Did the White House post an alert that all flights were grounded, airspace was restricted and the National Guard had been activated on Feb. 6, 2026? No, that's not true: Nothing on the White House website, the FAA alert history or in real news reporting shows any such actions were taken. The hoax has circulated through traffic farming accounts and…
Is a photo that shows Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer smiling and dining with Jeffrey Epstein legitimate? No, that's not true: The image was created by an artificial intelligence tool, according to several AI-generated content detectors. Google's Gemini detected a SynthID watermark embedded in the image indicating that all or part of it was created or edited with Google AI.…
Did Donald Trump really post a video on Truth Social featuring the faces of Michelle and Barack Obama superimposed on the bodies of apes? Yes, that is true: Shortly before midnight on Feb. 5, 2026 Donald Trump posted a 1-minute, 2-second video from the PatriotNewsOutlet.com. The video promoted a debunked conspiracy claim about voting machines during the 2020 election. The…
Does a real photo show Melania Trump and Ghislaine Maxwell posing with three young women whose faces have been redacted? No, that's not true: This fake photo was made to look like a Polaroid photo from 1998. The high resolution fake image was featured as a clickbait thumbnail for a YouTube video, with black redactions as if it originated from…
Is the business featured in a recent video by Dr. Mehmet Oz related to hospice and home care fraud in Los Angeles? No, that's not true: The business is a family-owned and operated bakery and market and there is no evidence that implicates the business in any fraud prosecution or to the hospice and home care industry. Several other businesses…
Did police discover the body of an elderly woman in a Pima County suburb with clothing found at the scene that closely resembled what Nancy Guthrie was wearing before her disappearance? No, that's not true: "This is not factual," the public information officer for the Pima County Sheriff's Department told Lead Stories. As of February 5, 2026, "TODAY" show host…
Did a viral video of a crying French school teacher hit and teased by fighting students show a real-life scene from a French classroom? No, that's not true: The clip showed typical inconsistencies found in generative AI videos. The name of the account that initially posted the video contained "IA", a French equivalent of "AI". The claim appeared in a…
Did U.S. Senator Ted Cruz say, "Let's stop attacking pedophiles" at a congressional hearing? Yes, he did, but his spokesperson described that as a gaffe, "a verbal slip", and clarified that the senator opposed such crimes. The overall context of Cruz's remarks did not contradict his press office's clarification. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) published on X…
Did the Department of Justice database correctly render the contents of a Jan. 17, 2013 email to Jeffrey Epstein when it turned the email's words into "New Brazilian just arrived, sexy and cute, =9yo"? No, that's not true: The original email said "19yo". The = sign is one of several substitution errors that arise from optical character recognition scanning, PDF…
Did the Epstein files contain an email discussing the beginning of World War III, scheduled to start on Feb. 8, 2026, as a viral image implied? No, that's not true: No email with the phrases "ww3" and "investmentt opp (nuclear)" could be located on the website of the Department of Justice, as of this writing. Lead Stories found a file…
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