Election Fraud

Does an authentic photo on social media show Tom Hanks wearing a T-shirt that reads "I was going to be a Trump voter for Halloween but my head wouldn't fit up my ass"? No, that's not true: The photo is a doctored version of a 2010 photo that shows the actor in a plain white T-shirt. Hanks has publicly stated…

Was voter turnout above 100 percent in 2020 in some precincts of Henrico County, Virginia? No, that's not true: Data in a social media post inaccurately added county-level absentee ballots to precinct counts using a mathematical estimate. The county director of elections told Lead Stories that the assertion about impossible turnouts is "incorrect." Counties are not concealing precinct data by…

Did Kamala Harris use a teleprompter during her September 2024 interview with Oprah Winfrey? No, that's not true: The teleprompter seen in a video clip online is placed well out of Harris' line of vision -- and in the full version of the interview, Harris does not turn her head to peek at it. The device was actually facing Winfrey,…

Did Kamala Harris's mother lie in her immigration application by saying she only had one child when she really had two at the time she applied for her visa? No, that's not true: Harris's mother had only one child -- Kamala -- at the time she filed the petition. The full document shows that Harris's mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, filed…

Did Elon Musk and Donald Trump team up to conduct a cryptocurrency scam that would violate election laws, as claimed in a post on X? No, that's not true: Footage from the 2024 Tesla shareholder's meeting, streamed live, was altered with a fake AI-generated voice and facial synchronizing animation. Musk's original presentation had no mention of "crypto", the altered video…

Did Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro not go to the 2024 Democratic National Convention? No, that's not true: There are several images and videos of Shapiro at the convention. Also, many news sources have reported on Shapiro's presence at the event in Chicago. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on August 19, 2024, on the official account of Monica…

Did NASA secretly drop a manned space capsule out of a plane in order to stage a hoax return of astronauts from outer space? No, that's not true: The footage that shows a space capsule sliding out of the back of a C-130 cargo plane was not part of a staged hoax. This was one of several drop tests conducted…

Was "Fulton County election worker, Wanda Shaye Moss" arrested on election fraud charges in June 2024? No, that's not true: The woman shown in a social media post is Wanda Geter-Pataky, who was arrested and criminally charged in connection with the misuse of absentee ballots in Bridgeport, Connecticut. She is not Wandrea ArShaye ("Shaye") Moss, the woman falsely accused of…

Is it statistically impossible that Joe Biden added 600,000 votes in Pennsylvania overnight during the 2020 election count? No, that's not true: The Pennsylvania Department of State told Lead Stories that "This claim is misinformation." Both 2020 presidential candidates, Biden and then-President Donald Trump, added hundreds of thousands of votes in the overnight hours following the closure of polls on…

Did Judge Juan M. Merchan tell jurors in the Donald Trump hush-money trial that they didn't have to reach a unanimous verdict? No, that's not true: The transcript of his instructions to the jury shows that Merchan said, "Your verdict, on each count you consider, whether guilty or not guilty, must be unanimous." Two law school faculty members rejected the…