Category: Fact Check

The cost of insulin in the United States has risen considerably in recent years, with some estimates finding that Americans have paid around 10 times more for the drug than people in other developed countries.

But recent changes by the government and drug manufacturers have started to drive insulin prices down, something President Joe Biden often mentions at campaign events.

Biden told the crowd at a March 19 campaign reception in Reno, Nevada, that he’s fought for years to allow Medicare to negotiate with drug companies.

“How many of you know someone who needs insulin?” Biden asked. “OK, well, guess what? It was costing 400 bucks a month on average. It now costs $35 a month.”

We’ve heard Biden make this point several times on the campaign trail — in other instances, he has said beneficiaries were paying “as much as” $400 a month — so we wanted to look into it.

The Inflation Reduction Act, which Biden signed in 2022, caps out-of-pocket insulin costs at $35 a month for Medicare enrollees. The cap took effect in 2023. In response, three drug manufacturers said they planned to reduce the price of insulin to $35 through price caps or savings programs.

The legislation also helped patients by clarifying how much they would have to pay for insulin and other drugs.

But Biden overstated the average monthly cost that Medicare beneficiaries were paying before the law. 

One government estimate for out-of-pocket insulin costs found that people with diabetes enrolled in Medicare or private insurance paid an average of $452 a year — not a month, as Biden said. That’s according to a December 2022 report by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services using 2019 data. Uninsured users, however, paid more than twice as much on average for the drug, or about $996 annually.

About half of U.S. insulin users are on Medicare

More than 37 million Americans have diabetes, and more than 7 million of them need insulin to control their blood sugar levels and prevent dangerous complications. Of the Americans who take the drug, about 52% are on Medicare.

It’s unlikely that many Medicare enrollees were paying the $400 out-of-pocket monthly average Biden referred to, though it could be on target for some people, especially if they’re uninsured, drug pricing experts told us.

“It would be more accurate to say that it could cost people on Medicare over $400 for a month of insulin, but the average cost would have been quite a bit lower than $400 on Medicare,” said Stacie Dusetzina, a health policy professor at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. 

Medicare Part D, also called the Medicare prescription drug benefit, helps beneficiaries pay for self-administered prescriptions. The benefit has several phases, including a deductible, an initial coverage phase, a coverage gap phase and catastrophic coverage. What Medicare beneficiaries pay for their prescriptions often depends on which phase they’re in.

“It is confusing, because the amount that a person was supposed to pay jumps around a lot in the Part D benefit,” Dusetzina said. For example, Dusetzina said that Medicare beneficiaries would be more likely to pay $400 a month for insulin during months when they hadn’t yet met their deductible. 

Dr. Mariana Socal, an associate scientist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said it’s also difficult to estimate insulin’s precise cost under Medicare because individual prices hinge on other factors, such as how many other prescription medications patients take. 

“Because the Medicare program has multiple instances where the patient is required to pay a coinsurance (percentage of the drug’s cost) to get their drug, it is very likely that patients were paying much more than $35 per month, on average, before the cap established by the Inflation Reduction Act went into effect,” Socal wrote in an email.

There are different ways to administer insulin, including through a pump, inhaler or pen injector filled with the medicine. 

In a 2023 report, U.S. Health and Human Services department researchers estimated that about 37% of insulin fills for Medicare enrollees cost patients more than $35, and 24% of fills exceeded $70. Nationally, the average out-of-pocket cost for insulin was $58 per fill, typically for a 30-day supply, the report found. Patients with private insurance or Medicare paid about $63 per fill, on average.

For people with employer-sponsored insurance, the average monthly out-of-pocket spending on insulin in 2019 was $82, according to an October 2021 report by the Health Care Cost Institute, a nonprofit that studies health care prices. The study found that the majority were spending an average of $35 a month, or lower, on the drug. But among the “8.7% of individuals in the highest spending category,” the median monthly out-of-pocket spending on insulin was about $315, the study said.

Our ruling

Biden said Medicare beneficiaries used to pay an average of $400 per month for insulin and are now paying $35 per month.

