The Washington Post’s “Fast Checker” Column has prepared the following statement
“Cheat Sheet” to watch for certain repeated claims by the two candidates Monday
night.
When listening to the DEBATE see if they are uttered and the response
from the opponent.
Donald
Trump
“I was totally against the war in
Iraq.”
False, false, false. We have carefully documented how
Trump supported the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
“Clinton caused all these
problems with her stupid policies. Look at what she did with Libya.”
Trump conveniently forgets that he also supported intervention in
Libya, specifically advocating the aim of removing leader
Moammar Gaddafi.
“The rise of ISIS is the direct
result of policy decisions made by Obama and Clinton.”
This is false. The terrorist group emerged as a direct result
of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
“Obama took everybody out of
Iraq. And really, ISIS was formed.”
Trump
apparently has forgotten that he also called for the immediate withdrawal of
U.S. troops.
“92 million Americans are not
part of the economy, a silent nation of jobless Americans.”
This is
a phony statistic. Trump is counting retirees, students, stay-at-home parents
and the disabled — people who say they are not seeking jobs.
“Since President Obama came into
office, another 2 million Hispanics have joined the ranks of those in poverty.”
From
the start, this was a cherry-picked, false factoid. But Trump keeps saying it
even though new Census data now shows that nearly 1 million Hispanics have been
lifted out of poverty under Obama.
“Fifty-eight percent of
African-American youth is unemployed.”
Another
false fact. Trump basically triples the official rate by counting students and
people in training programs as “unemployed” even though they are not seeking
jobs.
“Our veterans, in many cases, are
being treated worse than illegal immigrants.”
Ridiculous
on every level. Yet Trump keeps saying it, despite his campaign’s inability to
provide any credible evidence.
“Since 2013 alone, the Obama
administration has allowed 300,000 criminal aliens to return back into United
States communities.”
Some
fuzzy math is at work here. The official estimate of “criminal aliens” released
is about ¼ of Trump’s number, which lumps together people people not considered
criminal aliens.
“Your crime numbers are so crazy,
they’re going through the roof” because of illegal immigration.
Totally
false. There is no evidence this is the case.
“Illegal immigration costs our
country more than $113 billion a year.”
This is
a figure from a group that wants to dramatically reduce legal immigration.
Caveat emptor.
“Hillary Clinton plans to admit
620,000 Syrian refugees.”
There
is no such plan. This is a made-up figure.
“People are pouring in, pouring
in, and they’re doing tremendous damage if you look at the crime, if you look
at the economy.”
This is
doubly wrong. Illegal immigration flows are at their lowest level in two
decades. And there is no documented correlation between illegal immigration and
crime.
“Over 300,000 veterans died
waiting for care.”
Trump
often repeats a misreported figure in the media, based on a government report
about inadequate records-keeping. No one really knows the figure, but it’s not
this high.
“Hillary Clinton started talks to
give $400 million, in cash, to Iran.”
Iran
Revolution. (Critics have charged the payment was tied to the release of
hostages.) Clinton had nothing to do with this transaction, part of a
settlement of long-standing claims dating from the 1979
“NAFTA was signed by Bill
Clinton.”
Nope,
the North American Free Trade Agreement was negotiated and signed by President
George H.W. Bush, a Republican, though Bill Clinton was an avid supporter and
got congressional approval.
“You know who started the birther
movement? Hillary Clinton.”
Another
ridiculous claim — and ironic, given that Trump is the most famous birther of
all.
“NATO is unfair, economically, to
the United States. We pay a disproportionate share.”
Trump
is mixing apples and oranges here. The U.S. projects military might across the
globe, so defense budgets cannot be easily compared with the European countries
in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
“Obama went on an apology tour.”
Trump
resurrects a GOP golden-oldie from the 2012 campaign. There was no apology tour.
“I think it’s very sad when Obama
lands in Saudi Arabia, and he lands in Cuba, and there aren’t high officials to
even greet him. This is the first time in the history of Air Force One.”
It
appears to be news to Trump, but the airport ceremony is an unimportant part of
the trip. Presidents are frequently not greeted by their counterparts when they
arrive in an overseas airport.
“I built a business after my
father gave me a small loan of a million dollars.”
This is
a fable. Trump benefited from millions of dollars in loans from his father, as
well as his father’s connections in New York real state and local government.
His father also saved him from almost certain financial ruin in 1990.
“Trump University got an A rating
from the Better Business Bureau.”
Actually,
the BBB rated Trump University a D-minus, its second lowest grade.
“Vladimir Putin said I’m a
genius.”
No. The
Russian president only said Trump was a “colorful” figure.
Hillary Clinton
On emails, “everything I did was
permitted.”
Nope,
it was not permitted. She also did not comply with the requirement to turn over
business-related emails before she left government service.
“Classified material has a header
which says ‘top secret,’ ‘secret,’ ‘confidential.’ None of the emails sent or
received by me had such a header.”
Clinton
often relies on legalistic wording when talking about the email controversy.
The reality is that there do not need to be any markings for an email to
contain classified information.
“We now have 15 million new jobs
that have been created in the last 7 1/2 years.”
This is
wrong. Clinton only counts back 6 ½ years to get this number. The real number
for Obama’s presidency is 10.5 million jobs.
“The average CEO makes about 300
times what the average worker makes.”
Clinton
sometimes bungles this talking point. This version would be especially wrong.
The “300” figure comes from the pay ratio of top corporate chief executives to
workers at their companies; it is not a comparison of all CEOs and all workers.
“Hedge fund managers pay a lower
tax rate than truck drivers or nurses.”
This a
hyper-technical factoid. Clinton is talking about the tax paid on every
additional dollar of earnings, known as the marginal tax rate. She’s barely
right on nurses, wrong on truck drivers. But the effective tax rate — a more
important number — is higher for hedge fund managers.
“I worked with Democrats and
Republicans to create the Children’s Health Insurance Program.”
Clinton
overstates her backstage role in the creation of CHIP. She didn’t work directly
with Republicans.
George W. Bush’s “plan was to
give the Social Security trust fund to Wall Street.”
Democrats
love to bring up the long-dead GOP plan for Social Security, falsely deriding
it as “privatization.” But it was really only a modest, voluntary program.
“I will not let the Department of
Veterans Affairs be privatized.”
Neither
will Trump, though Clinton likes to pretend he does.
“We have to pass a law
prohibiting people on the terrorist watch list from being able to buy a gun in
the United States of America.”
The proposed
legislation actually wouldn’t ban such purchases automatically.
“The economy does better when you
have a Democrat in the White House.”
Clinton
is citing an actual study. But the study said this was mostly due to “good
luck,” not policy choices by Democratic presidents.
No comments:
Post a Comment