Did a Dominion Voting Systems official admit in 2017 that its election equipment allows for votes to be switched? No, that is not true. Dominion has strongly denied that votes can be switched in its systems. No evidence is presented -- in a widely shared video clip -- that Dominion admitted to a vote-switching capacity in its equipment.The Dominion official…

Was former President Barack Obama arrested for espionage? No, that's not true: A website completely made up the claim that Obama, the 44th president of the United States, was arrested on November 28, 2020. The article used direct quotes from a Department of Justice press release about a former CIA officer who was arrested and charged with espionage -- the…

Is a video discussing purported voter fraud in Arizona factual? No, it's not: The video contains falsehoods and unproven claims. Specifically, 35,000 votes were not added to Democratic candidates, as Lead Stories has previously reported, and there's no evidence that 1.9 million votes in Maricopa County are in jeopardy of being tossed because of signature verification issues. The county has…

Did the U.S. Army's Special Forces seize a CIA server farm in Frankfurt, Germany, resulting in deaths of U.S. soldiers? No, that's not true: A U.S. Army spokesperson told Lead Stories the claim is false. Lead Stories has previously debunked claims that American forces seized a computer server in Frankfurt that was owned by a company that provided voting machines…

Does a meme purporting to show the population and number of votes cast in Milwaukee, Detroit, Pittsburg and Lansing show the correct numbers for the 2020 election? No, that's not true: the numbers showing higher vote counts than population totals were made up, the actual vote counts in the places where city-level data was available was lower than the population…

Did a judge give Pennsylvania's legislators the power to choose presidential electors? No, that's not true: Commonwealth Court Judge Patricia McCullough issued a memorandum to explain to the state Supreme Court what her thinking was when she ordered a temporary halt to the certification of Pennsylvania election results while the petition to declare a mail-in voting law unconstitutional was litigated.…

Did the mail-in vote count (2,589,242) in the presidential election in Pennsylvania exceed the actual number of ballots sent to voters (supposedly 1,823,148) and were 1,126,940 votes "created out of thin air"? No, that's not true: The Pennsylvania Department of State's website for election returns shows that about 2.6 million mail-in ballots had indeed been counted as of November 27,2020.…

Is Dominion Voting Systems vice president Eric Coomer missing and has the company closed its headquarters? No, that's not true: A video repeats unfounded claims Lead Stories has previously debunked: that Dominion Voting Systems has shuttered its headquarters amid unfounded and rebutted claims that the company manipulated election results in favor of Joe Biden over Donald Trump. There is no…

Did an Arizona television station report Joe Biden's lead shrank after thousands of votes were found to be fraudulent and that non-citizens were voting? No, that's not true: ABC15 repeated a data error from one county, posted by the Arizona secretary of state's office, which showed Biden's lead dropping by approximately 6,000 votes. A local reporter tweeted out the "unofficial…

Is video recorded of all ballot drop-off locations in Georgia, and is the video available to the public upon request? Yes, that's true: Continuous or motion-sensor footage is recorded of all ballot drop-off locations in Georgia. Any member of the public can request the surveillance footage, according to Georgia's secretary of state's office. The claim appeared in a tweet (archived…

Does California Sen. Dianne Feinstein's husband, Richard Blum, own a stake in Dominion Voting Systems, and is that part of the reason she is relinquishing the top Democrat spot on the Senate Judiciary Committee? No, that's not true: A Dominion spokesperson told Lead Stories that Blum does not have an ownership stake in the company. Feinstein cited other reasons for…

Did Facebook remove the title "President Elect" from the @joebiden Facebook page, and then only identify President-elect Joe Biden as a politician? No, that's not true: a database of screenshots of the @joebiden Facebook page, for more than two week, shows that the page never contained the title "president elect" in its name. Additionally, a Facebook spokesman confirmed to Lead…

Did an Antifa leader in the 'Pittsburg area' tweet a warning to President Trump that armed Antifa members would block roads in conservative areas unless he conceded to Joe Biden? No, that's not true: A prankster, infamous for trolling the far right on social media, posted the tweet. Adam Rahuba is not an Antifa leader. He has admitted to past…

Did WikiLeaks dump documents November 17, 2020 revealing a CIA base in Frankfurt, Germany, was used to hack U.S. elections? No, that's not true: Wikileaks released documents back in 2017 purporting to show how the CIA hacked electronic equipment. The alleged CIA documents said nothing of hacking U.S. elections. The claim appeared in an article (archived here) published by The…

Have Dominion Voting Systems and Smartmatic closed up shop and are all their executives on the run after the 2020 vote count? No, that's not true: Neither Dominion nor Smartmatic has shuttered. Citing safety concerns, Dominion has encouraged employees to work remotely and to protect their social media. But, otherwise, both companies continue to operate as normal. Executives remain in…

Was the stage for Joe Biden's 2021 inauguration already being built in front of the White House in November 2020? No, that's not true: A meme making the claim features a 1993 photo of the Bill Clinton's first inaugural parade review stand. The inaugural ceremony traditionally is done on the U.S. Capitol steps, not in front of the White House.…

Was George Soros arrested by the FBI and is he currently in federal custody in Philadelphia under accusation of election interference? No, that's not true: the Canadian website that ran the story has a track record of publishing hoaxes and the screenshot of the supposed unsealed court document it offers as proof is photoshopped. The story first appeared as an…

Did Joe Biden have a big birthday party on Friday, November 20, 2020, where friends gathered close and sang "Happy Birthday" to him without masks? No, that's not true: The video purportedly showing the maskless celebration happened on November 20, 2019, long before COVID-19 had become a concern. The claim appeared in an article published by conservativetoday.org on November 21,…

Does a video show the shredding of paper ballots in Cobb County, Georgia, a day after a recount confirmed that Joe Biden won a 14-percent margin over Donald Trump? No, that's not true: A video posted on social media by a woman on November 20, 2020, showed routine shredding of documents, not ballots nor anything "relevant to the election or…

Did Joe Biden benefit from dead people, animals, and children voting illegally in Georgia in the 2020 presidential election? No, there's no evidence of such voter fraud. Although President Trump warned in July 2020 that he worried about pet dogs being illegally registered to vote, there have been no credible allegations to support the claim that animal votes contributed to…