The first public speech since the assassination attempt on Donald Trump will be the highlight of the final day of the Republican National Convention, and we’ll be watching to let you know if Trump or other speakers that night stray from the truth.
The 78-year-old former president will speak five days after a gunman opened fire at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, killing one attendee, seriously wounding two and damaging Trump’s ear. Other speakers joining Trump in Milwaukee tonight include Eric Trump, Tucker Carlson and Hulk Hogan.
In addition to the shooting, Trump’s speech is expected to cover Republican policies, election integrity and Democratic President Joe Biden.
Watch as the USA TODAY Fact-Checking team separates fact from fiction and adds important context when speakers are missing it.
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Republican Convention Fact Check: What Vance, Trump Jr., and others got right (and wrong) on Day 3
RNC video claims: Revenues fall for third straight year under Biden
“Under the Biden administration, Americans’ incomes have fallen for three consecutive years.”
This is misleading and an oversimplification of the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The assertion appears to refer to reports such as a September 2023 House Budget Committee analysis that tracked median household income, adjusted for inflation, and found it had declined for three consecutive years.
What’s not noted, however, is that this decline began in the final year of President Donald Trump’s term. After reaching a high of $78,250 in 2019, real median household income fell to $76,660 in 2020, the first full year of the COVID-19 pandemic — a fact noted in the House committee analysis but not mentioned in the video. It fell to $76,330 in 2021, when Joe Biden took office, and to $74,580 in 2022, the most recent data available.
But other data points to increases under Biden: Median weekly earnings for full-time workers will rise from $983 at the end of 2020 to $1,142 in the fourth quarter of 2023, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
– Jordy McCreary
RNC video claims: Credit card fees will skyrocket under Biden
“Credit card fees have increased by 50% since Biden took office.” -Narrated a video shown at the Republican National Convention
The Financial Times reported in March that U.S. consumers are set to spend nearly 50% more on credit cards in 2023 compared to 2020, before Joe Biden took office as president.
Credit card interest and fees rose by $51 billion to $157 billion in that period, the Financial Times reported, citing data provided by U.S. banks to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. The change represents an increase of about 48 percent.
The Biden administration is trying to implement new rules to address what it considers “junk fees,” such as late payment fees and overdraft fees, The Associated Press reported. A federal judge in May temporarily halted the Biden administration’s plan to reduce late credit card fees to $8 from the current average of $32, The Associated Press reported.
– Andre Buik
Linda McMahon claims: Trump’s China tariffs could raise billions of dollars
“Donald Trump imposed tariffs on China, raising billions of dollars in revenue and protecting American industry.”
The numbers here are spot on. Starting in 2018, President Trump imposed tariffs on thousands of products imported from China worth about $380 billion in 2018 and 2019, according to the Tax Foundation. The purpose of these tariffs was to protect U.S. domestic production. The tariffs resulted in about $80 billion in taxes paid to the U.S. government, according to the foundation.
However, it is worth noting that most of the revenue generated from these tariffs was paid by American importers, not China, according to the Tax Foundation and the Council on Foreign Relations. Most economists agree that increased business costs are typically passed on to consumers. The Tax Foundation estimates that the tariffs, which have been largely retained under the Biden administration, have had a negative impact on U.S. gross domestic product in the long term.
–Brad Sylvester
Mike Pompeo says there were no Chinese spy balloons during Trump’s presidency
“In four years, no Chinese spy balloons have flown over the United States.”
The false claim emerged for the second night in a row after multiple news outlets reported that Chinese surveillance balloons flew over the U.S. at least three times in 2023 under former President Donald Trump’s administration, but military officials were unaware of it at the time.
The balloons went undetected due to what General Glenn D. VanHerck, commander of the Pentagon’s Northern Command, described in The New York Times as a “perception gap.” The objects initially classified as UFOs were later reclassified as Chinese spy balloons.
The report came shortly after a Chinese balloon was shot down off the coast of South Carolina in February 2023 during the Biden administration, which Trump called “false disinformation.”
