1)South Korea doesn't pay the United States for U.S. troops that protect their country. (stated on March 23, 2011)
Trump’s statement on The View is incorrect. South Korea has signed an agreement to cover labor, logistical and construction costs running into the hundreds of millions of dollars annually. That may or may not be a big enough payment, but Trump is wrong to suggest that South Korea bears no financial burden at all. We rate his statement False.
2)Says President Obama's "grandmother in Kenya said he was born in Kenya and she was there and witnessed the birth." (stated on April 7, 2011)
Trump is serving up re-heated leftovers that have long ago been debunked. Anyone who listens to the tape of the phone conversation with Sarah Obama can hear how tightly you need to edit this interview to present it as evidence of a presidential cover-up. We rule Trump's claim that Obama's grandmother in Kenya said he was born in Kenya False.
3)"Libya supplies the oil for China. We get no oil from Libya." (stated on April 4, 2011)
Trump said, "Libya supplies the oil for China. We get no oil from Libya." His point in the first sentence was clearly that Libya was a major supplier of oil for China. But the data do not support his claim. Libya is far from being China’s chief supplier. It ranks ninth.
The second part of his statement is false -- the U.S. does get oil from Libya and the percentage is likely to increase..
On the whole, we rate Trump’s statement False.
4)President Obama has spent over $2 million in legal fees defending lawsuits about his birth certificate. (stated on April 7, 2011)
When fact-checking, we think the onus is on the person making the claim to back up his statement. And the only backing we've seen in this case is that the Obama campaign's legal team spent more than $2 million on legal fees since the election ended. It's clear to us that the WND story has been twisted to wrongly assume that every dollar the Obama campaign spent on legal fees went to fight the release of Obama's birth certificate. The evidence shows that's simply not true. It's a huge, unsubstantiated leap to assume that all, or most, of that was related to lawsuits about Obama's citizenship. We rule Trump's claim False.
5)"ObamaCare enrollment lie: Obama counts an enrollee as a web user putting a plan in ‘their online shopping carts.’" (stated on April 18, 2014)
While some insurance companies accept online payments and give Obamacare enrollees the option to pay immediately, many do not. In the Virginia-Maryland market for example, most companies mail bills to the new customers who come through the government marketplaces. That means customers don’t even have the option of paying straight away.
Also, while customers may not have paid, most states require a grace period of 30 or 31 days where insurers are required to pay claims.
So maybe they don’t intend to pay and will eventually lose their coverage. But for now, they are treated as if they were enrolled. And they did a lot more than just load up an online shopping cart.
We rate Trump’s claim False.
6)The Islamic State "just built a hotel in Syria." (stated on June 16, 2015)
The Islamic State does occupy a luxury hotel, which they took over about a month and a half ago. However, it’s in Iraq, not Syria, and they didn’t build it. It’s an old hotel that the group refurbished and occupied. As far as we know, the hotel’s rooms are reserved for Islamic State commanders, and the event spaces are for weddings.
At least for now, Trump doesn’t have to worry about the Islamic State running him out of the hotel business. We rate his claim False.
7) "Our real unemployment is anywhere from 18 to 20 percent. Don't believe the 5.6. Don't believe it." (Stated on June 16, 2015)
Setting aside his paranoia about the federal government cooking the books, Trump is off-base even if you give him the maximum benefit of the doubt. The highest official government statistic for under-employment is 10.8 percent -- roughly half as high as Trump says. And if you make a quick and dirty attempt to expand the scope of this measurement to include other Americans left uncounted in the standard statistics, there’s no plausible way to get it past 16 percent -- and even that’s stretching it. That’s well below the range Trump cited, so we rate the claim False.
8)"Even our nuclear arsenal doesn't work. It came out recently they have equipment that is 30 years old. They don't know if it worked." (stated on June 16, 2015 )
There have been a number of high-profile lapses in the management of the country’s nuclear stockpile in recent years, but those problems have to do with personnel and training. They’re not an indication that the weapons themselves "don’t work" -- which, if it were true, would be a significant problem for the nation’s strategic military position in the world.
In reality, the United States has been spending $35 billion a year to upgrade its nuclear stockpile, and officials tasked with certifying the safety and reliability of the current arsenal have consistently given their seal of approval. We rate Trump’s claim False.
