&Quot;Free Speech&Quot;

Does a screenshot show a real Mehdi Hasan social media post with a September 11 photo and the caption, "Make American planes crash again."? No, that's not true: The screenshot is altered. The original Feb. 16, 2025, and later deleted post by Hasan did not have a 9/11 image showing a plane about to crash into the World Trade Center.…

Did U.K.'s Prime Minister Keir Starmer publicly threaten to arrest X owner Elon Musk along with other "336 million Americans"? No, that's not true: Lead Stories reviewed Starmer's public comments about Musk and did not find anything remotely close to what social media attributed to the prime minister. The claim about hundreds of millions to be arrested is implausible on…

Did Cher tell Karoline Leavitt to "sit down, baby girl" after reading out her bio on MSNBC? No, that's not true: The viral story about the singer reacting to a supposed rant from Leavitt about "out-of-touch celebrities who think they can lecture America" originated on a network of websites and Facebook pages run from Vietnam. It contained verifiably false details.…

Did MSNBC air old 2017 footage of a large crowd in Boston Common and misrepresent it as live footage of the Oct.2025 No Kings protest? No, that's not true: The footage shows the October 18, 2025 No Kings protest as it was taking place. The 2017 protest mentioned on social media took place in a different area of the Boston…

Did singer Pink publish a defense of Jimmy Kimmel on social media that read "Freedom of speech cannot be bought with money; it is the voice of the people."? No, that's not true: No such post appeared on any of the social media channels of the singer. The story was promoted by a Facebook page managed from abroad. The claim…

Did Charlie Kirk make this final video sometime before he died, "Knowing this day might come"? No, that's not true: A video posted on TikTok contains a mashup of real scenes, but the audio is fake. A specialized detection tool analyzed the audio track from this video and determined that the voice of Charlie Kirk was made with an AI…

Was Steven Kenneth Bonnell II, also known as streamer Destiny, permanently removed from Twitch in the aftermath of his September 2025 comments on Charlie Kirk's assassination? No, that's not true: The real, indefinite ban still affecting streamer Destiny was already in effect before the killing of the conservative activist. It has been in effect since March 24, 2022. The claim…

On June 3, 2025 I was invited to make a statement during a public hearing at the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium organized by the Special Committee on the European Democracy Shield. The hearing was titled "Enforcement of the EU Digital Rulebook and political advertising in the context of foreign interference: understanding Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) and disinformation…

April 2 is International Fact-Checking Day, a global celebration of truth and accuracy. Like every year we want to take the opportunity to say that "Facts Matter". Usually at Lead Stories we are quite content to let the facts speak for themselves, but this year we have a much more eloquent guest speaker, world-famous actor Stephen Fry: Some of our…

Does a genuine transcript show what Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said after Representative Jim Himes asked a question about retweeting "posts from individuals affiliated with Russian state media" using her personal account? No, that's not true: The fake transcript starts off with things that were actually said but then adds more questions from a "reporter" who wasn't actually…