– Jordy McCreary and Kim Breen
Behind the scenes at the RNC: Rally shooting casts shadow over Trump’s closing speech
The assassination attempt that left Donald Trump with an injured ear has dominated headlines in the days leading up to tonight’s keynote speech by the former president.
Following the July 13 shooting in Pennsylvania that left one person dead and two seriously injured, President Trump rewrote his closing remarks, telling the Washington Examiner that he would “bring the whole country, the whole world, together.”
The FBI identified the gunman as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, and said Secret Service agents shot him dead at the scene, but authorities have never been able to determine the gunman’s motive, one of the main unanswered questions and a great deal of misinformation circulating.
USA TODAY has uncovered a series of false claims stemming from the assassination attempt.
– Jordy McCreary
RNC background: Trump is accused of election interference in an attempt to retake the White House
Former President Donald Trump is campaigning for reelection but continues to face criminal charges for his alleged involvement in the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
According to the federal indictment, Trump allegedly ordered his supporters to march on the Capitol to pressure former Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to certify Joe Biden’s electoral victory.
On July 15, just two days after he was injured in an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania, the former president took to his social media platform, Truth Social, to describe the incident as a “January 6th hoax” and called for the lawsuit to be dismissed.
More than 1,200 people have been charged in connection with the attack on the Capitol. Trump’s case is being handled by special counsel Jack Smith of the Department of Justice. Trump has pleaded not guilty.
USA TODAY has denied numerous claims about the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
– Andre Buik
RNC background: Biden’s age, gaffes a frequent theme
Whether Joe Biden is eligible to serve as president was a frequent topic of discussion among Republicans when he and Donald Trump first faced off in 2020, and recent events have only strengthened that view in their second showdown.
Concerns about Biden’s age were heightened in February when a special counsel released a report that described the 81-year-old Biden as an elderly man with “diminished capabilities” including memory problems. His poor performance with Trump in a presidential debate in June exacerbated the issues to the point that some leading Democrats called for him to drop out of the race. Biden briefly blamed his performance on fatigue, but that did not ease the concerns.
Biden has maintained he is qualified to serve another term, but his actions and statements are being scrutinized — and sometimes misrepresented — for clues about his competence.
USA TODAY has exposed several false claims about Biden’s mental and physical strength.
– Nate Trella
RNC Background: Project 2025 stirs debate
Democratic lawmakers have been trying in recent weeks to focus voters’ attention on Project 2025, also known as the Presidential Transition Project.
This effort by the Heritage Foundation and other conservative groups produced a 900-page playbook for the next Republican president whose guidelines, if fully implemented, would substantially reform the federal government.
Many of President Trump’s allies are involved in the project, but the president has denied any involvement.
“Some of the things they’re saying are completely ridiculous and terrible,” he wrote in a July 5 post on Truth Social, but did not specify which parts of Project 2025 he disagrees with.
Instead, his campaign presented “Agenda 47” as his policy plan for Trump’s second term, which includes executive orders on day one to end automatic citizenship for children of illegal immigrants born in the US and to shut down the US Department of Education.
The Republican 2024 platform mirrors President Trump’s vision for the country, calling for “the largest deportation program in American history” and penalizing school districts that expose children to what they deem “inappropriate racial, sexual or political content,” USA Today reported.
USA TODAY denied the allegations about Project 2025.
-Breanna Frank
RNC Background: Trump’s baseless claims of 2020 election fraud continue
As the 2024 election approaches, former President Donald Trump continues to baselessly claim that the election four years ago was rigged against him.
He also denied the allegations in a video played at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday.
Mr Trump’s campaign and the Republican National Committee, run by his daughter-in-law, have said they will mobilise 100,000 people in battleground states to ensure “transparency and fairness”, but opponents have criticised the move as a form of voter intimidation.
State-level recounts, verifications, and audits of the 2022 midterm elections have found no signs of systemic problems with voting fraud.
This matters because unfounded claims by Trump and his allies have infiltrated the Republican Party and are undermining faith in the electoral process. Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina and other prominent Republicans have refused to commit to accepting the election results.
USA TODAY has exposed numerous false claims about the integrity of the election.
– Jordy McCreary
Fact Check: The facts about the Trump assassination attempt: What’s true, what’s not true, and why
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