I’ve heard quite some horrifying things about incumbent President Donald Trump’s press conference, from an unfinished election he and his followers claim is “rigged.” Today, I took a look at the claims he made in the press conference to determine how much truth there was to his claims.
To do that, I devised a system of rating how truthful something is. It is a simple system where a grade of 1 is given to claims that are completely and irrefutably false, and 10 to claims that are entirely and wholly true. Context is given where applicable. These “truth grades” will be integers, so there will be no “1.5” or “9.2” grades; therefore, there are 10 possible grades.
Claim: “If you count the legal votes, I easily win. If you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election from us.”
Grade: 2
I think this is an overarching opening statement, which as we’ll see later on, is completely baseless.
Claim: “I’ve already decisively won many critical states, including massive victories in Florida, Iowa, Indiana, and Ohio.”
Grade: 6
While he has (most likely) won the states he named, several critical states still remain tight or undecided.
Claim: “We won these [states] and many other victories despite historic election interference from Big Media, Big Money, and Big Tech.”
Grade: 2
There is no evidence to back up this claim. The “interference” from “Big Tech” is actually in attempts to prevent the spread of misinformation (like this press conference!) and violence, which, according to Facebook, has been threatened in several places.
Claim: “As everybody saw, we won by historic numbers…”
Grade: 5
He has not “won,” but we have had record voter turnout (what a record-breaking year!).
Claim: “and the polls has got it [sic] knowingly wrong.”
Grade: 7
Yep, the polls know they’re not going to be accurate. They are mostly guesswork and are not reliable, nor do they claim to be.
Claim: “There was no blue wave that they predicted…”
Grade: 1
Yes, there was a “blue wave,” so to speak. I don’t know what statistic the President is looking at, but they do not line up with the numbers. (The electoral results are public information, the President has no special insider knowledge.)
Claim: “…but instead there was a big red wave, and it’s been properly acknowledged, actually, by the media, they were, I think, very impressed.”
Grade: 1
With the exception of a couple currently undecided states leaning Democrat, there was no change in the states’ votes. I watched, and am still watching. There was no “red wave.”
Claim: “We kept the Senate despite having twice as many seats to defend as Democrats…”
Grade: 1
The race is actually very tight and undecided. They have not kept the Senate. I don’t want to nitpick, but the Republicans only had five more seats to “defend” (35 versus the Democrats’ 30), which is not “twice as many”.
Claim: “They spent almost $200 million on Senate races in South Carolina and Kentucky alone.”
Grade: 6
The numbers I can gather put the spending in the mid $100 million to $200 million bracket. I’ll give this to him and write it off as hyperbole.
Claim: “At the national level, our opponents’ major donors were Wall Street bankers and special interests. Our major donors were police officers, farmers, everyday citizens.”
Grade: N/A (Not enough info)
I cannot find a list of donors or anything similar, such as a table about the groups funding the GOP.
Claim: “For the first time ever, we lost zero races in the House…”
Grade: 1
What?
You have lost 211 races in the House.
Try again.
Claim: “More Republican women were elected to Congress than ever before.”
Claim: 10
Claim: “I won the largest share of non-white of any Republican in 60 years.”
Claim: 10
Claim: “We grew our party by 4 million voters, the greatest turnout in Republican party history.”
Grade: N/A (Not enough info)
I see 400,000 somewhere, but I’m not sure that I have access to this data.
Claim: “Democrats are the party of the Big donors, the Big Media, the Big Tech, it seems, and Republicans have become the party of the American worker, and that’s what’s happened.”
Grade: 5
From what I’ve seen, both sides are just playing politics, accepting donations from whoever is willing to give it to them. In the Democrats’ case, this probably means Big Media and Big Tech. In the Republicans’ case… probably also Big Tech. I don’t have the donor data so I cannot confirm this.
Claim: “I believe we’re also the party of inclusion.”
Grade: 1
Claim: “As everyone now recognizes, media polling was election interference. These… fake polls were designed to keep our voters at home, create the illusion of momentum for Mr. Biden and diminish Republicans’ ability to raise funds. They were what’s called suppression polls, everyone knows that now.”
Grade: 1
What?
In what way does asking people who they want to win interfere with the election? Or publishing said results?
And exactly who “recognizes” or “knows” this?