9)Public support for abortion "is actually going down a little bit," polls show. (stated on June 28, 2015 )
There was a significant dip in the number of people who identified as pro-choice in 2012, but that number has rebounded during the last three years, according to a Gallup survey. Other research shows the percentage of people who identify as pro-choice or pro-life split has stayed relatively stable for at least the past 20 years.
We rate Trump’s claim False.
10)Says his book, The Art of the Deal, is "the No. 1 selling business book of all time." (stated on July 1, 2015)
The highest estimate pins the number of sales at 1 million, which we weren’t able to verify. According to one source of sales data, The Art of the Deal sold 184,000 physical copies since 2001. There are no lists of all-time sales, but we weighed The Art of the Deal against other popular books in its genre. While the book was very successful, it comes nowhere near claiming the title of top seller. Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People and Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People easily outpace it.
We rate the claim False.
11)"The $5 billion website for Obamacare … never worked. Still doesn't work." (stated on July 11, 2015)
Trump said "the $5 billion website for Obamacare … never worked. Still doesn't work." But experts say that, using the most reasonable definitions, Trump overstates the amount of money spent to create and fix healthcare.gov, and his claim that the website isn’t working -- and never did -- is debunked by the fact that millions of Americans have signed up for insurance through the site, even if some more limited glitches remain. We rate the claim False.
12)Says Florida had five sanctuary cities while Jeb Bush was governor. (stated on July 11, 2015 )
There’s no legal definition of a sanctuary city, and therefore no official classification. A federal report from 2006, when Bush was governor, didn’t name any Florida cities. We found one list on the Internet that claimed five Florida locations as current sanctuary cities, but the supporting evidence was virtually nonexistent. City officials told us they weren’t sure why their cities were on the list.
For lack of evidence, we rate Trump’s statement False.
13)"If you're from Syria and you're a Christian, you cannot come into this country" as a refugee. (stated on July 11, 2015)
This is wrong on its face -- a small number of Syrian Christians been admitted as refugees over the past nine months -- and also false in spirit, since there is nothing in the United States’ laws or regulations that discriminates against Christian refugees. We rate the claim False.
14)Says John McCain "has done nothing to help the vets." (stated on July 19, 2015)
While many veterans’ groups have had their differences with McCain over the years over specific legislation and his general approach to veterans’ issues, that’s not the same as saying he’s done "nothing" for veterans. In fact, just within the past two years, McCain has sponsored and helped enact several major provisions to help veterans. He also devotes a significant portion of his office staff to offer veterans on casework.
We rate Trump’s claim False.
15) The five Guantanamo detainees swapped for Bowe Bergdahl "are right now back on the battlefield." (stated on July 21, 2015)
The Taliban Five are known to be in Qatar, where they have been since their release over a year ago. Qatar is considered neutral ground -- not a battlefield -- and they are not allowed to leave the country. At least one of the five has been in contact with suspected insurgents, but experts said there is not enough information available to know the extent of these communications. And even if they had communicated with insurgents from afar, that would not the same as literally going back to the battlefield.
Because there is no evidence to support Trump’s claim, we rate it False.
16)Under President Barack Obama, income levels and unemployment numbers "are worse now than just about ever" for African-Americans. (stated on August 2, 2015)
Some key statistics for African-Americans, such as unemployment, improved significantly during Obama’s tenure. The ones that stagnated or worsened under Obama are still relatively positive compared to recent history.
Trump is wrong by several important measures. We rate the claim False.
17)Illegal immigration "wasn’t a subject that was on anybody’s mind until I brought it up at my announcement." (stated on August 6, 2015 )
Trump said that if it weren’t for him, Wallace in particular and the media in general wouldn’t be talking about illegal immigration. The numbers tell a very different story. For Wallace and his Fox News show itself, the topic came up just as frequently before Trump announced as afterward. For mentions in major newspapers, the pattern is somewhat mixed, but mentions were common before Trump announced.
There’s no doubt Trump’s bombastic comments brought additional attention to the issue, but the issue was on the minds of the media -- and politicians -- before Trump entered the fray.
But Trump stated that the topic would not be on the table at all if not for him. That is clearly not the case.
We rate this claim False.
