Voting Rights

Do 22 million illegal immigrants live in the United States, receive public benefits and vote illegally? No, that's mostly false: Two experts in public policy told Lead Stories that the number of illegal immigrants in the United States is closer to 11 million. Because they are not citizens, they cannot qualify for most public benefits and cannot vote in most…

Does the U.S. Constitution only grant men and women the right to vote? No, that's not true: The 19th Amendment to the Constitution says, "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex." That protects the voting rights of citizens of…

Do U.S. citizens pay a percentage of their taxes to the queen of England via the IRS, and is the IRS not part of the federal government? No, that's not true: The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is a bureau of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, which is an executive department of the U.S. federal government. To avoid double taxation…

Summary: Mike Lindell's video series allegedly proving fraud in the November 2020 elections relies heavily on digital evidence in the form of files and animations that Lindell claims show attacks on the U.S. election infrastructure coming from China and other places. Lindell has never acknowledged where these files and animations came from. Lead Stories traced them back to a website…

Does Burger King Corporation require its patrons to provide identification verifying a shared address in order to dine in at the same table? No, that's not true: While the Canadian province Manitoba implemented such a COVID-19 policy for restaurants, that is not a Burger King corporate policy. The claim appeared in several social media posts, including a Facebook post (archived…

Is Georgia removing Coke from all state-owned buildings? No, that's not true: Although a group of GOP state legislators requested that Coca-Cola products be removed from their offices, there is no known effort to spread such a ban to all state-owned buildings. The lawmakers' request came on the heels of a statement from Coke's CEO, who criticized Georgia's new voting…

Do New York and Delaware prohibit giving food and water to voters in line? No, that's not true: In New York it is not illegal to provide refreshment to voters, as long as the value of the refreshment is less than $1, and the person or entity supplying the refreshment is not identified, according to New York state election law.…

Did the "Act of 1871" establish the United States as a corporation? No, that's not true: The District of Columbia Organic Act of 1871 established a new, unified government for Washington, D.C. It "incorporated" that city, a common legal term by which areas are organized for governance by a single entity. In this case, two cities and a county were…

Does the recent legislation that funds aid to Americans economically hard-hit by the coronavirus pandemic also provide tax dollars for "gender studies" in Pakistan? No, that's not true: Though they were voted on as one package, the COVID relief measures were part of a separate bill that was then bundled together with others to streamline end-of-the-year votes in Congress. The…

Does a nine-point list of election "peculiarities" contain only true statements? No, it doesn't: The list relies on falsehoods and unproven theories. Chief among them are claims that swing states stopped counting ballots on election night, that record numbers of dead people voted and that low absentee ballot rejection rates suggest something nefarious is afoot. None is true, election officials…