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Did U.S. Special Forces take House Speaker Nancy Pelosi into custody after the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps charged her with "multiple counts of treason and seditious conspiracy"? No, that's not true: A representative of the U.S. Special Operations Command earlier denied to Lead Stories that Special Forces had arrested any civilian, and noted that the Special Forces do…

Did the staff of presidential candidate Joe Biden and the Democratic National Committee suppress political speech leading up to the 2020 election against then-President Donald Trump when it requested certain tweets be reviewed? No, that's not true: all of the deleted tweets we were able to review apparently violated Twitter's Terms of Service -- in particular, the rule that forbids…

Were Nancy Pelosi and "other Deep Staters" arrested at a President Joe Biden banquet in a faux White House owned by filmmaker Tyler Perry? No, that's not true: No branch of the U.S. military is allowed to arrest civilians, per the Posse Comitatus Act. This claim comes from a website that regularly produces fabricated headlines and classifies themselves as a…

Was "even the media" prosecuted during the 1945-46 Nuremberg trials of Nazi Germany's leadership and "put to death for lying to the public"? No, that's not true: This claim misrepresents the purpose of these historical legal proceedings, which set a precedent for holding individuals accountable for crimes against humanity. As the archives show, even those defendants who had a history…

Does a large drop in Wisconsin's active military votes between 2020 and 2022 suggest fraud? No, that's not true: There's no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election. Turnout can vary greatly from election to election, especially whether they're presidential, primary or midterm ballots. Also, the 2020 election set a modern record for the highest overall voter…

Did President Joe Biden choose a "Satan worshipper" to oversee the health of Americans? No, that's not true: Biden picked Dr. Demetre Daskalakis to serve as the deputy coordinator of a national health response team for a single disease, monkeypox. Daskalakis does have a tattoo of a pentagram -- a symbol that some associate with Satan and the occult --…

Did Maricopa County, Arizona, lose some 292,000 votes in its final vote tally for the November 8, 2022, elections? No, that's not true: The tweet making that claim left out voters who returned their mail-in ballots in person and people who cast provisional ballots. The implied claim that Maricopa County had misrepresented the true number of voters who took part…

Does a dual-use COVID-19/influenza A&B test prove coronavirus is the flu? No, that's not true: While COVID and influenza are both respiratory ailments, they are caused by different viruses and require different tests. The antigen test kit pictured in this story is marketed in Australia under the name Fanttest. It's a combination self-test that checks for both viruses at the…

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…