&Quot;Taxpayer Dollars&Quot;

Did Tel Aviv University get $581 million from American taxpayers? No, that's not true: The school received less than $6 million in U.S. government funds, an official website shows. A nonprofit data expert told Lead Stories that most of the money reported in the school's tax return under "Contributions and grants" is "likely Israeli government funding." The claim appeared in…

Did USAID spend over $8 million on Politico, LLC, as social media posts imply? No, that's not true: The government spending database only shows $44,000 in two transactions. Both were subscriptions, not grants. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on X where it was published on February 5, 2025. It opened: So let me get this straight... USAID…

Did the U.S. government spend or plan to spend $50 million exclusively on condoms in Gaza? No, that's not true: There's no evidence that the U.S. government intended to spend that much money just on condoms for the small territory. U.S. aid to Gaza is focused on humanitarian needs like food, medical supplies and other essential help. The U.S. State…

Did Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's wife, Olena Zelenska, buy a Bugatti sports car for almost 4.5 million euros in June 2024? No, that's not true: The invoice supposedly proving the claim contained multiple errors. Both Bugatti and Bugatti's Paris-based dealership denied the authenticity of the document shared online and a video supposedly showing a Bugatti employee confirming the claim appears…

Did President Joe Biden give $16 billion of American money away to Iran in 2023? No, that's not true: First, it's important to say that the amount in question is $6 billion, not $16 billion. Secondly, the money wasn't U.S. taxpayer dollars to begin with; the funds were Iranian financial assets that had been frozen in South Korea due to…

Did CNN show footage capturing Iranian lawmakers chanting "death to America" in the aftermath of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack of Israel? No, that's not true: The video circulating on social media was aired in 2020. The chanting was the reaction to the death of Qasem Soleimani, a high-ranking Iranian military official killed by a U.S. airstrike in Iraq…

Did billionaire philanthropist George Soros fund the purchase of voting machines in order to rig the 2022 midterm elections? No, that's not true: Elections are funded by taxpayer dollars and Soros has no connections to voting machine or voting software companies. The claim appeared in a November 6, 2022, Instagram post that uses a long string of hashtags for a…

Did the U.S. government secretly pay major media outlets to promote COVID-19 vaccines and suppress negative coverage? No, that's not true: The public education campaign via ads was announced by the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in the early months of 2021. The funding was approved by Congress. The paid ads were handled by…

Was the novel coronavirus launched as a diversionary tactic to distract the masses from misdeeds of global elites, and is COVID-19 less dangerous than the seasonal flu? No, that's not true: Experts in public health and virology have published several peer-reviewed papers dismissing as conspiracy theories the claim that the COVID pandemic was launched on purpose. The nation's leading infectious…

Has President Joe Biden taken down the southern border wall that former President Donald Trump built? No, that's not true: On Biden's first day in office, January 20, 2021, he ordered a "pause in construction and obligation of funds" relating to the expansion of the border wall Trump had decreed. Biden's order says nothing about tearing down the part of…