Did Trump win and do the audits prove that he is the president? No, that's not true: Donald J. Trump lost the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden. Trump received 74 million votes to Biden's 81 million votes, and Biden received 306 electoral college votes while Trump only received 232 electoral college votes. The claim appeared as a post (archived…

Does a video posted on Facebook prove that former President Donald Trump is still commander in chief? No, that's not true: Although the video makes the claim in its headline, nothing in the video substantiates the claim. The claim appeared in a Facebook Live video (archived here) recorded on August 1, 2021. The title of the video reads: PROOF TRUMP…

Did Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, "just" tell us they found a variant that "evades the test?" No, that's not true: The claim about Fauci was made in a tweet in March 2021, five months prior to being shared on Facebook in August 2021. The information in the claim appears to be…

Did former President Donald Trump get subpoenas for routers associated with Arizona's voting-counting machines and does that pave the way for Trump to be reinstated as president? No, that's not true: While Arizona's senate is attempting to obtain Maricopa County's routers, Trump is not directly involved in that. If the routers are handed over, and contain evidence of fraud, both…

Did a military tribunal find Tom Hanks guilty of pedophilia and child endangerment, and then execute him because of it? No, that's not true: A Pentagon duty officer confirmed to Lead Stories that the claim was "completely false." The originator of the claim has a disclaimer on its website to alert readers that it is not a real news source.…

Did wolves attack Shrek the Sheep (archived here), a Merino sheep who escaped from a sheep station only to be found 6 years later covered in approximately 60 pounds of wool? No, that's not true: there are no native wolves in New Zealand, although there are non-native feral dogs. The claim appeared in a Facebook post (archived here) published on…

Is InfoWars providing evidence-based information when it reports a doctor's claim that COVID-19 vaccines likely cause permanent heart damage in most patients that may kill some within three years? No, that's not true: The report is based on a Lytton, British Columbia family practitioner's video that provides no reviewable data about his patients' other medical conditions, data on parallel examination…

Was Nickelodeon named after Nicholas Elodeon, the creator of the kids TV channel? No, that's not true: What eventually became Nickelodeon began as Pinwheel, an experimental kids show produced by a cable company in Columbus, Ohio, in the late 1970s. It was later renamed Nickelodeon, a reference to the earliest movie exhibition theaters. The claim appeared in a tweet posted…

Did the CDC report that deaths related to COVID-19 vaccines had skyrocketed and that more people were dying of the vaccine than the disease? No, that's not true: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did not make any such announcement that vaccine-related deaths had shot up in the past week. Foreign reports were temporarily added into the VAERS (Vaccine…

Does an old photo show a young Nancy Pelosi walking with her dad, who appears to be Adolph Hitler? No, that's not true: The black-and-white image shows Helga Goebbels, the daughter of the chief Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels, walking with the German dictator in 1936. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) published on Facebook on July 24, 2021.…

Was German former Formula One race car driver Michael Schumacher in a coma for six years after a skiing accident? And did his wife Corinna go into bankruptcy to fund her husband's medical treatment? No, that's not true: Michael Schumacher suffered traumatic brain injury when he fell and hit his head on a rock while skiing in Meribel in the…

Does Facebook take down posts that include the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag? No, that's not true: A Facebook spokesperson said there was no truth to this. And posts with the Pledge of Allegiance are on Facebook at the time of this writing. The claim appeared in a July 4, 2020, Facebook post. It opens: FB took it down!!!!!!!…

Does this video compilation show amazing superhuman feats of punching speed? No, that's not true: These creative videos show a variety of post-production effects that can be achieved with digital tools, notably masking, using a video editing program. This collection of short videos was posted on Facebook by LADbible on May 7, 2021. The video was captioned: Lads Have Ridiculously…

Is it valid to compare the odds of a shark attack to the odds of contracting the delta variant of the COVID-19 virus? No, that's not true: One noted shark expert says a person is 300,000 times more likely to get COVID via the delta variant than to be attacked by a shark. The comparison claim appeared in a July…

Is a vaccinated person wrong to believe an unvaccinated person is a threat to their health? No, that's not true: No vaccine is 100% effective, so the vaccinated person is still at risk of infection and, at the time the post appeared, unvaccinated people were most likely to carry the infection. During a pandemic, with airborne viruses circulating from person…

Is there evidence that posters advertising jobs for teenagers are actually sex trafficking schemes? No, that's not true: According to representatives for anti-sex trafficking organizations, such posters are not known to be tied to sex trafficking, although they have been linked to labor schemes. The claim appeared in a Facebook post (archived here) on January 28, 2020. It features a…

Did a report recently reveal that COVID-19 killed pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein? No, that's not true: Jeffrey Epstein, who was being held on federal sex trafficking charges, was found unresponsive in a New York City jail cell on August 10, 2019, and soon after pronounced dead, about four months before the COVID-19 virus was found in the U.S. His death…

Did pop singer-songwriter Billie Eilish say that she wanted to be poor so she could be more relatable to her fans? No, that's not true: Eilish's publicist called the screenshot "fake press clips." The story originated from @BilliesUpdatess, a Twitter account that has now been suspended. When the fake story was published is not clear. The false story gained a…

Did the Henry County, Virginia, Sheriff's Office confirm images of a bigfoot? No, that's not true: Capt. Scott Barker with the sheriff's office confirmed to Lead Stories on the phone that their department has not seen or validated any images of the mythical creature, nor have they seen the creature in their county. The claim appeared in a post (archived…

Are the tweets replicating a Florida emergency room doctor's lament over rising Delta variant cases all part of a pro-vaccine propaganda campaign? No, that's not true: Several replicas appear to be part of a gaslighting ploy by anti-vaccine activists seeking to discredit news of rising hospital loads. Dr. Sam Ghali's tweet was turned into a meme that anti-vaccine and COVID-minimizing…