Another day, another fact-check of a social-media post

Another day, another fact-check of a social-media post.

This one is titled, "Biden-Harris accomplishments."

- "Allowed 15M unvetted illegals into the country"

False. This is malarkey to the max. How many undocumented immigrants were in the country when COVID struck, under Trump? 11.48M. How many were in the country at last count, under Biden? 11.5M. How many were in the country in 2006, when George W. Bush was president? 11.55M.

2006: 11.55M

2019: 11.48M

2022: 11.50M

Call me crazy, but those numbers come across as awfully similar, leading me to believe this claim is complete bullsh*t. There aren’t 15M undocumented immigrants total in this country, let alone during just the Biden administration.

https://immigration.procon.org/us-undocumented-immigrant-population-estimates/

- "Historic inflation crisis"

Sweet dear, baby Jebus, this is a tired talking point. What was inflation when Trump entered office? 2.5%. What was it when COVID hit the country? 2.5%. In other words, when we take COVID out of the equation during Trump’s term, inflation didn’t increase nor decrease. When we talk about the increase of inflation, however, we’d be remiss in not mentioning the pandemic. It’s not like said increase was isolated to the U.S. It was felt globally. Why? COVID. Lockdowns were implemented; jobs were lost; and once the lockdowns were lifted, supply could not match demand. The increase actually began under Trump, as due to demand not matching supply during lockdowns, inflation decreased to 0.1% in June of 2022, only to reach 1.7% by the time Trump left office. That trend didn’t stop there, as inflation reached a peak of 9.1% in June, 2022, before decreasing to 3.0% last month.

We reached pre-pandemic levels of employment as of June, 2022. So, once again, if we attempt to remove COVID from the equation as much as possible, here are the actual changes in inflation under the past two presidents.

Trump (1/17-1/20): +/-0.0% (2.5% to 2.5%)

Biden (6/22-6/24): -67.0% (9.1% to 3.0%)

Also, let’s get real. If Trump had taken the pandemic seriously from the outset, odds are we would not have seen so many deaths, jobs lost, and high inflation. Trump said COVID would disappear 38 times for 9 months after its inception. By the time some states decided to take matters into their own hands, it was too late. The damage had already been done, and there was no turning back.

https://www.bls.gov/charts/consumer-price-index/consumer-price-index-by-category-line-chart.htm

https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/10/politics/covid-disappearing-trump-comment-tracker/

- "Record high gas prices in all 50 states"

Once again, this claim lacks an incredible amount of context. Here are the numbers, when we attempt to remove COVID as much out of the equation as possible:

Trump (1/17-1/20): +8.5% ($2.35 to $2.55)

Biden (6/22-6/24): -29.8% ($4.93 to $3.46)

Trump sorely mishandled COVID; 40 states implemented lockdowns as a result; tens of millions of jobs were lost; and when said lockdowns were lifted, supply could not match demand. That's it. That's the story.

Sidenote: Not a single Republican voted for the Inflation Reduction Act, yet it was still passed and signed by President Biden. Thanks, Joe!

https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=pet&s=emm_epmr_pte_nus_dpg&f=m

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2022/08/ira-climate-bill-house-vote-republicans/671133/

- "Record high consumer debt"

These claims are the epitome of cherry-pickings. Yet again, let’s try to take a fair look at the numbers before COVID and after we reached pre-pandemic employment. Here’s the change in household debt as a percentage of disposable income for the past two presidents:

Trump: -1.0% (10.1% to 10.0%)

Biden: +/-0.0% (9.8% to 9.8%)

What’s the highest such percentage? 13.3%, under George W. Bush. It seems like Dubya and Drumpf break all the bad records.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP

- "Released terrorists into the country"

There were 100 documented jihadist terrorists in the United States during Trump’s 4 years in office, or an average of 25 per. Under Biden, that number has decreased to 30 in 3 years, or an average of 10 per. In other words, there’s been a 60% decrease of jihadist terrorists in the United States since Biden stepped into office. That's not even touching on right-wing domestic-terrorism. Oh, let me guess, that's Biden's fault too...

https://www.statista.com/statistics/667929/terrorists-in-the-us-since-911-year-and-gender/

- "Ukraine-Russia War"

Well, actually, said conflict has been brewing since 2014, but yeah, sure, it’s Biden’s fault. Also, let’s get serious here. Let’s pretend, for argument’s sake, the Ukraine-Russia conflict started when Biden was President. How would he be to blame for it?