The Inflation Reduction Act capped the monthly price of insulin at $35 for Medicare enrollees, starting in 2023.The change built in price predictability and helped insulin users save hundreds of dollars a year. 

However, most Medicare enrollees were not paying a monthly average of $400 before these changes, according to experts and government data. Costs vary, so it is possible some people paid that much in a given month, depending on their coverage phase and dosage. 

Research has shown that patients with private insurance or Medicare often paid more than $35 a month for their insulin, sometimes much more, but not as high as the $400 average Biden cited.

We rate Biden’s statement Half True.

PolitiFact Copy Chief Matthew Crowley contributed to this report.

Social media users are sharing an accelerated video of a cargo ship colliding with Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge and claiming it proves the crash was intentional.

A March 26 Facebook reel shared this video with text above it that read, “8x speed really exaggerates how sharp the Dali turned just before striking the bridge.” Dali is the Singapore-based vessel that struck the Key Bridge on March 26.

As the footage plays, a person in the video says, “You can’t tell me this looks like an accident. I mean, take a look at the angle in which it takes in order to hit that bridge.”

The video has been shared multiple times on Facebook and Instagram. These posts were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

(Screengrab from Facebook)

Federal and Maryland officials said they do not think the cargo ship’s crash into the bridge’s support column was intentional. Officials have referred to the event as an “accident.”

During a March 26 press conference, Gov. Wes Moore, D-Md., said, “The preliminary investigation points to an accident. We haven’t seen any credible evidence of a terrorist attack.”

During the same press conference., William J. DelBagno, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Baltimore field office, said, “I want to be clear that there is no specific or credible information to suggest there are ties to terrorism in this incident.”

President Joe Biden said during a different March 26 press conference, “This was a terrible accident. At this time, we have no other indication, no other reason to believe there is any intentional act here.”

Before the collision, the Dali had a “complete blackout,” meaning it lost engine and electrical power, Clay Diamond, executive director of the American Pilots’ Association, a national trade association for maritime pilots, told The Washington Post, The New York Times and CNN. (The National Transportation Safety Board is still investigating the extent of the ship’s power loss.)

In the collision footage, the ship’s lights turn on again after the power outage. Diamond told news outlets that was likely the ship’s backup generator activating.

When the ship lost power, the pilot did “everything that he could have done” to slow down the ship and prevent it from drifting right toward the bridge, Diamond told CNN.

The ship’s pilot ordered his crew to turn the Dali’s rudder hard left and drop the ship’s left anchor, Diamond said. The pilot also issued a mayday call, warning officials to close the bridge off from traffic.

“Those were all the appropriate steps, but it happened so quickly and with so little lead time,” Diamond told CNN. “Neither one of those maneuvers were enough.”

About five minutes passed from the time the first alarms sounded to when the 984-foot-long Dali, weighing 112,000 gross tons, or about 248 million pounds, crashed into the bridge. It’s unclear what triggered the alarms. The National Transportation Safety Board, an independent federal agency, is leading the investigation into the incident, which started March 26.

The agency initially obtained about six hours of footage from the Dali’s voyage data recorder, or VDR, which contains a “snapshot of the major systems on a vessel,” National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said during a March 27 press conference.

By regulation, the voyage data recorder must record 30 days of the ship’s history. The Dali’s data included audio recordings and information about ship speed, engine rotations per minute, rudder angle, ship heading and alarms. 

The board will obtain more data as the investigation continues. But based on preliminary data, the board built a timeline of events preceding the crash:

• At 12:39 a.m., the ship left Seagirt Marine Terminal in the Port of Baltimore.

• At 1:07 a.m., the ship entered the Fort McHenry Channel, traveling toward the Francis Scott Key Bridge.

• By 1:24 a.m., the ship was traveling at about 9 miles per hour.

• At 1:25 a.m., numerous alarms sounded on the ship. The ship’s voyage data recorder stopped recording system data but audio recordings continued.

• At 1:26 a.m., the voyage data recorder resumed recording the ship’s system data. Audio recordings showed steering commands and rudder orders were made. Around the same time, the ship’s pilot called for tugboats to return and help the Dali.

