For weeks, President Joe Biden has been saying the Build Back Better plan would be “fully paid for” and would not increase the deficit. But the official congressional scorekeeper in its long-awaited final analysis contradicted the president’s claims.
Responding to a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis signed an executive order on Oct. 31 allowing hospitals that are at or near capacity to transfer or stop admitting patients. Social media posts falsely claimed the order says hospitals can “refuse to treat the unvaccinated.” But the order doesn’t mention vaccination status.
Both President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris lauded the bipartisan infrastructure legislation for creating good-paying jobs for “millions” of Americans. But they meant millions of job-years, not millions of additional jobs.
The vast majority of people who have died with COVID-19 had other medical conditions that put them at risk of severe disease, or other conditions caused by COVID-19. But internet posts misinterpret data about those conditions to falsely claim that Italy has reduced its count of COVID-19 deaths. It hasn’t.
Kyle Rittenhouse, who is on trial for murder, testified in court that he drove himself from his home in Antioch, Illinois, to Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Aug. 24, 2020, the day before he shot and killed two men at a protest that became violent. The weapon he used, according to testimony, had been stored at a friend’s house in Kenosha. Democratic Rep. Karen Bass falsely claimed that Kyle’s mother drove her armed son across the Illinois-Wisconsin border.
The House’s current Build Back Better plan calls for extending a $7,500 tax credit for the purchase of electric vehicles, and it includes an additional $4,500 credit for electric vehicles built in the U.S. by union labor. We provide an explainer of what is being proposed.
After getting the COVID-19 booster on Oct. 27, California Gov. Gavin Newsom canceled a trip and did not participate in any official public events for 12 days. Social media posts claimed, without evidence, that Newsom was suffering serious side effects from the booster. But his staff denied that he had an “adverse reaction” to the shot and, during this time, he appeared twice on social media and reportedly attended a wedding.
FactCheck.org staffer Catalina Jaramillo was featured on the latest episode of “A Better Life?,” a podcast that explores how COVID-19 has made immigrants’ lives harder.
The COVID-19 death rate for unvaccinated people has been significantly higher than for vaccinated people in both Israel and the U.S. Despite that, conservative commentator Ben Swann makes the false claim in a video that Israeli data prove vaccines aren’t effective in preventing hospitalizations and deaths. But the charts he uses don’t distinguish between vaccinated and unvaccinated patients.
Aaron Rodgers, the star quarterback of the Green Bay Packers, made headlines when he contracted COVID-19 and then defended his decision not to get vaccinated with a string of false and misleading claims that fact-checkers have frequently debunked.