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PolitiFact rated an obviously false statement “Mostly True” with a July 24, 2023 fact check of Vice President Kamala Harris. Accordingly, we submitted a correction request pointing out some of the ways PolitiFact botched the fact check. Correction July 28, 2023: Original title was off by about 20 years on the date of the correction request. Now correctly reads 2023.
On July 24, 2023 PolitiFact published a supposed fact check of Vice President Kamala Harris. Harris claimed “(T)hey (Florida) decided middle school students will be taught that enslaved people benefitted from slavery.” PolitiFact rated Harris’ claim “Mostly True” on its trademarked “Truth-O-Meter.” Doubtless DEI directors and Democrats will largely cheer the ruling. We’ll explain how PolitiFact botched the ruling in…
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Zebra Fact Check had reason in July to submit a correction to Snopes.com, again “verified” as a signatory of the International Fact-Checking Network’s statement of principles. We found the process needlessly difficult. In fact, we referred to the IFCN’s most recent assessment of Snopes, by Margot Susca, to figure out how to submit our correction request. Before resorting to reliance…
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In a December 2022 fact check, Snopes.com claimed PolitiFact debunked the claim that a diary for a time in the possession of Project Veritas was authentic. That claim was false. We know the diary is authentic even if alleged contents of the diary have not been confirmed. PolitiFact’s fact check “debunked” claims about the contents of the diary, not the…
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Zebra Fact Check noticed a fine case of inconsistent methodology from the fact checkers at PolitiFact. As correction requests go, this one counts as ill-defined. We point out the inconsistency but do not suggest how PolitiFact might fix the problem, for the problem of inconsistency forms a veritable spider’s web of problems with PolitiFact’s fact-checking. In response to our email…
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