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Did President Trump post a meme on Truth Social showing SpongeBob SquarePants making a "Got Done Last Week" list? Yes, that's true: The meme appeared on Trump's Truth Social account on February 23, 2025. It was still on the @realDonaldTrump account at the time of this writing. A screenshot of the post appeared in a post (archived here) on X,…

Did Senator Mitch McConnell die on February 17, 2025 at the age of eighty-two? No, that's not true: A post announcing McConnell's death was published by a parody account spoofing the real account Breaking 911. The spoof account has a disclaimer which says, "Parody artist. If you fell for my bait, you owe me eight dollars." As of February 18,…

Does a viral screenshot show a real X post from Ashley St. Clair talking about conceiving a baby with Elon Musk using "IVF with PGT-M & CRISPR" and saying the "DNA now includes enhancements from other organisms"? No, that's not true: The post did not appear on St. Clair's X account, and it was not indexed by Google. All versions…

Did a video truly show Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth drink what appears to be bourbon whiskey from a glass during a NATO press conference? No, that's not true: The video that appeared on TikTok appears to have been created by using a phone to film a TV screen, and some kind of sheen made the liquid in Hegseth's glass appear…

Did President Donald Trump post to Truth Social that New Zealand and Congo were both "Third World Countries" and that the Democrats were launching a "meme" coin? No, that's not true: Images of such a post circulating on social media appear to have been falsified, indicated by the inconsistent use of upper and lower case "K" in the engagement counts.…

Did the Trump State Department come up with the idea to order $400 million worth of armored Tesla vehicles? No, that's not true: The original proposal to buy armored electric vehicles for the State Department came during the Biden administration in April 2024. The $400 million line item was included in a State Department Procurement Forecast Fiscal Year 2025 in…

Does a 2025 poll say Germans think President Donald Trump is the greatest threat to world peace just weeks after taking office? No, that's not true: The poll being circulated in February 2025 was actually conducted in 2019, toward the end of Trump's first term in office. The graphic being shared comes from a 2019 Fox News story reporting that…

Did President Donald Trump sign an executive order giving public housing residents a two-year deadline to move? No, that's not true: There is no such executive order posted on the White House website as of February 12, 2025. A search of Trump official remarks in 2025 also did not locate any mention of public housing or a deadline order. The…

Did Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, say, "Jesus Christ didn't have electricity either and he did just fine" while explaining President Donald Trump's tariff policies? No, that's not true: None of Leavitt's press briefings before the purported quote appeared online included that remark. There is evidence that the supposed quote originated in a joke response from a Reddit…

Did Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum address President Donald Trump in a speech about "7 billion consumers ready to replace" their American products and vacations with non-American ones? No, that's not true: Lead Stories could not find any evidence that Sheinbaum ever said that to Trump, let alone publicly. Neither the website of the Mexican government nor Google News, among other…

Does a photo on social media show a man flipping off President Donald Trump during the 2025 Super Bowl game? No, that's not true: Lead Stories found evidence of the photo being posted online since 2023. Social media posts of the photo indicated it was taken at a college football game in Iowa on September 9, 2023. Media outlets widely…

Did President Donald Trump react to the Super Bowl in a post on Truth Social saying that the Chiefs were "too focused on DEI nonsense" and the Eagles got "USAID money flowing in like water"? No, that's not true: Images of such a post circulating on social media appear to have been falsified. The post was not present on Trump's…

Did a video captioned "BOO THE BASTARD" authentically show President Donald Trump being booed at the Super Bowl in 2025? No, that's not true: The video was uploaded to TikTok days before the 2025 Super Bowl with a caption encouraging viewers to "do it." The original footage was taken at a 2020 football game that did not feature the booing…

Is there evidence the Coca-Cola Company called Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on their own workers in Texas and did several of them get deported as a result? No, that's not true: Online posts and videos making this claim lack details about the concrete place and time this supposedly happened and they offer up differing versions of events. A…

Did President Donald Trump post on Truth Social that the Department of Education spent millions developing a hybrid of the fork and the spoon (commonly known as a spork) on February 8, 2025? No, that's not true: A screenshot of such a post circulating on social media appears to have been fabricated. There is no such post on Trump's Truth…

Did Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum say she thought Americans encouraged felons and rapists to come to the United States since "that's what they chose to be their president"? No, that's not true: There is no evidence Sheinbaum made such a statement. The quote originated on a TikTok channel that describes itself as a place for "Awful Sports Takes, Brutal SportsBetting…

Did President Donald Trump fire 3,000 air traffic controllers one week before the fatal American Airlines Flight 5342 collision with a military helicopter? No, that's not true: A White House spokesperson told Lead Stories they had not fired any air traffic controllers as of publication date. Trump did direct the head of the Federal Aviation Administration to end "DEI hiring…

Did ICE announce it was pausing a hotline to report undocumented immigrants because 90 percent of the calls were people reporting Elon Musk? No, that's not true: That claim originated on a satirical X account named "The Halfway Post." The ICE website still lists the number 1-866-DHS-2-ICE to "report suspicious activity," and it currently shows no statements or news releases…

Did newly confirmed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent post on X that he was "committed to eliminating income taxes, replacing them with a fair consumption tax, and adopting a gold-backed currency"? No, that's not true: X has since suspended the account where the post appeared for violation of its rules, which often includes taking down fake accounts. There is no evidence…

Does an old photo show Elon Musk's grandfather Joshua Haldeman standing in front of the office of Technocracy Inc. in Canada? No, that's not true: The black-and-white image shows Howard Scott, an American engineer who founded the technocracy movement in 1933, according to reverse image search results. Haldeman's obituary says he was a chiropractor in Canada. The claim appeared as…