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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.
Sorting fact from fiction had PolitiFact Georgia’s team of truth-seekers checking out Facebook photos of Pope Francis and what was billed as well-known Atlanta pastor Creflo Dollar.
PolitiFact also checked claims Donald Trump about Syrian refugees and the financing of Democrats by Planned Parenthood-affiliated groups.
Abbreviated versions of our fact checks are below.
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Full versions can be found at www.politifact.com/georgia/.
Viral Image on Thursday, October 1st, 2015 in Facebook posts
Pope Francis uses a modest compact car to get around, while Creflo Dollar drives an expensive sports car.
The image that showed up the PolitiFact Georgia inbox had already pinged wildly around social media.
The top part showed the Pope waving from the back seat of the small four-door Fiat 500L. Below it was a photo of a driver purported to be College Park megachurch pastor Creflo Dollar, tooling in a shiny silver roadster with an EU license plate.
The reader wondered, could that actually be the lead pastor of World Changers Church International behind those sunglasses, zipping along somewhere in Europe? We wondered too, and decided to do some digging.
The roadster driver is actually rapper Kanye West, making the image clearly false.
Even the context – trying to draw distinction between a supposedly humble servant of God with an apparently audacious one – ignores that both the Pope and Dollar have ready access to lavish luxuries.
We rated this claim Pants on Fire.
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Donald Trump on Sunday, October 4th, 2015 in an interview on ABC “This Week”
Among Syrian refugees, “there aren’t that many women, there aren’t that many children.”
Donald Trump is now against bringing any Syrian refugees to the United States, saying he has concerns about how many able-bodied men seem to be fleeing the war-torn nation.
This Week host George Stephanopoulos asked Trump on Oct. 4, 2015, why he told a New Hampshire crowd he would send refugees back to Syria should he win the presidency. Trump had previously said he would accept some Syrian refugees for humanitarian reasons.
“The migration was strange to me because it seems like so many men,” Trump answered. “There aren’t that many women, there aren’t that many children.”
It appears Trump is conflating two different sets of refugees: Those 534,000 reaching Europe by sea, who are mostly men, and the 4 million Syrians in U.N. refugee camps, most of whom are women and children.
Only about 10,000 refugees in the camps are slated for resettlement in the United States over the next year. Those making the perilous trip to Europe are not.
Trump’s assessment of the refugee situation is badly mangled.
We rated his statement False.
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Sean Duffy on Friday, September 18th, 2015 in a speech
Millions of dollars are spent by Planned Parenthood to elect Democrats to the House of Representatives and the Senate.”
During debate on a bill to defund Planned Parenthood, Republican U.S. Rep. Sean Duffy of Wisconsin alluded to secretly recorded videos that prompted the legislation, then he made a claim about the group’s political activity.
“If you watch this debate, you have to ask: How could anybody defend the practices at Planned Parenthood?” Duffy said on the House floor on Sept. 18, 2015, the day the House approved the one-year defunding.
“Harvesting body parts. How could anybody defend that? It’s an easy answer. Look in (the) political season. Millions of dollars, millions of dollars are spent by Planned Parenthood to elect Democrats to the House of Representatives and to the Senate. This isn’t about babies; this is about money.”
A reader asked us to check Duffy’s claim.By law, the operational, medical clinics of Planned Parenthood cannot spend money in politics. But separate entities that are affiliated with Planned Parenthood can, and they spent millions just in the 2014 election cycle to elect Democrats.
We rated Duffy’s statement Mostly True.
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