It's a little bit funny when PolitiFact publishes a list of their most popular fact checks -- in this case on politicians and pundits. You can tell that most of their fans are liberals, because the most popular items are usually conservatives getting slapped as "False." Seven of their top ten blogs questioned conservatives or Republicans, and six of them were rated False or Pants On Fire.
By contrast, two items on Gov. Gavin Newsom and one on Joe Biden never go below "Half True." Here's the lower half:
10. Matt Walsh: "Tuck-friendly" bathing suits at Target "are available in kids’ sizes." (False)
9. Donald Trump: "They are trying to make it illegal to question the results of a bad election." (False)
8. Scott Adams: People not vaccinated against COVID-19 "came out the best." (False)
7. Laura Ingraham: Video clip shows that protesters in Tennessee "made their way onto the state Capitol floor." (False)
6. Gavin Newsom: "Per capita, more Floridians move to California than Californians moving to Florida." (Half True!)
This Newsom item from the Hannity debate was a classic! In raw numbers, it's clear more Californians are moving to Florida, so PolitiFact had to play games alongside Newsom and suggest that per capita was the measurement that counted. Facts are fitted to favor Democrats.
In all of PolitiFact's checking since they started in 2007, Newsom has 29 fact checks, and DeSantis has 54. But Newsom has 13 of 29 (almost half) that are True or Mostly True. DeSantis has 12 of his 54 (22 percent) True or Mostly True. Newsom has only 6 of his 29 as Mostly False/False/Pants on Fire, DeSantis has 32 of 45 (or almost 60 percent).
These were the top five:
5. Donald Trump: The Trump administration "built nearly 500 miles of border wall." (Half True)
4. Donald Trump: "The same people that raided Israel are pouring into our once beautiful USA, through our TOTALLY OPEN SOUTHERN BORDER, at Record Numbers." (Pants On Fire)
3. Gavin Newsom: "We are more energy independent today" under President Joe Biden. (Half True)
2. Joe Biden: "One quarter" of today’s $31.4 trillion federal debt "was accumulated in the four years of my predecessor," Donald Trump. (Half True)
1. Tucker Carlson: Capitol Police officers "helped" QAnon Shaman Jacob Chansley and "acted as his tour guides." (Pants On Fire)
The liberals really can't stand anyone who questions their January 6 horror stories, where they are so overwrought they tend to connect it to 9/11. Some fact-checks of conservatives are accurate, and some are fudged. But there's no question PolitiFact's readers and donors like this site as a check on conservatives and Republicans.
