Election Disinformation

Did Michelle Obama's doctor go on the record about the former first lady using a urinal during the 2008 presidential campaign, thereby proving that she is a man? No, that's not true: The article making this claim originated in 2017 on a now-defunct satirical website called America's Last Line of Defense. Clearly marked disclaimers on the original website, run by…

The year is almost over, so it is good to look back. First, the numbers, as of December 15, 2022. This year we have published 1,555 fact checks in English (so far ...) 283 fact checks about COVID misinformation; 244 debunks of Russian propaganda and false claims about the invasion of Ukraine; 140 debunks of false claims about election fraud,…

Does a video show an "Iranian whistleblower" revealing how they hacked a federal voter registration database during the U.S. 2020 election and created fraudulent overseas ballots? No, that's not true: The footage -- shown at an election integrity event in October -- includes a screen recording that the U.S. Justice Department already determined is intended to mislead people. It does…

Are Dominion voting machines in Pennsylvania "rigged for election theft," depending on whether a voter uses a Sharpie, pen or pencil? No, that's not true: The claims are not backed by any evidence and are unsubstantiated. Both Dominion and the Pennsylvania Department of State say the voting systems are designed to work with various writing implements that may be used…

Is Pennsylvania under a court order to only count ballots on Election Day? No, that's not true: The post provided no evidence of such a court order. Under current election law, unofficial results will be available within a few days of the election. Amy Gulli, the director of the Office of Communications and Press for the Pennsylvania Department of State,…

Does this clip show election fraud happening on live television? No, that's not true: Edison Research, the sole provider of Election Day data to the National Election Pool, which provides numbers to news organizations, told Lead Stories the vote change cited in the post was due to a typo in Henderson County, Kentucky. The error was caught and corrected within…

Did the restart of the CERN subatomic particle collider on July 5, 2022, open portals to other dimensions or release phenomena like the Mandela Effect, 5D or timeline shifts? No, that's not true: There's no evidence that that anything spiritually or cosmically unique or unexpected happened when the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) switched on after more than three years of…

Ms. Susan Wojcicki, It's been almost two years since the COVID-19 pandemic started. The world has seen time and time again how destructive disinformation and misinformation can be for social harmony, democracy, and public health; too many lives and livelihoods have been ruined, and far too many people have lost loved ones to disinformation. As an international network of fact-checking…

Did a Kenosha, Wisconsin, police officer find a suspicious pile of bricks in a back alley and were these bricks placed by leftists in preparation for rioting? No, that's not true: An audio recording of police officers speaking with their dispatcher is authentic, but there is no evidence that there was anything out of the ordinary about the bricks. Declaring…

At Lead Stories we are always open to trying out new technologies and methods when it comes to fact checking. The only way to truly know if something works or not is to try it out. Which is why we are happy to announce we have chosen to participate in a new initiative that seeks to explore if trading representations…