President Joe Biden said victims of the California fires are eligible for a $770 payment for necessities like food and fuel. Social media posts misleadingly suggested the payment would be the only federal aid for those affected by the fires. Federal aid available to the fire victims includes help with home repair or replacement, medical expenses and other assistance.
President-elect Donald Trump said that when he takes office he will “immediately” reverse President Joe Biden’s recent executive action making more than 625 million acres of U.S. coastal waters off limits for new offshore drilling. But Trump’s intent to quickly “unban” any future oil and gas drilling in those areas may not be as simple as he suggests.
Federal law enforcement officials have identified an Army veteran, who was born in the United States, as the sole person responsible for the Jan. 1 terrorist attack in New Orleans that killed 14 people and injured many more. But some Republican politicians and social media posts have wrongly claimed or suggested that the attack was the result of illegal immigration.
We wrote about a lot of misinformation in 2024, and, as usual, some fact-checking articles piqued our readers’ interest more than others. In this post, we present the 10 most popular stories published on our website this past year.
Q: Who is flying the drones that are appearing over the East Coast?
A: On Dec. 17, four federal agencies said they followed up more than 5,000 reported drone sightings and determined that they were lawful private and law enforcement drones and other aircraft “mistakenly reported as drones.” The agencies said the drones do not pose a security threat.
Elon Musk, who has been tapped by President-elect Donald Trump to lead a committee to ferret out government waste, wrongly posted to X that members of Congress are trying to vote themselves a 40% raise. The maximum possible raise in 2025 would be 3.8%, not 40%.
House Speaker Mike Johnson was spinning the facts when he claimed Republicans would have won a larger majority in the House in the 2024 election if not for Democrats’ gerrymandering of districts. The net effect of redistricting did not give the Democrats a large advantage, experts told us, with most of them saying the Republicans benefited more than Democrats.
President Joe Biden pardoned his son Hunter Biden from serving time for gun- and tax-related crimes. But contrary to claims on social media, Hunter Biden’s gun charges did not stem from a 1994 “crime bill authored” by then-Sen. Joe Biden.
President-elect Donald Trump is the first Republican presidential candidate to win the popular vote in 20 years. Social media users have wrongly claimed that Trump lost the popular vote, but they are confusing the popular vote with a majority of votes. The unofficial results show Trump received slightly less than a majority, but more votes than any candidate.
Attacks by Israeli forces and Hamas continue to kill or displace people in the Gaza Strip. But social media posts misleadingly claim Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential election led Hamas to call for an end to the war in Gaza. Hamas has called for a ceasefire several times before the election. And the violence has continued since Election Day.