President-elect Donald Trump told the New York Times he had an “open mind” about climate change, but he went on to repeat some of the same false and misleading claims that have been used by those who reject mainstream climate science.
Fake news is nothing new. But bogus stories can reach more people more quickly via social media than what good old-fashioned viral emails could accomplish in years past.
House Speaker Paul Ryan falsely claimed that “because of Obamacare, Medicare is going broke.” The law actually improved Medicare’s financing, and the program isn’t going “broke.”
Donald Trump misleadingly touts tax cuts of 30 percent for “working people” or 35 percent for “a middle-class family with two children,” adding that Hillary Clinton “wants to raise your taxes up to the sky.” That distorts both Trump’s and Clinton’s plans.
Donald Trump claimed that a 25 percent average increase in premiums on the HealthCare.gov exchanges was a “phony number,” citing instead increases of “60, 70, 80 percent.” But Trump just as easily could have cherry-picked increases in the single digits.