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Zebra Fact Check requested correction or clarification regarding a claim of fact PolitiFact included in its March 22, 2022 article titled “‘Don’t say gay’ vs. ‘parental rights’: Fact-checking claims about Florida’s HB 1557.” Sometimes PolitiFact answers email with a standardized response. In this instance we did not receive any response. We sent a second version of the correction/clarification request minus…
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Upon noticing that PolitiFact fact check had failed to properly contextualize a claim from Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), Zebra Fact Check sent a correction request to PolitiFact on July 1, 2022. PolitiFact acknowledged its receipt of the correction request with a form email.
On June 27, 2022, Zebra Fact Check sent a correction request to PolitiFact via [email protected]. PolitiFact issued a “Mostly True” rating for President Biden’s claim that the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision made the United States “an outlier among developed nations in the world.” We explained to PolitiFact it used an unrealistic approach to defining “developed nations” that was inconsistent with…
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On June 16, 2022, Zebra Fact Check sent a complaint about PolitiFact to the International Fact-Checking Network.
A PolitiFact fact check got out ahead of the facts, evident after Uvalde, Texas law enforcement issued contradictory reports about events surrounding a shooting incident. PolitiFact obscured from readers that it issued apparent false reports while relying on official sources. Instead of admitting it changed its reporting, PolitiFact told readers it updated its story with new information that came out…
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Zebra Fact Check discovered a major methodological error in PolitiFact’s May 24, 2022 fact check of a claim by Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). Accordingly, we sent a correction request to [email protected]. We received PolitiFact’s standard acknowledgment form letter in reply.
When PolitiFact responded to our May 27, 2022 outreach by failing to disclose edits it made to a May 26, 2022 fact check, Zebra Fact Check sent another correction request to PolitiFact. We noted, among other things, that revising and eliding material does not count as an update according to PolitiFact’s statement of principles.
Having received no apparent acknowledgment of our May 16, 2022 inquiry about the International Fact-Checking Network’s complaints process, we sent the same inquiry again on May 26, 2022 with a new subject line. The IFCN busies itself with an annual fact-checking convention this time of year, so that may help explain a slow response.
Zebra Fact Check found PolitiFact had announced an “update” to an article where it had changed existing material as well as adding new material, all without following its own statement of principles for doing an update. Accordingly, we sent PolitiFact an email message to [email protected] asking PolitiFact to follow its policy regarding changes to its story.
Zebra Fact Check again tried to obtain information from the International Fact-Checking Network about its practices touching its complaints process. This time we focused our message on Project Manager Ferdi Özsoy. Özsoy oversees the IFCN’s application and verification process.