Rolling Updates and Fact Checks
Election Integrity
10:42 p.m.: Wallace asked if each candidate would ask their followers to be peaceful and not engage in violence if it takes days or weeks to count ballots to determine a winner. Trump responded: “If I see tens of thousands of ballots being manipulated, I can’t go along with that. … This is not going to end well.” Trump spoke directly to the Proud Boys: “Stand down and stand by.”
Asked to Biden, Biden said an unequivocal, “Yes.” Biden noted that “no one has established at all that there is fraud related to mail-in ballots, that somehow it’s a fraudulent process.”
Trump interrupted, “It’s already been established. Look at Carolyn Maloney’s race in Manhattan.” In the Maloney race, there were questions in vote counts for ballots that didn’t have postmarks, with issues settled in court.
10:37 p.m.: “I think we’re gonna need them to look at the ballots,” Trump said of the Supreme Court. Trump claimed that there was a situation in West Virginia where a “mailmun” was caught selling ballots. (Fact check: in West Virginia, a postman was arrested for changing ballot requests from Democrat to republican. It had nothing to do with voting ballots.)
10:36 p.m.: Trump claimed that there was “no transition” after the last election, claiming “Crooked Hillary” rigged the last election. “As far as the ballots are concerned, it’s a disaster.” Trump stated, “This is going to be a fraud like you’ve never seen.”
10:34 p.m.: Biden said he wanted to make sure people can vote and encouraged people to ensure their registrations was up-to-date. Biden noted that the DHS Secretary and FBI director said that there’s no evidence of fraud in mail-in voting. Biden said he would accept the outcome of the final count of all the votes, win or lose.
The Trump and Biden Records
10:30 p.m.: Trump: “They want to take out the cows.” (Fact Check: WT actual F does that mean?)
10:29 p.m.: Trump: “We’ve lowered carbon emissions.” (Fact check: in 2018, carbon emissions jumped, and went down slightly in 2019. There has been a net increase since Trump’s took office.)
10:26 p.m.: Trump: “The car has gotten so expensive because they’ve got computers all over the place for a little bit of gasoline.” Computers, or sensors, are not in cars to solely make it fuel efficient. They’re there for safety, more electronics for use by passengers, for braking sensors and for engine management. Removing those would not lower the price of a car by $3,500.
10:24 p.m. Trump claimed that if “we had good forest management,” California would not have forest fires. The federal government controls 55% of the forests in the state, so using Trump’s logic, his leadership led to the forest fires.
10:21 p.m.: Trump claimed Hunter Biden was dishonorably discharged. This is not true. Hunter Biden got a general discharge.
10:19 p.m.: Trump claimed the Obama Administration “left him 128 judges to fill.” That’s not true. The Senate failed to act on nominations for all those seats. He claimed sitting 300 judges is a record; FDR sat more.
10:18 p.m. Trump claimed that “there was unity going to happen” to tout his record. Trump touted a 91% approval rating at the VA. (Fact Check: the approval rating for the VA was 93% during the Obama Administration.)
Race and Violence in Our Cities
10:14 p.m. “Antifa is a dangerous, radical group, and you oughta be careful of them,” Trump yelled at Biden. “They’ll overthrow you.”
10: 12 p.m. Trump said he would condemn white supremacists and militia organizations. He then failed to condemn them.
10:10 p.m. Trump claims one of his advisors didn’t say chaos and violence helps his campaign. Kellyanne Conway did, in fact, say that.
10:09 p.m. Biden noted Trump’s budget cuts $400 million in local law enforcement assistance. Biden said he’s not for “defunding the police” but supported aid to have mental health workers work with police, as well as other social service programs to better help the police do their jobs.
10:06 p.m. Trump claimed that crime increases are almost exclusively the problems of “Democrat cities” even though Wallace mentioned increases in Tulsa and San Antonio.
10:05 p.m. Biden says he favors “law and order with justice, where people are treated fairly.” He noted that violent crimes went down by 17% during the Obama/Biden Administration.
10:01 p.m. Wallace asked if Trump believed there was systemic racism in the country and why he ended racial sensitivity training, which Trump said was racist. “If you were a certain person, you have no status in life,” Trump said of the training. (Fact check: Yes, that’s right. That’s what minorities feel in various situations and parts of this country, and the training is to make others, particularly white people, understand the feelings minorities feel.) Trump said the training was “very bad ideas and frankly, very sick ideas. And really, they were teaching people to hate our country.” Trump never stated whether he believed if there is systemic racism in the country.
9:58 p.m. Trump claims called Biden called Black people “superpredators.” That’s not true. Hillary Clinton is on tape referring to multiple gang violence offenders as superpredators, not Biden. Trump claims that Biden never said “law enforcement;” this is untrue. Biden talked about law enforcement during his town hall in Moosic, Pennsylvania.
9:56 p.m. Biden recalled the Charlottesville White Supremacist march of 2017 and the protests in Washington, DC after George Floyd’s homicide.