18)"Some of the things that (Megyn Kelly) said, I didn’t say." (stated on August 9, 2015)
Trump said that "he didn’t say" some of the things about women that Kelly talked about.
The record, however, shows the opposite is true. He has said exactly what Kelly mentioned in the debate.
We rate Trump’s statement False.
19)"We’re the most highly taxed nation in the world." (stated on August 24, 2015)
Trump said the United States is "the most highly taxed nation in the world." Depending on the measurement you use, the United States is either in the middle of the pack or on the lighter end of taxation when compared to other advanced industrialized nations. We rate his claim False.
20) "We have 93 million people out of work. They look for jobs, they give up, and all of a sudden, statistically, they're considered employed." (stated on August 28, 2015)
That figure, boosted by Trump’s description, represents a basic misunderstanding of the labor market.
Once you strip out full-time students, senior citizens, the disabled, and those who have chosen not to work to take care of their children, a more reasonable estimate of "out of work" Americans is somewhere in the neighborhood of 21 million, or less than a quarter of Trump’s figure. Meanwhile, he is flat wrong that the government reclassifies discouraged workers as "employed."
We rate his claim False.
21)Under the Iran deal: "If Israel attacks Iran … we’re supposed to be on Iran’s side." (stated on September 3, 2015)
The claim rests on an interpretation of a provision that the U.S. and other partners are prepared, "as appropriate," to cooperate with training to strengthen Iran’s ability to protect against and respond to nuclear security threats, including sabotage.
But the White House has made it clear that its interpretation of the provision is that it is targeted at terrorists and saboteurs, not Israel or other U.S. allies. If you’re still in doubt, consider that nothing in the provision compels the U.S. to offer any assistance to Iran in the event of a threat to its nuclear program.
So we rate Trump’s statement False.
22)Says Mexico doesn't have birthright citizenship, and Americans are the "only ones" to have it. (stated on September 16, 2015)
Trump defended his pursuit of ending birthright citizenship by saying not even Mexico has it, adding the United States is alone on this right.
But that’s not true, no matter how many times Trump repeats this line.
Anyone born on Mexican soil is considered Mexican by nationality, regardless of whether their parents are Mexican. No one in Mexico, even if a person’s parents are Mexican, is considered a "citizen" by the country’s Constitution until he or she turns 18.
The United States and Mexico are joined by more than 30 countries around the world, predominantly in the Americas, that offer birthright citizenship.
We rate the claim False.
23)"The birther movement was started by Hillary Clinton in 2008. She was all in!" (stated on September 22, 2015)
It’s an interesting bit of history that the birther movement appears to have begun with Democrats supporting Clinton and opposing Obama. But Trump, and others who have made this claim, neglect to mention that there is no direct tie to Clinton or her 2008 campaign.
The story appears to have started with supporters of Clinton, an important distinction.
Trump goes on to completely distort the chain of events by claiming Clinton "was all in" on the birther movement. Most of the talk started after Clinton suspended her presidential campaign. And the only thing she officially has ever done is deny any accusation of starting a whisper campaign.
We rate this claim False.
24)Among Syrian refugees, "there aren't that many women, there aren't that many children." (stated on October 4, 2015)
It appears Trump is conflating two different sets of refugees: Those 534,000 reaching Europe by sea, who are mostly men, and the 4 million Syrians in U.N. refugee camps, most of whom are women and children.
Only about 10,000 refugees in the camps are slated for resettlement in the United States over the next year. Those making the perilous trip to Europe are not.
The priority refugees from this group would be torture survivors, people with serious medical conditions, unaccompanied children and teens, and women and children at risk. Those factors, coupled with background screenings, suggest they would likely not be ISIS operatives waiting to terrorize the United States.
Trump's assessment of the refugee situation is badly mangled. We rate his statement False.
25)"We have the highest tax rate anywhere in the world." (stated on October 14, 2015)
All sets of data we examined for individual and family taxes prove him wrong. Statutory income tax rates in the U.S. fall around the end of the upper quarter of nations.
More exhaustive measures - which compute overall tax burden per person and as a percentage of GDP - show the U.S. either is in the middle of the pack or on the lighter end of taxation compared with other advanced industrialized nations.
We rate Trump’s claim False.