• At 1:27 a.m., the Dali’s pilot ordered the left anchor to be dropped and issued additional steering commands.

• About 20 seconds later, the pilot made a radio call that the Dali had lost power and was approaching the Key Bridge. The Maryland Department of Transportation instructed officers to stop traffic from crossing the bridge.

• At 1:29 a.m., the ship was traveling at about 8 miles per hour when the voyage data recorder reported sounds consistent with the bridge collision. Dashboard cameras showed the bridge’s lights go out.

• A few seconds later, the ship’s pilot reported the Key Bridge was down.

Our ruling

Social media users are claiming video of the ship colliding with the Baltimore bridge proves it wasn’t “an accident.”

Federal and state officials’ preliminary reports say there is no credible evidence the bridge collision was intentional and have repeatedly called it “an accident.”

Audio recordings and other information from the ship show the crew tried to slow the vessel and prevent contact with the bridge. The pilot also issued a mayday call to stop traffic on the bridge.

We rate this claim False.

RELATED: Baltimore bridge collapse: A cyberattack, a movie and other false claims about the ship accident

In a change of tune from previous elections, Republicans have encouraged voters to “bank” their votes by casting their votes early at in-person absentee sites.

That includes Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden, who represents western Wisconsin in Congress. On April 1, 2024, he wrote on X (formerly Twitter):

“Get out and vote in-person-absentee TODAY at your clerks office! (Or) in-person tomorrow at your designated polling station!” Van Orden said.

But for Wisconsin’s presidential primary election — held April 2 — early voting was only offered through March 31. 

Let’s clear up the dates for early voting in Wisconsin, and why that wasn’t an option at the time Van Orden made the claim.

For presidential primary, clerks could offer early voting between March 19 and 31

Van Orden’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But the Wisconsin Elections Commission has a list of dates for the presidential primary, including the deadline for early voting. 

That list explains that early voting started on March 19, and can run through March 31. March 31 was Easter and marked the Sunday before Election Day.

Communities can choose which dates in that range to have early voting, along with hours and locations. While it can take place at a clerk’s office, it can also be held at community centers and libraries, for example.

For example, the City of Milwaukee offered early voting through March 30 and included locations like UW-Milwaukee’s Helene Zelazo Center for the Performing Arts. 

State law lays out time range, early voting can run through Sunday before Election Day

The restriction on conducting early voting on Monday isn’t just for this election. It’s part of state law. 

“If application is made in person, the application shall be made no earlier than 14 days preceding the election and no later than the Sunday preceding the election,” state law says. 

Translation: In-person absentee can only happen between 14 days out from the election and the Sunday before Election Day (which is always a Tuesday).

So that means early voting is not possible on Monday, which is when Van Orden made his tweet encouraging people to do so. 

And one more interesting point: Wisconsin does not allow for voter registration on the Saturday, Sunday or Monday before Election Day. 

So, early voting toward the end of that time range is not possible if you need to register or re-register. If that applies to you, registering at the polls is still an option. 

Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on April 2. That second part of Van Orden’s claim is right: You can vote in-person at the polls tomorrow.

Our ruling 

The day before Wisconsin’s presidential primary, U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden encouraged people to “get out and vote in-person-absentee TODAY at your clerks office!”

But state law only allows for early voting through the Sunday before an Election Day. Early voting was not offered on the Monday before the election, when Van Orden made his claim.

One more reminder for good measure: You can still go to your polling place on April 2, and register to vote there if you need to. 

But Van Orden gave voters the impression they could vote in-person absentee on April 1, when in fact that opportunity ended on March 31. 

We rate his claim False.

In a March 27 interview on MSNBC, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott addressed social media posts characterizing him, a Black man, as a “DEI mayor.” 

A day later, the conservative X account Libs of TikTok posted a 17-second clip from that interview and quoted him saying, “They should be afraid because that’s my purpose in life.” 

