FactChecking the First Presidential Debate

The much-anticipated first debate of 2024 between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump is over.

And what a debate it was.

Both candidates unleashed a relentless barrage of false and misleading statements. Some highlights (and we use the word loosely):

• Trump warned that Biden “wants to raise your taxes by four times,” but Biden has not proposed anything like that.
• Biden repeated his misleading claim that billionaires pay an average federal tax rate of 8%. That White House calculation factors in earnings on unsold stock as income.
• Trump repeated his false claim that “everybody,” including all legal scholars, wanted to end Roe v. Wade’s constitutional right to abortion.
• Both candidates erred on Social Security, with Biden incorrectly saying that Trump “wants to get rid” of the program, and Trump falsely alleging that Biden will “wipe out” Social Security due to the influx of people at the border.

Oh, there's more. Read the full story, "FactChecking the Biden-Trump Debate."

Reader: Is it accurate to say the amendment to the Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) restarting the draft is a "Democratic amendment?   If it is, please give more information.

FactCheck.org Director Eugene Kiely: There is no “Democratic amendment” to restart the draft. That’s a misunderstanding of a provision in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2025. 

The House passed the NDAA on June 14 by a vote of 217 to 199, with 211 Republican votes and only six Democratic votes. The legislation includes a provision that would automatically register men between the ages of 18 and 26 in the Selective Service System. The system is nothing new. It was created by the Selective Service Training and Service Act in 1940. Currently, men ages 18 through 25 must register. Failing to register is a felony punishable by a fine of up to $250,000 and five years in prison, and some states have created additional penalties, the Selective Service System says on its website. A 2024 budget document for defense civil programs says the Selective Service System has “an active database of over 92 million registrant records.” 

However, Defense News said in a story on the House bill that “the number of individuals who have skipped registering has increased in recent years, in large part because registration options were removed from the federal student loan process two years ago.” So, in response, the House bill will make registration automatic. 

A Fox News article about the bill’s passage in the House attributed the provision to Rep. Chrissy Houlahan, a Pennsylvania Democrat. Sarah Slavin, a spokesperson for Houlahan, said this when I asked the difference between existing law and the proposed amendment: “So, current law requires men to ‘present’ themselves for registration (i.e. they have to independently sign up for selective service, even if failing to do so is technically a crime). Our amendment would allow the Selective Service System to use existing government database to populate the selective service rolls, rather than having young men sign themselves up. So, they would automatically be registered when they turn 18 (which is not currently the case).”

But the provision in the House bill does not mean that those men will be drafted or that the draft is being restarted.

Wrapping Up

Here's what else we've got for you this week:

• "Wind Energy’s Key Environmental Advantage? Low Emissions": We answer a new Ask SciCheck question from a reader: Are wind farms harmful to the environment? 
• "Trump Spreads Election Misinformation in Key States": In speeches in Nevada and Arizona, former President Donald Trump continued to spread misinformation that undermines public confidence in state and federal elections.
• "Competing Narratives on Real Wages, Incomes Under Biden": In recent weeks, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Sen. Tim Scott offered seemingly contradictory claims when discussing the impact of inflation on the typical American’s wages and income. Both can cite economic data that support their claims. The difference is the starting point of their comparisons.

• "Publicaciones tergiversan el fallo sobre la demanda por mandato escolar del COVID-19": Un tribunal federal de apelaciones ha reabierto una demanda contra el Distrito Escolar Unificado de Los Ángeles por su mandato de vacunación contra el COVID-19, que ya no está en vigor. Según el tribunal, debe permitirse que el caso se desarrolle más allá de los argumentos preliminares. Pero los activistas antivacunas han tergiversado la decisión para afirmar falsamente que el tribunal ha “declarado que el pinchazo de ARNm contra el covid NO es una vacuna”.
• "La caída del crimen en Venezuela no prueba la afirmación de Trump de que el país está enviando criminales a EE. UU.": En casi todos sus discursos recientes, el expresidente Donald Trump ha citado una caída en la delincuencia en Venezuela como prueba de que el país, abatido económica y políticamente, está enviando sus criminales a Estados Unidos. Expertos dentro y fuera de Venezuela nos dijeron que no hay evidencia que respalde la afirmación de Trump. 
• "Verificación de las afirmaciones sobre inmigración que hizo Trump en Phoenix y Las Vegas": El expresidente Donald Trump ha hecho de la inmigración ilegal y su impacto en Estados Unidos un tema central de su campaña, pero varios de sus puntos de referencia son erróneos o engañosos. Estas son algunas de sus afirmaciones sobre inmigración realizadas en eventos recientes en los estados electorales pendulares de Arizona y Nevada.