Here’s what Richard Betts, a Columbia University professor emeritus of war and peace studies and of international and public affairs, said regarding the matter:

“American presidents have scant control over foreign decisions about war and peace unless they show their willingness to commit American power. Restraint in use of force is good, and the USA should not feel responsible for righting every wrong abroad, but Trump can’t have it both ways – holding back from military commitments abroad but expecting to deter aggressors from acting against their neighbors.”

He also said:

“Russia was intervening militarily in the Ukraine’s Donbas region throughout Trump’s administration, and Trump couldn’t stop it. Nor did he do much to stop Syria’s chemical weapons use beyond an airstrike that had no influence. If Trump had been in office in February 2022, Putin would have had every reason to assume he could get away with invading the rest of Ukraine since he had Trump in his pocket.”

Richard Arnold, a Muskingum University associate political science professor, added this:

“Trump couldn’t have prevented Russia’s invasion of Ukraine without simply selling out the Ukrainians and giving Putin what he wanted, or putting American forces in Ukraine. Under Biden, the U.S. hit the Russians with just about every non-military means of crippling their country and so far it has not worked. This seems more like a talking point on which Trump can never be called because you can’t get evidence either way.”

Donald Trump has never cared for evidence, as it always seems to conspire against him. As Jack Nicholson once told a 12-year-old Tom Cruise, "You can't handle the proof!," or something like that.

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9476/

https://www.politifact.com/article/2024/jul/18/biden-blamed-for-wars-at-rnc-but-how-much-sway-doe/

- "Israel-Hamas War"

Oh, give me a break. Israel and Palestine have been going at it since before 1947. Biden was 5 years old in ’47; Harris was -17.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/27/palestine-and-israel-brief-history-maps-and-charts

- "Disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan"

Yeah, MAGA may want to remove this one from the list. Here’s the sequence of events:

February, 2020: The Trump administration negotiated a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban, which excluded the Afghan government; freed 5,000 Taliban soldiers; and set as the final withdrawal date May 1, 2021.

Then, as reported by FactCheck dot org, this took place:

“And the Trump administration kept to the pact, reducing U.S. troop levels from about 13,000 to 2,500, even though the Taliban continued to attack Afghan government forces and welcomed al-Qaeda terrorists into the Taliban leadership.”

After delaying the final withdrawal, the Biden administration went through with it on August 31st of that year.

Was the withdrawal messy? Yes. But who set up the withdrawal; released 5,000 Taliban prisoners as part of the deal; and left Afghanistan out of the negotiation talks? Donald Trump. The Biden administration was handed a mess, and while they admittedly didn’t magically transform it into something pretty, they did with it what they could. Donald Trump could literally sh*t in his hand; give it to Joe Biden; and if, in 5 seconds time, Biden didn't make it smell like roses, Trump would say, "You see? That's your sh*t! You did that! How could it not smell like best, bigliest flowers the world has ever known?!?"

https://www.factcheck.org/2021/08/timeline-of-u-s-withdrawal-from-afghanistan/

- "Violent crime skyrocketing"

This is 100% false. Here’s what the FBI recently reported, as told by Josh Campbell and Devan Cole of CNN:

“Violent crime dropped by more than 15% in the United States during the first three months of 2024, according to statistics released Monday by the FBI.

The new numbers show violent crime from January to March dropped 15.2% compared to the same period in 2023, while murders fell 26.4% and reported rapes decreased by 25.7%. Aggravated assaults decreased during that period when compared to last year by 12.5%, according to the data, while robberies fell 17.8%.”

Overall, here are the numbers from the past two presidencies:

Homicide rate

Trump: +25.5%

Biden: -17.4%

Firearm deaths

Trump: +17.0%

Biden: -4.6%

https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/10/us/us-violent-crime-rates-statistics/index.html

https://www.axios.com/2023/12/28/us-murder-violent-crime-rates-drop

https://www.statista.com/statistics/258913/number-of-firearm-deaths-in-the-united-states/

- "Tried to jail political rival in name of democracy"

Once again, this is false. Noticing a trend? Joe Biden didn’t vote in a grand jury against Donald Trump. He didn’t arrest Donald Trump. He didn’t charge Donald Trump. He didn’t take part on a jury to convict Donald Trump. He won’t be sentencing Donald Trump.

Former president Trump was indicted not once, not twice, not even three thrice, but four times, to the initial tune of 91 felony charges. The Department of Justice is independent of the President of the United States (exception: under Donald Trump), and only two of the four indictments have come from it. The other two have come at the state level. So, even if we want to pretend Biden was in charge of the two federal indictments, that would leave two others – one of which has already resulted in 34 felony convictions for the former apprentice.