“Nothing to see here… just the Mayor of Baltimore threatening White people,” Libs of TikTok wrote to nearly 3 million followers. The account is created and run by Chaya Raichik.

(Screenshot from X)

But a look at Scott’s full interview, which happened a day after the cargo ship collision that brought down the Francis Scott Key Bridge, clarifies that he didn’t threaten white people. He spoke for more than a minute and was reacting to comments from what he called “those who are racist.”

Within hours of Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse March 26, some Republican politicians and social media users baselessly claimed “DEI” and Scott’s race were to blame for the event.

DEI stands for diversity, equity and inclusion — programs aiming to create environments of fairness and respect in schools and workplaces. Some conservatives are increasingly citing DEI to criticize hiring processes, policy decisions and corporate decision-making. 

During the March 27 episode of MSNBC’s “The Reid Out,” host Joy Reid opened a segment by discussing the social media posts that characterized Scott as a “DEI mayor.” 

She mentioned an X post by Florida Republican congressional candidate Anthony Sabatini, who shared a video of the bridge collapse and wrote, “DEI did this.”

Reid told viewers that Scott was elected, “in a city that is 61% Black,” adding that “by right-wing logic, a ‘diversity hire’ would have been a white man.”

About a minute later, Scott, 39, who is running for reelection in 2024, joined the show. Scott said he views the use of the term “DEI” in that context as a stand-in for a racial slur. (We have bolded the section of the interview that Libs of TikTok’s post included.)

REID: “I will allow you, Mayor Scott, if you so choose to do so, to respond to the tomfoolery and attacks on you for having the nerve to be Black and also a mayor.”

SCOTT: “Listen, I know, and we all know, and you know very well that Black men, and young Black men in particular, have been the bogeyman for those who are racist and think that only straight, wealthy, white men should have a say in anything.

“We’ve been the bogeyman for them since the first day they brought us to this country. And what they mean by DEI, in my opinion, is duly elected incumbent. 

“We know what they want to say, but they don’t have the courage to say the N-word and the fact that I don’t believe in their untruthful and wrong ideology, and I’m very proud of my heritage and who I am and where I come from scares them. Because me being at my position means that their way of thinking, their way of life of being comfortable while everyone else suffers is going to be at risk, and they should be afraid, because that’s my purpose in life.“

Reid then talked about the six victims of the collapse, all presumed dead, who were Latino men.

Community notes are submitted by certain users and become public if “enough contributors from different points of view rate that note as helpful,” according to X. Similarly, a note can be taken down if enough users downvote it. 

Libs of TikTok did not respond to PolitiFact’s request for comment. But the account disparaged the community note in a March 31 post.

An archived snapshot shows the community note was live on the Libs of TikTok post as of March 30; by April 1, it had been removed.

Our ruling 

Posting a 17-second clip of Scott’s MSNBC interview, Libs of TikTok said “Nothing to see here… just the Mayor of Baltimore threatening White people.”

But a look at Scott’s full interview clarifies that he didn’t threaten white people.

Scott was talking about “those who are racist and think that only straight, wealthy, white men should have a say in anything.” Scott said “they should be afraid,” because as a Black man in a position of power, he threatens that point of view. 

We rate Libs of TikTok’s claim False.

On March 29, the Biden White House proclaimed March 31, 2024, as Transgender Day of Visibility. This move prompted outrage from social media users and political figures upset that Easter, which fell on the same day, had been “replaced” or overwritten.  

“Banning sacred truth and tradition —while at the same time proclaiming Easter Sunday as “Transgender Day”—is outrageous and abhorrent,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., posted on X. 

The claims swirling across social media missed a lot of context. 

It is a coincidence that Easter and Transgender Day of Visibility fell on the same day this year, and President Joe Biden released a statement for Easter, too.

Transgender Day of Visibility, a day dedicated to raising awareness about the transgender community, has been on March 31 every year since its creation more than a decade ago.

It is a fixed date like the Fourth of July, Veterans Day or Christmas. President Joe Biden issued a similar “proclamation” for March 31 in 2023, 2022 and 2021. Biden also declared March 31, 2024 César Chávez Day to honor the labor activist famous for organizing farmworkers.