This doesn’t even make any sense.
Claim: “They had me losing Florida by a lot [8.4 points] and I ended up winning Florida by a lot. Other than that they were very accurate.” (and its preceding quote that I didn’t bother to transcribe)
Grade: 5
Yes, Trump won Florida, but not by “a lot.”
Let’s assume the poll he’s talking about actually did have Biden winning by 8.4 points (mainly because I don’t feel like looking that poll up). We all know the polls aren’t accurate. So what? They’re not supposed to be completely accurate. They’re supposed to give you a good idea. There are also a bunch of different polls, including that poll, CNN’s, and Fox’s polls, that can be considered to get a better idea of how people want to vote.
And finally, he claims that the polls were entirely wrong and fraudulent (or at least implied that), then turns around and says that it was “very accurate” except for the example he gave to show how inaccurate it was…? Are you sure Biden isn’t the only demented Presidential candidate?
Claim: “They’re not stupid people, they know that. Suppression.”
Grade: 5
I highly doubt they’re trying to suppress you, Mr. Trump. You make for good TV.
Claim: “There are now only a few states yet to be decided in the Presidential race.”
Grade: 10
Yep.
Claim: “The voting apparatus [sic] of those states are run in all cases by Democrats…”
Grade: 5
Even if they are all ran by Democrats, is this evidence of fraud or anything? This is a heavily regulated area for this exact reason.
Claim: “We were winning in all the key locations by a lot, actually…”
Grade: 1
I watched the electoral numbers and maps, and still am. Most of the states stuck with their leanings or turned to their 2016 results when they were called.
Claim: “…and then our numbers miraculously started to whittle away, in secret…”
Grade: 2
Is he referring to this (which, by the way, appears to be a fabrication, since I cannot find the original on either FiveThirtyEight or ABC News) or this (which, by the way, could simply be the doing of Inspect Element)? And further, if there is any credibility, why isn’t it at least on Fox News?
Claim: “and they wouldn’t allow legally permissible observers, we went to court in a couple of instances and we were able to get the observers and when the observers got there, they wanted them 60, 70 feet away, 80 feet, 100 feet away or outside the building to observe people inside the building…” [and its following statements, similar in nature]
Grade: 1
I shouldn’t even have to do this.
Claim: “I’ve been talking about mail-in voting for a long time, it’s really destroyed our system, it’s a corrupt system.”
Grade: 1
Nope. It has made the process take much longer, but that doesn’t mean there’s fraud. Try again.
Claim: “We were ahead in vote [sic] in North Carolina by a lot, a tremendous number of votes, and we’re still ahead by a lot.”
Grade: 1
Biden was winning North Carolina until nearly midnight. Even then, the margin was extremely tight. He is only ahead by about 76,000 votes in NC.
Claim: “We were up by nearly 700,000 votes in Pennsylvania, we won Pennsylvania by a lot, and that gets whittled down to… 90,000 votes.”
Grade: 7
I’m going to assume Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Nevada did their mail in ballots last, and I assume they are largely Democrat votes in the mail-in ballots.
Claim: “and they’re appealing [the ruling about observers], actually, they’re appealing, they want a case that we want people to watch [sic] and we want observers, and they’re appealing…”
Grade: 7
Yes, they’re appealing the case. The case was not about what Mr. Trump is saying it is.
Claim: “Likewise in Georgia I won by a lot, a lot, with a lean of over– getting close to 300,000 votes on Election Night, in Georgia, and by the way got whittled down…”
Grade: 5
Gee, I wonder why. Maybe because a lot of states did mail in ballots last, which Democrats utilize(d) more than Republicans.
Claim: “and now it’s getting to be to a point where I’ll go from winning by a lot to perhaps being even down a little bit.”
Grade: 10
Gee, I wonder why.
The End
Alright, that’s enough. I can’t go through another 10 minutes of straight false claims, so I’ll do what any sensible news outlet would do and cut it off here.
Number of false claims: 13/28
Number of undetermined claims: 6/28
Number of true claims: 7/28
Correctness Grade: 25%
Average Grade: 4
I sure hope I don’t have to do this again.
He keeps telling himself, “They really like me.” But in reality? Nobody really likes you. Even if you’ve done some good stuff for the economy, nobody really wants a Liar-in-Chief.