Poynter’s Pulitzer Prize-winning PolitiFact debunks misleading claims made by the country’s most prominent figures to ensure citizens have the fact-based information they need to govern themselves and hold people responsible for their actions. 

At the end of the year, the nonprofit fact-checking enterprise reviews the most significant falsehoods and exaggerations to award the infamous Lie of the Year title. Each contender for 2021 undermined an accurate narrative and stoked fear and violence. Lies about COVID-19, vaccinations, elections, climate change and war rose to the top of the list. 

The 2021 Lie of the Year title goes to the collective attempts to downplay and deny the Jan. 6 insurrection, the most serious attack on representative democracy in modern times. Learn the two reasons why PolitiFact picked this lie.

Over the weekend, tornadoes devastated communities across the Midwest and South. Poynter senior faculty Al Tompkins went home to Kentucky, where the death toll is at least 74 people, to cover the critical on-the-ground reporting by local and national journalists. Tompkins met Trent Okerson, a meteorologist at WPSD whose forecast saved Kentuckians’ lives, including one community member who followed Okerson’s warnings and got his family to safety minutes before their home was destroyed. Tompkins also spoke to CNN anchor Pamela Brown who hopped on a flight from Washington, D.C., to Nashville, found a rental car and made the two-hour drive through the tornado-scarred Kentucky countryside, ready to report the catastrophe that hit her home state. Reporters and photojournalists also shared stories from the 60-mile path of destruction in Kentucky with Tompkins.

With your generous contributions, journalists can depend on Poynter’s dynamic slate of programs to manage on-the-job stress and hone their reporting skills to keep you, your family and your community safe.

When Poynter launched its digital media literacy initiative MediaWise in 2018, the nonpartisan nonprofit set an ambitious goal: teach a million middle and high school students how to better detect misleading or inaccurate information on the internet. Now, nearly four years later, MediaWise has reached 21 million people of all ages in the United States and continues to grow its roster of robust educational programs.

With support from Meta, formerly known as Facebook, MediaWise announces a global expansion of its online fact-checking training. The project will adapt its highly effective digital-first training to slow the spread of misinformation online and help older adults in Brazil, Spain and Turkey make informed decisions about the content they engage with and share across social media platforms.

You might also like to:

• Host a movie night with your family and friends over the holidays. Poynter's Tom Jones’ recommends these 25 journalism movies.
• Consider these tips during your next writing session.
• Get ready for next year’s midterm elections. Subscribe to PolitiFact’s newsletter to get the week’s top fact-checks and prepare to cast your vote next year.

Thank you for being the heart of the matter. We wish you a healthy and happy holiday season. Cheers to a well-informed new year!

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