But Easter’s date changes each year.

The Christian holiday celebrating Jesus Christ’s resurrection is also observed by children with chocolate bunnies and egg hunts. It fell on March 31 this year. In 2023, it fell on April 9, and the year before, on April 17. 

Easter’s date is based on the lunar calendar and always falls on the Sunday following the first full moon after the spring equinox. Other roving holidays, such as Thanksgiving or Memorial Day, are based on a certain week in a given month.

In 2025, Easter will fall on April 20, a day often associated with smoking marijuana.

By issuing a “proclamation” for Transgender Day of Visibility this year, Biden did not replace or change Easter.

“As a Christian who celebrates Easter with family, President Biden stands for bringing people together and upholding the dignity and freedoms of every American,” said Andrew J. Bates, White House deputy press secretary.

Here’s another holiday for the April calendar: International Fact-Checking Day on April 2!

Has President Joe Biden banned religious imagery from White House Easter festivities?

That’s what some Republican observers and Biden critics asserted in social media posts that derided him for deviating from tradition by banning religious themes and symbols from an Easter egg design contest.

Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem wrote March 30 on X: “Joe Biden banned ‘religious themed’ eggs at the White House’s Easter Egg design contest for kids, AND he announced that tomorrow is ‘National Transgender Visibility Day.’ Did he forget that tomorrow is Easter, Resurrection Sunday?”

Noem’s post ended in a call of support for former President Donald Trump: “Joe Biden and his White House have made it clear that people of faith, particularly Christians and our Bible-believing views, have no place in his America.”

But Biden did not ban religious-themed eggs for the contest. The contest is overseen by the American Egg Board, which has prohibited religious designs for any White House Easter event since the board was created in 1976, when Republican Gerald Ford was president.

This fact-check will focus on Noem’s claim about the egg designs. In another story, we explained how the Christian holiday of Easter coincided this year with the International Transgender Day of Visibility, which is held annually March 31, and Easter Sunday follows the lunar calendar. The last two Easter holidays came in April.

PolitiFact asked Noem’s office for comment but did not receive a response by publication.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Andrew Bates told PolitiFact that rhetoric around the anti-Biden Easter claims was “cruel, hateful and dishonest,” adding that Biden, who is Christian, celebrates Easter. Noem, he said, was criticizing “every president who’s been in office the last 45 years.”

Why religious-themed egg designs aren’t permitted

Although the White House’s annual Easter Egg Roll has existed since 1878, the egg design contest for kids started in 2021. Another event, the First Lady’s Commemorative Egg presentation, has been held annually since 1977.

Eggs designed by children of members of the military adorn the East Colonnade of the White House ahead of the White House Easter Egg Roll on March 28, 2024. (AP)

Since the American Egg Board was created in 1976, it has overseen the White House’s Easter celebrations — including the first lady’s event and the egg design contest — and has kept the same guidelines about religious and political imagery whenever the organization is asking for public participation. That’s because it’s part of the federal government’s “checkoff program.”

These programs work to increase revenue and promote a product or commodity — in this case, eggs. As part of the federal government, the American Egg Board’s speech is considered government speech and it must follow federal guidelines that require it to stay neutral on politics and religion; any program or activity cannot be seen as lifting one religion or set of beliefs over others. 

Many people angry at Biden mentioned a March 29 Fox News article that carried the headline, “Religious-themed designs banned from White House Easter egg art contest.” Similar headlines had been online since January.

The article cited a flyer that invited children of National Guard members to submit Easter eggs this year, stipulating that submissions “must not include any questionable content, religious symbols, overtly religious themes, or partisan political statements.” 

The guidelines also say the egg designs cannot promote “bigotry, racism, hatred or harm against any group or individual or promotes discrimination based on race, gender, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age.”

These rules have existed for years. 

“The American Egg Board has been a supporter of the White House Easter Egg Roll for over 45 years and the guideline language referenced in recent news reports has consistently applied to the board since its founding, across administrations,” American Egg Board President and CEO Emily Metz wrote in an emailed statement. 