Going even beyond the technicalities, how would it make any logical sense for President Biden to try and prevent a man, he’s already defeated once in an election, from running against him again? The main reason he stayed in the 2024 race for so long was because he thought, “I already beat this guy once. I can do it again.” That’s it. For as tremendous a job as I personally feel the President has done in his 3.5 years, his approval numbers have been anything but impressive, and odds are, due to his own negatives, Donald Trump was the only potential Republican nominee he could have possibly defeated in the coming election. So, once again, it would have made absolutely zero sense for him to have tried to imprison the guy he beat just 4 years earlier.

- "Lied to the American public about Joe's decline"

There has been no documented proof that President Biden is suffering from dementia. Think back 4 years. What was the Republican Party’s main attack against the then former Senator and Vice President? His age. They’d then fill the airwaves with photoshopped images, edited clips, and out-of-context quotes, in an attempt to convince the public Biden was too old and memory-lapsed to effectively serve as president. This tactic has continued throughout his term, and sadly, it’s worked – as approximately 70%+ of the voting public believes he’s not cognitively fit for a second term. No matter what the misleading right-wing propaganda machine has tried to tell us, however, the truth lies elsewhere.

Here's what geriatrician Daniel Stone wrote about the President:

“Fortunately, President Biden shows no signs of Alzheimer’s disease. At news conferences, he references new events and obviously creates new memories efficiently. He speaks slowly and pauses to find words like others with benign age-associated memory impairment. These issues are exacerbated by a chronic speech impediment. Biden has struggled with stuttering since childhood, and remnants of the condition have long been apparent in his speech.

Unfortunately, word hesitations coupled with the mild stutter can’t help but affect his public speaking. Biden’s political opponents and the uninformed exploit it, along with stereotypes about older people, to create a false narrative about intellectual impairment.”

Sure, this is just a single geriatrician’s opinion, but I’ll take his opinion over the non-medically-licensed armchair experts any day. I always found this to be an odd attack strategy by the Trump team, anyway. Donald Trump is no spring chicken, and if we watched a video of all the gaffes and memory-lapses he’s displayed, we’d be sitting on our a$$es until Christmas, 2026.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2024-03-07/joe-biden-age-memory-alzheimers-cognition

- "Declared war on American energy"

Well, that’s interesting, considering the U.S. reached 13.2 million barrels of oil per day in October, 2023 – which is the largest such volume in recorded history. For those scoring at home, Joe Biden was President in October of 2023.

https://www.newsweek.com/joe-biden-producting-more-oil-donald-trump-environment-1858714

- "Record low test scores for K-12 students"

Again, this is false, and it’s missing the larger picture.

In 2022, reading and mathematics scores dropped to 215 and 234, respectively. The lowest scores for each are 208 in reading and 219 in mathematics, in 1971 and 1973. Reading scores have held relatively steady for the past 51 years, whereas scores in mathematics had been consistently increasing until 2022.

Again, for those wanting to blame President Biden, you really need to work on your mastery of chronology. Biden came into office on January 20, 2021. The aforementioned scores were reported on September 12, 2022. What could President Biden have possibly done in a year and a half to have yielded the declining scores? Not much, especially since COVID lockdowns had been lifted at that point. Which reminds me, who failed in their COVID response, and to such a great extent, schools across the country were forced to lockdown for weeks? That would be Donald Trump. It’s always projection with these folks. Every accusation is a confession.

https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=38

- "Most unpopular president and VP in history"

I get tired of saying this and sounding like a broken record, but that's false.

While there isn’t a great deal of data on Vice Presidents’ record highs and lows, in terms of approval, there are when it comes to Presidents – at least since FDR. Having said that, since Vice President Kamala Harris has become the presumptive Democratic nominee, her approval rating, according to an ABC News/Ipsos survey, has improved quite markedly – increasing from 35% to 43%, while Donald Trump’s has deceased from 40% to 36%.

That brings me to the most unpopular Presidents in U.S. history. Here are the lowest approval ratings for our Commanders-in-Chief:

George W. Bush: 19%

Harry Truman: 22%

Richard Nixon: 23%

Jimmy Carter: 28%

George H.W. Bush: 29%

Donald Trump: 29%

Joe Biden: 31%

On the flip-side, do you know who has the lowest max approval rating in our country’s history? That would be Donald Trump, at just 49%. Biden would come in as the second lowest, at 63% - a full 14 points higher than Trump.

https://www.newsweek.com/kamala-harris-approval-rating-trump-ipsos-1931289

https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/presidential-approval/highslows

#MAGACultMorons #VoteKamalaHarris2024