26)Says CIA Director George Tenet told the Bush administration that the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack "was coming. So they did have advanced notice." (stated on October 20, 2015 )
Trump claims that the CIA told the Bush administration that a domestic terror attack was coming. The report assembled over a span of three years after Sept. 11, 2001, found no specific alert. The potential for a domestic attack was discussed in early August, but it was mentioned only in broad terms and was not brought back up. Investigative reports in the years since found that the CIA warnings emphasized possible targets overseas.
Tenet told investigators that as late as Sept. 10 he did not talk about a domestic attack with the president.
There’s no support that Bush and top White House officials had, as Trump said, "advanced notice" of an attack on New York City or any other place in America.
We rate this claim False.
27)"Sixty-one percent of our bridges are in trouble." (stated on October 14, 2015)
The FHWA identifies 24 percent of the bridges as deficient. This doesn’t mean, to borrow a Trump phrase, that "our bridges are falling down." It means that the infrastructure is aging and many of the spans require high maintenance, while others are serving more traffic than anticipated when they were built.
We don’t mean to minimize the nation’s infrastructure problems, but Trump’s inflated figure is nowhere near the mark. We rate his statement False.
28)Says Ohio Gov. John Kasich "got lucky with a thing called fracking," which "is why Ohio is doing well." (stated on October 28, 2015)
Though Ohio underwent a fracking boom in recent years, Trump is overstating its impact on Ohio’s economy. By all estimates, fracking jobs account for 2 percent of those added in the state during Kasich’s tenure. Shale development has improved GDP by about 1 percent and contributed to less than a percent of the state’s tax revenue.
Not even the drillers themselves back Trump’s claim. We rate it False.
29)Says his plan would cut taxes without increasing the deficit. (stated on October 28, 2015)
Free market-oriented and liberal groups alike say Trump’s tax plan would lead to a $10 trillion revenue loss, even if it did create economic growth.
Since Trump has said he will not slash retirement programs like Social Security and Medicare, experts doubt that any spending cuts he made would result in a revenue-neutral tax plan.
We rate Trump’s claim False.
30)The 9/11 terrorists' friends, family, girlfriends in the United States "were sent back for the most part to Saudi Arabia. They knew what was going on. They went home, and they wanted to watch their boyfriends on television." (stated on December 15, 2015)
Trump provided no evidence. The 9/11 Commission investigation found that 13 of the 19 attackers were unmarried. Only two had wives, a third had a girlfriend, and none of those women were in the United States immediately before the attack. The commission further found evidence that the hijackers had cut ties with their families.
There is no substance behind the statement. We rate this claim False.
31)Canadian-born Ted Cruz "has had a double passport." (stated on January 5, 2016)
Trump didn’t provide and we didn’t find evidence that Cruz, who relinquished his dual citizenship in 2014, ever carried passports for the U.S. and Canada--nor, Cruz’s camp advises, did he ever apply for a Canada passport.
We rate the claim False.
32)Donald Trump repeats wrong claim that prisoners swapped for Bergdahl are 'back on the battlefield' (stated on January 10, 2016)
The Taliban Five are known to be in Qatar, where they have been since their release over a year ago. Qatar is considered neutral ground -- not a battlefield -- and they are not allowed to leave the country. At least one of the five has been in contact with suspected insurgents, but experts said there is not enough information available to know the extent of these communications. And even if they had communicated with insurgents from afar, that would not the same as literally going back to the battlefield and, as Trump said, "trying to kill everybody.".
Because there is no evidence to support Trump’s claim, we rate it False.
33)Among Syrian refugees and migrants coming into Europe, "there look like very few women. Very few children." (stated on January 14, 2016)
The data in no way supports that claim.
The majority of more than 4.6 million Syrian refugees entering Europe are women and children 17 and younger. Of migrants arriving by sea -- about 1 million people -- 31 percent are children and 19 percent are women.
We rate this statement False.
34)"When they say Mexico can't pay for the wall, I say of course they can. We have a trade deficit with Mexico that's unbelievably big. ... It's billions and billions of dollars -- far more than what we're talking about for the wall." (stated on January 20, 2016)
The trade deficit is about $50 billion. Estimates to build a wall vary widely, though the ones we saw were smaller than the trade deficit. It’s impossible to know a precise figure because Trump hasn’t offered a detailed plan.
