2020 Election Fact Checking

A Big Tech-backed “fact” “checking” outfit claimed to debunk explosive evidence in support of Republicans’ claims of significant election problems at a Thursday Georgia Senate hearing. It didn’t. Not even close.

Georgia election officials disputed a video promoted by President Donald Trump’s campaign as evidence of election fraud, saying the footage shows nothing but "normal ballot processing."

The surveillance video was introduced as proof of illegal activity by Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani and his team during a Dec. 3 hearing with Georgia state legislators. The Trump campaign then circulated One America News Network’s live coverage of the event online.

A viral thread on Twitter attempts to connect Attorney General Bill Barr with Dominion Voting Systems by claiming that he has been appointed to the board of directors of Dominion Energy, which the author of the tweets claims owns Dominion Voting Systems.

A viral Instagram post from right-wing commentator David Harris, Jr. claimed that a Georgia judge reversing his order for the state of Georgia to “impound and preserve the voting machines in the State of Georgia, and to prevent any wiping of data” is evidence that “SOMEONE HAS THE JUDGES IN THEIR BACK POCKET!”

From the point of view of moderator Chris Wallace of Fox News, the first 2020 presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden seemed promising — at least for the first few moments.

"My initial reaction was, ‘This is great — they’re going to engage with each other!’" Wallace said. "Not long after, you began to feel, ‘This is getting out of control.’"

In the years-long competition among Fox employees to demonstrate the most obsequiousness to President Trump, it seemed unlikely that anyone might be able to surpass Sean Hannity’s robust lead. Maria Bartiromo, though, is making a late charge.

CLAIM: Attorney Sidney Powell claimed that widely used voting machines from the election technology company Dominion Voting Systems featured software created "at the direction" of former Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to swing his own election results, and that the company has ties to the Clinton Foundation and Soros.

This is false

EVIDENCE: None of this is true. Dominion has no corporate ties with Venezuela, the Clinton Foundation or Soros.

One of the big surprises of the 2020 election was how even though most Latino voters across the US voted for Joe Biden, in some counties of competitive states like Florida and Texas, a higher-than-expected percentage of Latinos supported Donald Trump. One factor that many believe played a role: online misinformation about the Democratic candidate.

Can President Donald Trump wield the power of the pardon to protect himself? This is a question readers have asked us, so we asked legal scholars about a range of scenarios.

Trump himself has asserted that doing so would be legal, although as he raised the possibility, he added that he wouldn’t need to, because he believed he had no legal worries.

"As has been stated by numerous legal scholars, I have the absolute right to PARDON myself, but why would I do that when I have done nothing wrong?" Trump tweeted on June 24, 2018.

Members of the Trump campaign’s legal team have made a series of claims about Dominion Voting Systems and alleged ties to Venezuela in their attempt to cast doubt on the presidential election results.

In a press conference on Thursday, Rudy Giuliani claimed that “many” ballots are calculated overseas and open to hacking as he introduced lawyer Sidney Powell, who attempted to tie Dominion Voting Systems to the Chávez regime in Venezuela.