The Facts on ‘De-Nazifying’ Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin justified his military's brutal attack on Ukrainians by claiming Russia seeks a “de-Nazification” of Ukraine. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently said he won't negotiate with Russia if it brings up the terms "de-Nazification” or "de-militarization" of Ukraine.  

This week, FactCheck.org Deputy Managing Editor Robert Farley took a deep dive into the issue of neo-Nazis in Ukraine. Rob spoke with numerous experts who say Ukrainian neo-Nazis are small in number and have little political influence, but founded one of the country's best paramilitary units.

The Azov battalion, which was founded by members of two neo-Nazi groups, won back the city of Mariupol from separatists in 2014. At that time, then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko praised Azov as “our best warriors” and officially enrolled the unit into the Ukrainian National Guard. 

But far-right, ultra-nationalist political groups have been on the "political periphery, wielding little influence over national politics," Melanie Mierzejewski-Voznyak wrote for "The Oxford Handbook of the Radical Right," which was published in 2018.

Eugene Finkel, an associate professor at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, told Rob: “Neo-Nazi, far right and xenophobic groups do exist in Ukraine, like in pretty much any other country, including Russia. They are vocal and can be prone to violence but they are numerically small, marginal and their political influence at the state level is non-existent." 

Read the full story, "The Facts on ‘De-Nazifying’ Ukraine." 

• Establish a monitoring, prevalence assessment and response system for the Office of the Surgeon General, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, building on existing efforts.
• Make all monitoring, prevalence assessment and response data available to scholars in real time.
• Use direct contact with the public to communicate foundational knowledge and bolster trust.
• Audit the language of all CDC, NIH and FDA public-facing materials to flag and fix instances that increase public susceptibility to misconceptions.

Reader: Maybe you should check your fact-checkers!!! So biased against Trump! It’s obvious. Once Biden took office he stopped all gas/oil production, including the Keystone, etc. We only have high gas prices due to Biden & no one else. Thanks.

FactCheck.org Director Eugene Kiely: I did check our fact-checkers, and this is what I found: Biden hasn’t “stopped all gas/oil production,” as you say.  

In 2020, the US averaged 11.3 million barrels per day. In 2021, the U.S. average was 11.2 million barrels per day. The difference is less than 1%. But production is expected to rise in 2022 and 2023. The Energy Information Administration writes in its most recent short-term energy report: “We forecast that production will rise to average 12.0 million b/d in 2022 and then to record-high production on an annual-average basis of 13.0 million b/d in 2023. The previous annual-average record of 12.3 million b/d was set in 2019.”

As for Keystone XL, President Joe Biden canceled the Keystone XL pipeline when he took office. However, that project has been mired in court fights brought by environmentalists and local Native American groups -- which is the reason why the project did not start in the four years that Trump had been in office. As Tom Kloza, the global head of energy analysis and a co-founder of the Oil Price Information Service, told us: “One might look at crude prices later in the decade and put some blame on the current administration but we are importing record amounts of Canadian crude and the Keystone XL Pipeline wouldn’t have been online by now under any circumstances.” 

The fact is, oil prices are set on the global market and presidents of both parties have little control over them. Nevertheless, presidents get blamed whenever gasoline prices go up. We wrote about that when Republicans blamed President Barack Obama and Democrats blamed President Donald Trump for high gasoline prices. 

Wrapping Up

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

• "Examining Rick Scott’s Claim That Medicare, Social Security Will Soon Go ‘Bankrupt’": Sen. Rick Scott went too far in claiming that Medicare will go “bankrupt” in four years and Social Security in 12 years. Government trustees project that certain trust funds would become depleted by then, but payments would continue, albeit at a reduced rate. 
• "Former Judge Janice Rogers Brown Was Not Nominated to the Supreme Court": Republicans did not nominate former Judge Janice Rogers Brown to the U.S. Supreme Court. A Facebook post falsely claims that Brown — not Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson — was the first Black woman to be nominated to the nation’s highest court. 
• "Facebook Video Misrepresents CDC Report on COVID-19 Vaccine Boosters": A report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that side effects such as a sore arm or headache following a booster dose of the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines were less frequent than after the second dose. But a Facebook video from a chiropractor misrepresents the report’s findings, the systems that record adverse events and the availability of information on those events. 
• "CNN Video Shows Canadian Fire Gear Donated to Ukraine, Not ‘Fake Footage’": A recent Facebook post falsely claims that CNN footage from the war in Ukraine was faked, citing a firefighter’s jacket bearing the name of a Canadian city. But the footage was shot in Ukraine. The jacket was donated by a Canadian organization.
• "Viral Photo of Russian Bomber Shows Incident from 2020": Amid rising tensions between the U.S. and Russia over the invasion of Ukraine, a misleading photo posted March 22 on Facebook shows an American fighter jet intercepting a Russian bomber near Alaskan airspace. But the incident was not related to the current situation in Ukraine; the photo appeared in an article published in Aero Magazine in June 2020.
• "Save America PAC": A Republican leadership PAC formed by former President Donald Trump.
• "American Bridge 21st Century/AB PAC": A liberal super PAC that conducts opposition research to aid Democratic candidates and organizations. 
• "House Majority PAC": A Democratic PAC focused on keeping a Democratic majority in the House.
• "Congressional Leadership Fund": A conservative super PAC aiming to win a Republican majority in the House of Representatives.

• "Fauci sigue haciendo apariciones públicas y no ha ‘desaparecido':" El Dr. Anthony Fauci ha seguido haciendo apariciones públicas, aunque la cobertura de noticias se ha alejado en gran medida de la pandemia desde que Rusia invadió Ucrania en febrero y los casos de COVID-19 han disminuido drásticamente. Algunos políticos y críticos, sin embargo, han sugerido que Fauci se ha vuelto tan impopular que ha “desaparecido” de la vista pública. Esto no es cierto. Fauci ha hecho al menos una docena de apariciones públicas desde el 15 de febrero. 
• "Publicaciones malinterpretan un documento sobre el control de seguridad de la vacuna contra el COVID-19 de Pfizer": Un documento de Pfizer publicado recientemente por la Administración de Alimentos y Medicamentos de los Estados Unidos (FDA, por sus siglas en inglés) describe eventos adversos notificados tras la vacunación y corrobora la continua seguridad de la vacuna contra el COVID-19 de la compañía. Sin embargo, un popular video y otras publicaciones en línea dan a entender erróneamente que la vacuna causó estos eventos. Muchas publicaciones asumen, también incorrectamente, que una larga lista de problemas de salud que Pfizer está monitoreando, ocurrieron y se debieron la vacunación.