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On May 24, 2019 PolitiFact published an item surrounding actor Alyssa Milano’s claim a Georgia law would subject women to prosecution. The article found the law did not say what Milano claimed. But the PolitiFact article did not take the step of applying a “Truth-O-Meter” rating. We reached out to PolitiFact to encourage adherence to a consistent standard. The text…
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On June 4, 2019 Zebra Fact Check submitted a complaint about the fact-checking organization PolitiFact to the International Fact-Checking Network. Our message to the IFCN said were were offering evidence of PolitiFact’s failure to meet its IFCN obligation to adhere scrupulously to an honest and open corrections policy. The description of our complaint follows in .pdf format.
On May 27, 2019 Zebra Fact Check emailed PolitiFact asking for the fact checkers to fix an incoherent fact check published by PolitiFact Pennsylvania on January 19, 2017. PolitiFact Pennsylvania’s fact check misstated facts and misled and misdirected readers regarding the subject matter of the fact check. The text of the ZFC email follows in .pdf format.
In May 2019 we lodged a complaint with the International Fact-Checking Network charging that PolitiFact’s failure to fix a demonstrable error in its reporting helped show PolitiFact’s failure to scrupulously comply with an open and honest corrections policy. We are unsure of the exact date the message was sent to the IFCN. Typically we wait at least a week after…
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On May 13, 2019, Zebra Fact Check sent an email to PolitiFact asking for a correction of a July 19, 2013 fact check in which PolitiFact rated a literally true statement from Republican Dan Stein as “False.” A .pdf version of that email follows:
Zebra Fact Check judges with high confidence that it sent a complaint about PolitiFact to the International Fact-Checking Network on April 6, 2019. The complaint details a minor research project conducted to estimate PolitiFact’s compliance with its claim that it publishes a page listing all the articles or Truth-O-Meter fact checks it has corrected or updated. Our research showed that…
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On May 10, 2019 Zebra Fact Check sent a complaint to the International Fact-Checking Network offering evidence PolitiFact fails to scrupulously adhere to an honest and open corrections policy. That complaint follows in .pdf format.
On May 3, 2019 Zebra Fact Check requested a correction from PolitiFact on a 2011 “Obameter” story. The text of that message follows in .pdf format.
On May 3, 2019 Zebra Fact Check sent a complaint about PolitiFact to the International Fact-Checking Network. That complaint follows in .pdf format. Correction Sept. 28, 2019: When published, this item said the complaint from Zebra Fact Check was sent on April 3, 2019. That date was wrong. We replaced the incorrect date with the correct date, May 3, 2019….
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On April 24, 2019 PolitiFact published a fact check of a claim by Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. The fact check ignored a false statement from Sanders and in its conclusion falsely claimed it true that the Vermont Constitution only places one restriction on voters (being of “quiet and peaceable behavior”). Zebra Fact Check sent an email message to PolitiFact…
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