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False claims about the Charlie Kirk assassination, the Jeffrey Epstein files, and purported verbal gaffes by President Trump topped the list of most-read Lead Stories fact checks in 2025. Here are our most read fact checks of the past year, reflecting our reader's interest in finding out the truth about various viral stories. If you see something suspicious in 2026,…

Did House Democrats release photos showing Jeffrey Epstein with a girl in a green skirt who also appears bound and gagged in another image? No, that's not true: These images have both been digitally edited. The original image of Epstein from 2005 showed him posing with Ghislaine Maxwell. It has been in the Getty Images library since 2016. The image…

Did U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement "rebrand" itself to be publicly known as Homeland Security Investigators, not ICE? No, that's not true: ICE still exists under the same old name. "Homeland Security Investigators" discussed in social media posts is not a brand-new entity -- it has operated since 2010 as one of the major divisions within ICE, but the correct…

Is there evidence that Erika Kirk was a recruiter for Jeffrey Epstein or that she had her husband, Charlie Kirk, killed to shut him up about it? No, that's not true: The claim appears to be based on another false claim that Erika Kirk operated a charity in Romania that was used for trafficking orphaned children internationally. Lead Stories previously…

Is there any evidence that Charlie Kirk's widow Erika Kirk's "Romanian Angels" or "Everyday Heroes like You" ministries were accused of "snatching children only to send them straight into sex and organ trafficking networks in the United Kingdom and Israel? No, that's not true: A review of Romanian court records and media reports by Lead Stories' Romanian staff found only…

Did the most recent, July 2025 version of the 2023 U.K. Online Safety Act prohibit "all criticism" of unauthorized immigration on social media? No, that's not true: According to the full text of the law, what is considered an offense is assisting illegal immigration and human trafficking. Social media posts offering people smuggling services would be against the law, not…

Did President Donald Trump post a 435-word tirade about the public's interest in the canceled investigation into the clients of the dead child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein? No, that's not true: There have been no genuine Trump posts about Epstein on Truth Social since January 2024. The mock-up using Trump's Truth Social profile image was posted by a self-described humor…

Do posts about suspects "Kelvin Buckland" and "Malena Renae Mason" being on the run offer a genuine warning for the members of various local communities? No, that's not true: Such posts were later flipped to promote rental deals. If people click the links promoted in the new versions of the posts, a series of web pages aim to trick social…

Is owning a child sex slave legal in California, as a social media influencer wrote? No, that's not true: It is at least a misdemeanor in California to solicit prostitution from teens. In April of 2025, Democratic lawmakers blocked passage of a proposed amendment that would have made soliciting prostitution with trafficked minors a felony, but that did not remove…

Are homicide detectives searching for Joselyn Valdo Santos for the killing of three-month-old Charlotte Jones on April 1, 2025? No, that's not true: Social media posts making the claim are part of a bait-and-switch scam designed to lure you into sharing personal information that can then be sold or used to scam you further. These posts use unrelated mugshots and…