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How does PolitiFact Georgia’s Truth-O-Meter work?
Our goal is to help you find the truth in American politics. Reporters from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution fact-check statements by local, state and national political leaders, including lobbyists and interest groups. We then rate them on the AJC Truth-O-Meter.
To fact-check a claim, reporters first contact the speaker to verify the statement. Next, the research begins. Reporters consult a variety of sources, including industry and academic experts. This research can take hours or a few days or even longer, depending on the claim. Reporters then compile the research into story form and include a recommended Truth-O-Meter ruling.
The fact check then moves on to a panel of veteran editors who debate the statement and the reporter’s recommended Truth-O-Meter ruling. The panel votes on a final ruling; majority prevails.
PolitiFact and PolitiFact Georgia last week checked statements by politicians and pundits from Atlanta to Washington and on subjects from brewing beer to border security.
Hillary Clinton had to face questions on what someone surely has dubbed email-gate. But before she did, we took a look at Chuck Schumer’s attempt to throw water on accusations that her use of a private email account for State Department business crossed a line.
Craft beer brewers were working the halls of the state Capitol, hoping to convince pro-business lawmakers that they are at a financial disadvantage since they are not allowed to sell for onsite or offsite consumption at their facilities.
We checked their claim that Georgia is only one of five states that don’t allow for direct sales to consumers.
And we checked a an item that PolitiFact Georgia readers submitted about the expansion of a private school scholarship program.
Abbreviated versions of our fact-checks can be found below. Full versions can be found at www.politifact.com/georgia/
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Georgia Craft Brewers Guild on Monday, March 9th, 2015 in a statement
Georgia is one of only five states where breweries can’t sell you a pint of beer to drink on premise or sell you a six-pack to go.
Georgia craft beer brewers are lobbying legislators, hoping to get state law changed so they can sell directly to consumers.
Among their arguments: Most other states let their craft brewers sell their product for on-site and off-site consumption.
The Georgia Craft Brewers Guild, their association, said only four other states, take such a restrictive position. They are West Virginia, Hawaii, Mississippi and North Dakota, said Nancy Palmer, the group’s executive director.
We checked in with the four other states. We found North Dakota isn’t as restrictive, and two of the other three states have potential loopholes.
The guild’s overarching point is correct —- Georgia’s law is restrictive by any standards.
We rated the statement Mostly True.
Marco Rubio on Friday, February 27th, 2015 in a speech at CPAC
“There are at least three sectors of the border, one in particular, that are just completely insecure.”
America’s southwest border — spanning from San Diego to the southern tip of Texas — has nine sectors. And Sen. Marco Rubio says three of them, and one in particular, are “just completely insecure.”
We don’t know how Rubio came up with three sectors, and neither did experts we spoke with. There certainly is one sector of late with a troubling amount of activity, the Rio Grande in south Texas, that also is less effective at apprehending border crossers than other sectors.
However, the number of people attempting to cross the border is down considerably everywhere else, and the effectiveness rating is up in eight of nine sectors since 2006, including the areas with the most significant activity.
We rated Rubio’s statement Mostly False
Charles Schumer on Sunday, March 8th, 2015 in comments on CBS "Face the Nation"
“The State Department asked all secretaries of state to send their emails over.” Hillary Clinton’s “the only one who’s done it.”
U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., appeared March 8 on CBS’ Face the Nation to throw cold water on accusations of wrongdoing by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in her decision to use her private email account for official State Department business.
“The State Department asked all secretaries of state to send their emails over, and she’s the only one who’s done it,” Schumer said.
We decided to dig into Schumer’s claim. Spokesman Matt House said Schumer was referring to an October 2014 letter from the State Department to former secretaries of states. (Four former secretaries were asked about personal email accounts. Two have said they rarely used email, the third used personal email but had no records to turn over and the fourth was Clinton.)
That makes Schumer’s defense fairly hollow when you think about it.
We rated the statement Mostly False.
The Associated Press on Monday, March 9th, 2015
Under legislation that has cleared the Georgia House, some children who are “legal refugees” could obtain state scholarships to attend private schools.
The Georgia House has passed and sent to the state Senate a bill to expand the state’s special needs voucher program to include some legal refugees.
House Bill 296 would open the scholarship program, which was created in 2007, to about 700 school-age, legal refugees who are not proficient in English. The Associated Press had a brief report on the bill when it passed the House on Monday, and a reader asked us to dig deeper.
The bill’s chief sponsor, state Rep. Randy Nix, R-LaGrange, told PolitiFact the qualifying students “are legal, and Georgia is obligated to educate them.”.
The highest concentrations of these students are metro Atlanta, especially the Clarkston area of DeKalb County, he said.
If the bill passes the Senate and is signed by the governor, the scholarship program would be open to students who meet the definition of legal refugee under Title I of the Immigration and Nationalization Act.
The students would be required to have I-94 clearance, with a refugee admission stamp, and be “limited-English proficient as defined in 20 U.S.C. Section 7801.” Currently, the families of about 3,400 disabled students, with autism, blindness and other health problems, received taxpayer-funded vouchers to help pay their children’s tuition to private school school.
The vouchers, or scholarships, vary in an amount based on the severity of the disability. The maximum last year was $12,803, just shy of what’s reported as the average tuition at private schools dedicated to teaching special needs students.
The bill, as passed by the House, would not require that participating refugees attend a public school in the year prior. That is a require for the participating disabled students.
We rated the statement True.
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