However, Trump’s overall message here is misleading because he suggests that the size of the trade deficit is proof that Mexico could pay for the wall. In reality, the trade deficit has nothing to do with whether the Mexican government could afford to write the United States a check to build the wall.
We rate this statement False.
35)"I never once asked that (Megyn Kelly) be removed" as a debate moderator. (stated on January 28, 2016)
This statement greatly downplays Trump’s comments ahead of the debate, even if his absence really had more to do with a mocking Fox News release in the end.
Trump mused about skipping the debate because of Kelly for a couple days before that news release. He went so far as to say Kelly "should not be allowed" to moderate, that she "should recuse herself," and she "shouldn’t be in the debate."
We rate Trump’s claim False.
36)"Right now we’re the highest taxed country in the world." (stated on February 6, 2016)
We used a couple of different measurements suggested by experts to determine that no matter how you slice it, the United States is far from the most taxed nation in the world, whether it’s an advanced industrialized economy or not.
We rate his statement False.
37)On the Iraq war, "I said it loud and clear, 'You'll destabilize the Middle East.' " (stated on February 13, 2016)
Maybe Trump felt this way privately, but he made no publicly reported comments in the lead-up to the Iraq War that reflect this sentiment. He certainly did not say it "loud and clear."
We could only find one example of Trump commenting on the Iraq War before the invasion, and he seemed apprehensive but not vehemently opposed to the operation. He only started publicly denouncing the war after it started.
Because he far overstated how loudly he declared his position on the Iraq War, we’re cranking the rating on this statement up to False.
38)"If it weren’t for me … (illegal immigration) wouldn’t even be a big subject." (stated on February 25, 2016)
Trump’s talk about building a wall -- and making Mexico pay for it -- certainly has made headlines. But talk about America’s immigration system and proposed changes preceded the billionaire businessman’s candidacy for president.
We rate this claim False.
39)When Mitt Romney chose Paul Ryan as his vice-presidential running mate, "that was the end" of Romney’s chances to win.(stated on February 17, 2016)
Polls taken in the days after Ryan’s selection generally showed that Romney’s standing vs Obama was as good or better than in the days before the pick. We couldn’t find any evidence that the Ryan pick sunk the ticket.
We rate Trump’s statement False.
40)"We (Trump University) have an ‘A’ from the Better Business Bureau." (stated on February 28, 2016)
Literally speaking, that is inaccurate. The Better Business Bureau gives the program no rating today because it’s no longer a going concern.
Trump University had an A at some point. The Better Business Bureau doesn't release details of its past ratings, but it did say Trump's program had ratings that ranged from A+ to D-.
What we do know, from several published reports and archived Web pages, is that the university had a D in 2010 and under its new name, had ratings ranging from C to B, with no ratings after March 2014.
Trump’s claim is literally wrong and also ignores the university’s lower Better Business Bureau scores. We rate it False.
41) "The people that went to school with (Barack Obama), they never saw him, they don't know who he is." (stated on February 10, 2011)
We could get deeper into this but it seems like overkill. It's abundantly clear that there are lots and lots of former classmates who remember Obama at every level of school. It's true that Obama's two years at Columbia are relatively undocumented. And far fewer classmates have publicly shared recollections of Obama from that period, as opposed to other school years before and after. At Columbia, Obama was a transfer student, he lived off campus and by his and other accounts he buried himself in his studies and didn't socialize much. But even so, there are several students who recall Obama at Columbia.
In short, media accounts and biographies are filled with on-the-record, named classmates who remember Obama. Trump is certainly right that presidential candidates are heavily scrutinized. As even a basic online search confirms, Obama's school years were, too. Trump's claim that people who went to school with Obama "never saw him, they don't know who he is" is ridiculous. Or, to borrow Trump's phrase, it's crazy. We rule Trump's statement Pants on Fire.
42)"CNN did a poll recently where Obama and I are statistically tied." ( stated on April 27, 2011)
After Trump began broadcasting his views on Obama’s birth certificate in a series of nationally televised interviews, his head-to-head numbers against Obama worsened. His average for the four polls conducted in April produced an average Obama lead of more than 15 points.
