMTRUMP COUP J6?
TRUMP SPoUTS bs W/ [SOME]PPL ARE SAYING? SHE GOES WITH UNNAMED REPUBLICANS
AN 4 24
Fox News Business host Maria Bartiromo is promoting the thoroughly debunked claim an executive order signed by President Joe Biden allows “illegal immigrants” and “felons” to vote.
Bartiromo, in pushing the false claim, told Fox News viewers, “Republicans are warning that there’s a Biden order, executive order, which allows illegal immigrants and felons to vote.”
There is no such order.
“It doesn’t appear that Joe Biden can win on his policies,” Bartiromo said Wednesday. “A Wall Street Journal poll this morning shows Trump leading Biden in six out of seven swing states, that’s Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada and Pennsylvania. In Wisconsin, the two are tied in a head-to-head matchup. So how does Biden win? Republicans are talking about the potential of an election that is tampered with. Republicans are warning that there’s a Biden order, executive order, which allows illegal immigrants and felons to vote.”
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The conspiracy theory appears to have come from Mississippi’s Republican Secretary of State Michael Watson three years ago, a conspiracy theory Watson himself resurfaced last month.
Fox News several weeks ago reported Watson had sent the U.S. Dept. of Justice a letter “asking it to stop enforcing a Biden executive order that he warns is being used to attempt to register ineligible convicts and illegal immigrants to vote.”
“As you are aware, on March 7, 2021, President Biden issued Executive Order No. 14019 which sought to turn the Department of Justice agencies from their historical missions of law enforcement to voter registration and get out the vote operations,” Watson wrote, according to Fox News. “These efforts are an intrusion into state matters and are a misuse of federal revenue and resources. In addition, it appears that these efforts have led to agencies under your charge attempting to register people to vote, including potentially ineligible felons and to co-opt state and local officials into accomplishing this goal.”
The fact-checking website Verify makes clear: “No, Biden’s executive order doesn’t allow ineligible people to vote.” It also says it’s “not true” that Biden’s order “would make it easier for ineligible people to vote.”
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A USA Today fact check arrives at the same conclusion: “No, Biden didn’t (and can’t) allow immigrants in US illegally to vote.”
“Experts said the claim is nonsense. Biden has issued no such order, and he does not have the power to decide who votes.” Also, the paper notes, “in 1996, Congress made it illegal for non-citizens to vote in federal elections.”
When he was a state lawmaker Watson voted against making it easier for college students to register to vote, and in 2021, as Mississippi Secretary of State, Watson said “he is worried that the nation will suffer if more ‘woke’ and ‘uninformed’ college students become registered voters,” the Mississippi Free Press reported at the time. The news outlet took a deep dive into Watson’s extensive claims, also debunking them.
MSNBC’s Ari Melber in 2021 highlighted Watson’s remarks, and called them, “just one of many occurrences of GOP officials unintentionally revealing they don’t want everyone to vote.”
Watch Bartiromo below or at this link.
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