Jan. 21, 2017 — Speech at Central Intelligence Agency headquarters
The repeated claim: “Honestly, it looked like a million and a half people. Whatever it
was it was, but it went all the way back to the Washington Monument.” Later:
“…all the way back to the Washington Monument, was packed.”
In fact: The crowd, which may not have even been half a million people
strong, did not come close to reaching the Washington Monument.
The repeated claim: “It was almost raining, the rain should have scared em away, but
God looked down and He said, we’re not going to let it rain on your speech. In
fact, when I first started, I said oh no. First line, I got hit by a couple of
drops, and I said this is too bad … but the truth is that, it stopped
immediately, it was amazing, and then it became really sunny.”
In fact: Neither of these claims is true. The rain did not stop
immediately, and the sky then remained cloudy.
The claim: Trump told
Congressional leaders that “he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton in
last November’s election because between three million and five million
‘illegals’ cast ballots, multiple sources told Fox News.”
In fact: This claim, also reported by numerous other major media outlets,
simply has no basis in reality. Trump’s own lawyers said in a legal
filing that “all available evidence suggests that the 2016 general election
was not
tainted by fraud.” The National Association of Secretaries of State — the state
officials who run elections — said
they “are not aware of any evidence that supports the voter fraud claims made
by President Trump.”
The claim: “In terms of a total audience including television and
everything else that you have we had supposedly the biggest crowd in history.
The audience watching the show. And I think you would even agree to that. They
say I had the biggest crowd in the history of inaugural speeches.”
In fact: “They” can mean anyone, but no expert is declaring that Trump
had the biggest inauguration crowd in history. Obama’s 2009 inauguration drew
far more people in person and far
more television viewers. Trump’s claim relies on the people who watched the
inauguration on online streams. It is possible that these people gave him a
record, but it is impossible
to know for sure.
The claim: “No, no, you have to understand, I had a tremendous victory, one
of the great victories ever. In terms of counties I think the most ever, or
just about the most ever.”
In fact: Trump’s victory was not close to one of the biggest of all time.
He lost the popular vote, and his Electoral College margin ranks 46th out of 58
elections. Trump did far better in terms of counties, winning more than any
candidate since Ronald Reagan, but he was well short of setting the record or
even “just about” tying it: Richard Nixon won
more than 2,950 counties in 1972, far exceeding Trump’s
2,623.
The claim: Regarding his false claim of “millions” of possible illegal
voters: “Those were Hillary votes. And if you look at it they all voted for
Hillary. They all voted for Hillary. They didn’t vote for me. I don’t believe I
got one. OK, these are people that voted for Hillary Clinton.”
In fact: These large numbers of illegal voters did not “all” vote for
Clinton because they do not exist. Even if they did, it would be impossible for
Trump to know that not a single one voted for him, since the ballot is secret.
This claim is simply absurd.
The claim (on refugees): “We’ve taken in tens of thousands of people. We know nothing
about them. They can say they vet them. They didn’t vet them. They have no
papers. How can you vet somebody when you don’t know anything about them and
you have no papers?”
In fact: Refugees to the U.S. are rigorously
vetted. The process includes multiple kinds of background and security
checks and at least two interviews with U.S. representatives. Regardless of
their paperwork situation, and regardless of one’s opinion on how good the
vetting is, the U.S. knows far more than “nothing” about the refugees it
approves.
The claim: “Do you believe it? The Obama Administration agreed to take
thousands of illegal immigrants from Australia.”
In fact: The people in question are refugees, not illegal immigrants; the
agreement covers 1,250 people, not “thousands.”
The claim about his travel ban: “I think it was very smooth. We
had 109 people out of hundreds of thousands of travellers and all we did was
vet those people very, very carefully … General Kelly — who’s now Secretary
Kelly — he said he totally knew, he was aware of it, and it was very smooth. It
was 109 people.”
In fact: The implementation of the ban was anything but smooth — it
produced confusion in foreign countries, in America and even within Trump’s own
government — and it affected far more than 109 people. A lawyer for the Trump
administration said in court that 100,000
people had their visas revoked; Homeland Security officials announced
that 721 people had been denied boarding at airports; thousands more were
left uncertain about their status or were forced to change plans. Trump’s press
secretary has clarified
that the 109 figure refers solely to “the initial group of people that were in
transit at the time the executive order was signed” — which is not even close
to the total number of people impacted.
The repeated claim: “I have already saved more than $700 million when I got involved
in the negotiation on the F-35. You know about that.”
In fact: Trump did not personally secure these savings: Lockheed Martin had
been moving to cut the price well before Trump was elected, multiple aviation
and defence experts say. Just a week after Trump’s election, the head of the
F-35 program announced a reduction of 6 to 7 per cent — in the $600 million to
$700 million range.
“Trump’s claimed $600 million cut is right in the ballpark of what
the price reduction was going to be all along,” wrote
Popular Mechanics. “Bottom line: Trump appears to be taking credit for
years of work by the Pentagon and Lockheed,” Aviation
Week reported, per the Washington Post.
The claim: “The previous administration allowed it to happen. Because we
shouldn’t have been in Iraq but we shouldn’t have gotten out the way we got
out. It created a vacuum, ISIS was formed.”
