Did the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services give illegal immigrants citizenship in exchange for voting for Democrats for the rest of their lives? No, that's not true: A Homeland Security representative pointed out the satire disclaimer that can be found on the Real Raw News website and linked to an article debunking Real Raw…

Do COVID-19 nasal test swabs contain both lithium and DARPA hydrogel that allow recipients to be remotely controlled? No, that's not true: The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) told Lead Stories that nasal swabs used to test for COVID do not contain lithium or hydrogel from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The claim appeared in a TikTok video…

Are 4-year-old children prescribed puberty blockers as part of gender-affirming care? No, that's not true: The American Academy of Pediatrics told Lead Stories this claim is "not accurate." Puberty blockers are only prescribed once an individual has started or is beginning to start puberty. Four-year-olds do not normally go through puberty. The claim appeared in a tweet (archived here) on…

Does the movie "Died Suddenly" demonstrate that COVID-19 vaccinations cause widespread sudden death or severe medical outcomes? No, that's not true: The film recycles previously debunked claims that the vaccine is lethal or dangerous for the average person receiving it. More than 5.45 billion people have been vaccinated worldwide and public health experts recommend immunization against the virus, saying it…

Do medical schools neglect to teach future doctors about vaccines, how they're made and their potential dangers? No, that's not true: Vaccine education is a typical part of the training in schools of medicine. Representatives of multiple medical schools told Lead Stories that learning about vaccines is a foundational part of their curriculum for teaching students to become doctors. The…

Did Arizona election officials say "we accidentally mixed un-counted votes with counted votes, maybe 15 to 17 thousand"? No, that's not true: The elections department spokesperson told Lead Stories that Maricopa County officials never said that and there is no record of news organizations reporting Arizona election officials saying that. The claim appeared as an Instagram post on November 17,…

Is Twitter owner Elon Musk charging journalists who use the non-gendered pronouns "they/them" $16 per month to secure a blue check verification -- twice the price as other users? No, that's not true: The claim is satire and neither Twitter nor Musk have announced a plan to double charges for nonbinary reporters. The claim appeared in a November 8, 2022,…

Did Maggie Hassan, a New Hampshire Democrat who ran for Senate in the 2022 midterms, win 1,100 votes from a town with only 700 people? No, that's not true: The New Hampshire Secretary of State told Lead Stories the inflated vote tally was the result of "human error" and had since been corrected. Election results for New Hampshire can be…

Does a video showing people dropping off multiple ballots at one time in a drop box prove election fraud and what "really happened" in Arizona? No, that's not true: Delivering more than one ballot for other voters is legal in Arizona. Individuals can return someone else's ballot if they are a relative, share a household or are a caretaker, a…

Does a "bunch of bags" randomly arriving at the Maricopa County, Arizona, counting center prove that election fraud occurred there? No, that's not true: The black canvas bags in the image are used to transport voted ballots and results from vote centers on Election Day. The bags are heavily secured and under constant surveillance by members of both the Democratic…

Did Maricopa County, Arizona ballots make a stop with no observers at "Runbeck Printing Company" to be sorted before they were sent to the county for counting? No, that's not true: The claim was made without direct evidence. Maricopa County's spokesperson said bipartisan teams of election workers took sealed envelope packets to Runbeck Election Services, where envelope signatures are scanned…

Was a Phoenix affiliate of Fox News part of an attempt to defraud voters by calling the Arizona governor's race 12 days before Election Day? No, that's not true: While the affiliate, Fox 10 Phoenix, did accidentally air a graphic in late October that showed Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs defeating Republican candidate Kari Lake by six points, the station acknowledged…

Are the ExpressPoll pollbook devices used in Dallas County for the 2022 general election operating on out-of-date software? No, that's not true: ExpressPoll Version 7.2.3.0, the up-to-date version, was certified by the Texas Secretary of State's office in May 2022, its spokesperson Sam Taylor confirmed to Lead Stories. "Dallas County would not have been able to use them if they…

Does a filing on the Florida Secured Transaction Registry show that Anthony Fauci, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and many other public servants are involved with a diamond business in Sulphur, Oklahoma? No, that's not true: There is no business by that name registered in Oklahoma. The Registry filing made by Paul Michael Walters does not appear to be a record…

Does a viral video show election workers in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, commiting voter fraud in November 2022? No, that's not true: This exact video and claim were previously debunked in 2020. The election worker shown was manually transcribing damaged ballots, Delaware County officials said. No proof has emerged that the two individuals featured were not adhering to the Pennsylvania election…

Were "poll pads" in Texas caught adding "hundreds" of voters in real time as a poll was being closed? No, that's not true: The state-certified Election Systems & Software (ES&S) voting systems e-pollbooks in Dallas County, Texas, previously experienced "some delay in the downloading" of checked-in voters and then caught up, according to the Texas Secretary of State. "The updating…

Was U.S. government aid to Ukraine misused by funding Democratic candidates during midterm campaigns through the crypto exchange FTX? No, that's not true: Social media posts did not differentiate between private donations and U.S. government funds allocated to support Ukraine, and no reliable sources reported that either of those was invested in FTX. The claim appeared in re-posts identical to…

Did a Republican poll watcher in Arizona have access to voter check-in information where she claims to have seen evidence that 200 extra ballots were counted? No, that's not true: The Maricopa County Elections Department told Lead Stories that "[p]olitical [p]arty observers do not have access to voter check-in data," plus "there are processes in place every election to reconcile…

Do large downticks in cumulative voting graphs for the 2022 Pennsylvania Senate and governor's races prove election fraud? No, that's not true: Edison Research, which supplies election data to news organization websites, told Lead Stories that the downticks shown by My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell on social media and on his Frank Speech website -- totaling tens of thousands of…

Was it suspicious that more Democrats in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, requested mail-in ballots than Democrats in Philadelphia County, even though 273,765 fewer registered Democratic voters live in Allegheny County in 2022? No, that's not true: This also happened in 2018 and 2016, according to a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of State, who added, "There is no evidence of fraud."…