The Economy
9:53 p.m.
Trump: “Can I be honest?”
Chris Wallace: “No.”
9:51 p.m. Biden claimed an independent review found that Biden’s economic plan would create $1 trillion more than Trump’s plan. This is true.
9:49 p.m. Trump claimed that the Obama Administration had the slowest economic recovery since 1929. That’s untrue: Obama had the largest net GDP point growth since World War II. Trump’s job growth is negative: Job growth under Obama: 214k per month increase. Job growth under Trump: 127k per month decrease. Trump has lost 5,474,000 jobs in the US since his election, according to BLS.
9:45 p.m. Biden: “You’re the worst president the country has ever had.” (Fact Check: Well… at least in the bottom three.)
9:44 p.m.: Trump claimed the Obama Administration “gave him the [Old Post Office] building” to develop a hotel. That’s untrue. The government still owns the building. Trump pays a lease.
9:44 p.m. Wallace asked Trump if it was true that Trump only paid $750 in federal income taxes the year he was elected. Trump claimed “millions of dollars” in federal income taxes, though he initially avoided specifically claiming what he paid in 2016. Later, when pressed about what he paid in 2016, he responded “millions.” He claimed he would release his tax returns.
9:42 p.m. Biden claimed FEMA is not providing PPE to schools because the agency claims the coronavirus is not a national emergency. This is true.
9:40 p.m. Trump claimed that a governor said he would open the economy on November 9th because, Trump claimed, it would hurt Trump’s reelection chances. There’s no record of a state announcing a re-opening six weeks from now.
9:39 p.m. Trump claimed he “closed down” the economy at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. (Fact Check: Trump implemented no domestic policy to effect an economic shutdown; that was the action of state governors.)
COVID-19
9:36 p.m. Trump claimed he is holding rallies outside and safe. (Fact check: his rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma was in an arena on June 20. Herman Cain, who was at the Tulsa rally, contracted coronavirus and died.) Trump claimed he had “35-, 40,000 people at these rallies.” That’s not true. There are five thousand, at most, at recent rallies from press reports.
9:34 p.m. Trump claimed that young people aren’t hurt by the coronavirus. That’s not true. Infection rates are increasing among children. Children who get coronavirus also run the risk of Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C), a condition that leads to the inflammation of organs that can lead to death in some cases.
9:33 p.m. Trump claimed he had the “greatest economy in the history” of our nation. (Fact Check: Obama had a 3.1% GDP growth rate in 2015. Trump’s best year will be 2018, when he had a 3.0% GDP growth rate.)
9:31 p.m. Trump claimed that he could have a vaccine by November first, while his own health experts say that it won’t be available until summer. When Biden quoted Trump’s statement about injecting bleach to cure coronavirus, Trump stated it was sarcastic. (Fact check: Trump said it from the podium in the press room, and look for confirmation of that statement from Dr. Deborah Birx, who was sitting off to the side.)
9:27 p.m. Trump blamed the spread of the virus on China. He said “Democrat governors” have praised him, and that they provided enough PPE. (Fact Check: hospitals say they have a PPE shortage.) Trump claimed “We’re doing therapeutics already.” (Fact Check: there is no authorized therapeutic treatment for coronavirus.)
9:24 p.m. Biden cites Trump’s statement, “It is what it is,” essentially ceding any control over managing the coronavirus pandemic. He cited Trump’s call with reporter Bob Woodward, where Trump said he didn’t want to “cause a panic.” Biden said, “Americans didn’t panic. [Trump] panicked.”
The Supreme Court
9:21 p.m.: “Will you shut up, man?” Biden says to Trump. Biden turns to the moderator and says, “That was a really productive segment, wasn’t it?”
9:20 p.m. Biden says Trump has no plan for health care. Fact Check: Trump promised a health care would be released in “two weeks” to Chris Wallace in an interview on July 19th. Nothing has been presented, and he now says it will be released by the election.
9:18 p.m. Trump claimed he finished first in his class. Fact check: Trump is not listed in his University of Pennsylvania graduation program as a cum laude graduate, meaning he did not graduate with a 3.5 GPA or higher.
9:17 p.m. Trump has said that Biden didn’t do anything to lower healthcare costs and prescription drug costs. Biden and the Obama Administration passed the Affordable Care Act, which lowered costs of insurance.
9:12 p.m. Trump challenged the fact that there are 100 million people with pre-existing conditions. CMS states that 50 to 129 million non-elderly people have pre-existing conditions.
9:08 p.m. Trump claims that the rationale behind his appointment of Barrett to the Supreme Court has to do with the fact that republican won the election in 2016. However in 2016, Obama had won the 2012 election, and republicans held off on nominating Merrick Garland because it was an election year.
Biden countered with the argument republicans made in 2016, that the voters should decide who makes the appointment, including through the elections.
Trump repeatedly said that his term is four years and he intended to be president for four years. That’s in direct contrast to the position put forth by Senate republicans in 2016.