Did the Arizona audit show that Donald Trump won the state? No, that's not true: The audit in Maricopa County, Arizona's most populous county, showed that Joe Biden beat Trump there by nearly 45,000 votes. That edge contributed to Biden's victory in the state as a whole, where he won by close to 10,500 votes. The claim appeared in a…

Did ballots in Arizona show "VERIFIED AND APPROVED" stamps behind a black triangle, meaning that the image was fake or not a valid ballot? No, that's not true: The image shown during the presentation of the Maricopa County election audit was an inversed image made by the scanner, the Office of Maricopa County Records told Lead Stories. The claim appeared…

Are "duplicate ballots" in Maricopa County, Arizona, proof of voter fraud? No, that's not true: "Duplicate ballots" or ballot envelopes don't prove duplicate votes. If a voter sends back a mail-in ballot and the signature on the envelope is questioned, or there is no signature, election officials will work to cure that signature by contacting the voter. If the issue…

Are House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Joe Biden being investigated by the FBI for election fraud? No, that's not true: There is no evidence offered to support this claim and no publicly available evidence supports it. The claim is fake, a Pelosi spokesperson said. The claim appeared in the headline of a video post (archived here) on Facebook published…

Do California ballots have holes in them so that others can see how someone voted? No, that's not true: A spokesperson for California's secretary of state told Lead Stories that the holes in ballot envelopes were included to aid California voters who have "low vision" in finding where to sign on the envelope. There are also ways to orient the…

Was the fifth Mike Lindell election fraud video correct in claiming a major American voting machine company is controlled by Chinese Communist Party investors and that voting machines used in the 2020 election were hacked via the internet? No, the claims were made without accompanying evidence. Federal banking and finance forms fall well short of supporting the claim that Dominion…

Did the materials released by Mike Lindell at his Cyber Symposium meet evidentiary standards of relevance, proof of origin, chain-of-secure-custody and reproducibility that online security experts say would be needed to take seriously his claim that he holds massive data files showing the 2020 election was stolen by hackers? No, that's not true. Lead Stories asked for the information necessary…

Did "corrected" vote totals from the 2020 election presented by Mike Lindell at his election fraud Cyber Symposium as "Truth" support the theory that fake ballots were injected into every state's official election returns? No, that's not true: Lindell's "Truth" totals add up to the same number of votes he calls "The Big Lie," which are the final tallies that…

After Mike Lindell's appearance on the April 28, 2021, "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" show, Lead Stories published a story titled "Attention Mike Lindell: What You May Want To Know About The 'Data' Used In Your Stolen Election Claims" that traced some of the data used in Lindell's movies to a man named Dennis L. Montgomery. Lindell has been quite vague on…

Does a blurry video posted to Mike Lindell's Frankspeech.com show internally consistent evidence of election fraud? No, that's not true: the (clearer) screenshot that serves as the thumbnail image for the video shows identical data for Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. That would suggest the video documents manufactured evidence. The video was also used as the centerpiece of Mike Lindell's Cyber Symposium…