So, Trump not only gave an incorrect attribution for the poll that showed him within the margin of error, but he also ignored or didn't know about more recent polls that suggest he would not do well in a head-to-head contest against Obama. We also think it’s misleading of Trump to characterize the poll as "recent." In another context, he might have an argument that it’s "recent," but in a dynamic, fast-changing primary contest, two months is the equivalent of a geological eon. The fact is, the most recent four polls show Trump losing to Obama by near-landslide proportions. We rate Trump’s claim Pants on Fire!
43)After the U.S.-led military alliance ejected Saddam Hussein’s forces from Kuwait in 1991, the Kuwaitis "never paid us." (stated on April 27, 2011)
A final accounting published a decade later by the House Budget Committee’s Democratic staff found that the final reimbursements eventually crept up slightly, to $54.1 billion. Of that, $48.4 billion was in cash, and $5.7 billion was in kind.
So Trump was flat wrong that Kuwait "never paid us." When the books were closed on the war, the United States found itself out of pocket by about $7 billion -- less than half of the $16 billion shelled out by the Kuwaitis. We rate his claim Pants on Fire!
44)Says President Barack Obama’s recent New York fundraising trip "cost between $25 million and $50 million." (stated on October 13, 2014)
Trump provided no evidence, likely because all the available information points to a total that would be way, way lower than $25 million, let alone $50 million.
We rate the claim Pants on Fire.
45)"The last quarter, it was just announced, our gross domestic product … was below zero. Who ever heard of this? It's never below zero." (stated on June 16, 2015)
He messes up his economic terms; the gross domestic product was not "zero." And the growth in the gross domestic product has been below zero 42 times over 68 years. That’s a lot more than "never." We rate his claim Pants on Fire!
46) "When was the last time you saw a Chevrolet in Japan? It doesn’t exist, folks." (stated on June 16, 2015 )
Trump said Chevrolet cars in Tokyo don’t exist.
Literally, that’s not true. Chevy sells cars in Japan.
However, Chevy sales are more like a trickle compared to the flood of Japanese brands in the market. A journalist who covers the auto industry in Japan told us visitors would not likely see a Chevy during their stay in Japan.
47)"Hundreds of thousands of (illegal immigrants are) going to state and federal penitentiaries." (stated on July 1, 2015 )
In 2013, there were fewer than 100,000 noncitizens -- legal and undocumented -- in federal and state prisons. If you add in local jails, it’s quite possible but uncertain that the total number of incarcerated illegal immigrants is above 100,000, though it’s also possible that many of these individuals are held for immigration violations as opposed to other crimes. We just don’t have solid data on this point.
Without any good information to back it up, Trump’s claim falls flat. We rate it Mostly False.
48)"Four times, I said, he (John McCain) is a hero, but you know ... people choose selective pieces." (stated on July 19, 2015)
Trump literally said McCain is a hero five times, but never without caveats. Once, he added "perhaps, I believe" before conceding the point. Twice, he was interrupted. And the last two times, Trump said, "He is a war hero because he was captured." In other words, Trump also chose "selective pieces" and misquoted himself.
We rate his claim Mostly False.
49)Under Gov. Scott Walker, Wisconsin "projected a $1 billion (budget) surplus and it turns out to be a deficit of $2.2 billion." (stated on July 25, 2015)
There was in early 2014 a projection of a $1 billion surplus heading into the 2015-’17 budget period. Late in 2014, there was a projection of a $2.2 billion shortfall -- the difference between expected revenues and the amount of money being requested by state agencies. But the shortfall was never a deficit -- and some of the surplus was consciously spent by Republicans, as tax cuts.
For a statement that contains only an element of truth and ignores critical facts that would give a different impression, our rating is Mostly False.
50)"Jeb's policies in Florida helped lead to its almost total collapse." (stated on September 8, 2015)
Economists told us the Great Recession was precipitated by a housing bubble that grew out of multiple factors, including policies on all levels of government. While Bush’s actions as governor may not have done anything to prevent the financial crisis — some experts said he could have worked to throttle down the overbuilding — all agreed he did not cause the recession.
We rate Trump’s statement Mostly False.
...to be continued
News
Library
Technology
Giải Trí
Portals
Tin Sốt
Home