In fact: Daesh, also known as ISIS and ISIL, was formed long before the
U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq, which occurred in 2011. The group has roots as
far back as 1999, and it was already using the name Islamic State by 2006,
under George W. Bush. While it had been weakened
by 2011, it was around. So Trump can make a reasonable argument that the
U.S. withdrawal helped the group thrive, but it is simply inaccurate to say
Daesh “was formed” in a post-withdrawal vacuum.
The claim: “The murder rate in our country’s the highest it’s been in 47 years, right? Did you know that? 47 years? I’d say that in a speech and everybody’s surprised. Because the press doesn’t tell it like it is. It wasn’t to their advantage to say that.”
In fact: The homicide rate is not even close to a 47-year high. In fact, it
remains near
historic lows. There were 10 homicides per 100,000 residents in 1980, eight
per 100,000 residents in 1995; in 2015, the latest year for which there is
national data, it was five per 100,000 residents. Trump sometimes correctly
notes that the increase
in the homicide rate between 2014 and 2015 was the largest in more than 40
years. But that is far different than the actual rate being the highest.
The claim: “I want you to turn in the bad ones. Call Secretary Kelly’s
representatives and we’ll get them out of our country and bring them back where
they came from, and we’ll do it fast. You have to call up the federal
government, Homeland Security, because so much of the problems — you look at
Chicago and you look at other places. So many of the problems are caused by
gang members, many of whom are not even legally in our country.”
In fact: Trump has not presented any evidence whatsoever that illegal
immigrants are responsible for much of Chicago’s crime problem, and academic
experts and local officials say Trump is wrong. “I don’t know anyone in Chicago
who believes that,” said Toni Preckwinkle, president of the Cook County board, according
to CBS Chicago. “Whether we are talking about African-American or Latino
neighbourhoods, we are not talking about illegal immigrants. We are talking
about our native-born sons and daughters.”
Feb. 9, 2017 — Private meeting with senators about Supreme Court
nominee Neil Gorsuch
The claim: “The president claimed
that he and (Republican former senator Kelly) Ayotte both would have been
victorious in the Granite State if not for the ‘thousands’ of people who were
‘brought in on buses’ from neighbouring Massachusetts to ‘illegally’ vote in
New Hampshire.”
In fact: Such fraud did
not happen.
The claim: “Just leaving Florida. Big crowds of enthusiastic
supporters lining the road that the FAKE NEWS media refuses to mention. Very
dishonest!”
In fact: There were some supporters along the road, but they were
far outnumbered by protesters, according
to reporters on scene.
The claim: “Walmart announced it will create 10,000 jobs in the United
States just this year because of our various plans and initiatives.”
In fact: The Walmart expansion plan that is creating the jobs was announced
in October, before Trump was elected. The company did not reveal the
precise 10,000 figure until after Trump took office, but it is directly
connected to the previous announcement.
Feb. 16, 2017 — White House press conference
The claim: “General Motors likewise committed to invest billions of dollars
in its American manufacturing operation, keeping many jobs here that were going
to leave. And if I didn’t get elected, believe me, they would have left. And
these jobs and these things that I’m announcing would never have come here.”
In fact: GM made a new $1 billion commitment to U.S. factories, not
“billions”; it committed $2.9 billion last year, before
Trump was elected. GM did not offer any indication that it made the
decision because of Trump, and independent automotive analysts said it was
unlikely the company had done so. “Mostly theatre to play in the news cycle
created by President-elect Trump’s tweets,” Autotrader analyst Michelle Krebs said.
“These investments and hiring plans have long been in the works and are a
continuation of what the company has been doing in recent years.”
The claim: “We had Hillary Clinton give Russia 20 per cent of the uranium
in our country.” Added: “Hillary Clinton gave them 20 per cent of our uranium.”
In fact: Clinton didn’t
personally give Russia uranium. The State Department, which Clinton led as
secretary of state, was one of nine government entities that reviewed the
Russian purchase of the Toronto-based firm Uranium One, which controlled the
rights to about 20 per cent of U.S. uranium capacity. There is no evidence
Clinton was personally involved in the process in any way. Further, only the
president could have made the decision to block the deal; Clinton did not have
final authority either way.
The claim about the 9th Circuit appeals court: “In fact,
we had to go quicker than we thought because of the bad decision we received
from a circuit that has been overturned at a record number. I have heard 80 per
cent — I find that hard to believe; that’s just a number I heard — that they’re
overturned 80 per cent of the time.”
In fact: This statement is false in one way, possibly misleading in
another. It is false that the 9th Circuit is overturned by the Supreme Court at
a “record number.” Even in the study
conservatives usually cite in criticizing the 9th Circuit, the court had the
second-highest reversal rate between 1999 and 2008. Between 2010 and 2015, it
was third-highest.
In the most recent court term for which complete data is readily available, the
9th Circuit was again in second place.
It may be misleading to discuss reversal rates this way at all.
The Supreme Court overturns a majority of cases it agrees to hear —
but those cases represent a tiny fraction of total cases decided by a circuit
court. So even if 80 per cent of 9th Circuit cases that reach the Supreme Court are
overturned, that still means more than 99 per cent of the circuit’s total
decisions are not overturned.
The claim: “I guess it was the biggest electoral college win since Ronald
Reagan.”
In fact: George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama all
earned bigger
margins in the electoral
college than Trump did.
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