Our ruling

Noem said Biden banned “religious themed” eggs at this year’s White House’s Easter design contest for kids.

The contest is new, but religious or political themes have been prohibited for every White House Easter egg event since at least 1976, when the American Egg Board was created. As a federal commodity program, the board must adhere to federal guidelines that require it to stay neutral on politics and religion; programs or activities cannot be seen as lifting one religion or set of beliefs over others.

We rate Noem’s claim False.

RELATED: Hopping to conclusions? No, Easter has not been ‘replaced’ with Transgender Day of Visibility

Former President Donald Trump repeated familiar false claims ahead of his first visit to Wisconsin this campaign cycle: that he actually won the state in 2020 and there was widespread voter fraud.

On April 1, 2024 — a day before Wisconsin’s presidential primary and Trump’s first 2024 rally in the state — Trump appeared on WISN-AM’s Dan O’Donnell show. 

Trump incorrectly said he won Wisconsin in 2020. He did win the state in 2016, but lost in 2020.

“We had a reelection the second time. We actually did much better than the first time. We won in Wisconsin, as you know, the first time. The second time we did much better,” Trump said.

Trump also falsely claimed that he won after “wrongdoing” was discovered in the 2020 election.

“But I guess it was delayed,” Trump continued. “They found out a lot of wrongdoing. And after the wrongdoing was found, people said, ‘Well, he actually did win.’”

O’Donnell, a conservative talk radio host, did not push back on Trump’s false claims that he won the state in 2020 or that there was wrongdoing in the presidential election. 

PolitiFact Wisconsin has checked these claims before. But ahead of Trump’s rally in Green Bay let’s take a trip down memory lane.

Trump did not win Wisconsin in 2020, though he did win the state in 2016

Let’s tackle the first part of Trump’s claim: That he performed better in Wisconsin in 2020 than he did in 2016. 

That is unequivocally false. And it’s something PolitiFact Wisconsin has checked on multiple occasions, including back in 2021. 

We noted then, and we’ll repeat here, that President Joe Biden won Wisconsin in 2020. Biden took 1,630,866 votes compared to Trump’s 1,610,184 in the state, so Trump lost by 20,682 votes. 

Trump did win the state in 2016, taking more than 22,000 votes over Democrat Hillary Clinton. He netted 1,405,284 votes in Wisconsin in 2016.

So, while Trump picked up more raw votes in 2020, his performance was not better because he ultimately lost by about 20,000 votes.

PolitiFact Wisconsin reached out to Trump’s campaign for backup but did not hear back by deadline.

Bottom line: Trump did not win Wisconsin in 2020. PolitiFact Wisconsin has repeatedly rated that claim Pants on Fire. 

Recounts affirmed Biden’s victory, no widespread fraud or wrongdoing

In the second part of Trump’s claim, he says that he won after “a lot of wrongdoing” was discovered. 

Let’s look back again. In 2020, PolitiFact Wisconsin explained that recounts Trump requested upheld Biden’s victory. 

The net pickup for Biden was 74 votes in the heavily Democratic Milwaukee and Dane counties. So, Trump actually fell further behind.

So, again, recounts affirmed that Biden won the election. 

PolitiFact Wisconsin has also debunked several claims that there was “wrongdoing” or pervasive voter fraud. 

That includes clarifying that late returns for Biden were because of how Milwaukee counts its absentee ballots, not fraud. 

We’ve also debunked his claim that absentee ballots were being dumped in rivers or creeks. 

On top of that, a probe led by former state Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman — who has aligned with Trump and promoted his false claims — turned up no evidence the election was incorrectly called.

The conservative Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty also found no evidence of widespread fraud. State auditors also found voting machines worked properly. 

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Even reviews led by conservatives found no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election. 

PolitiFact Wisconsin found false Trump’s claims of pervasive “wrongdoing” many times before, and the same applies here.

Our ruling

In a radio interview, Trump repeated familiar false refrains.

That is, that he won Wisconsin in 2020 and “after the wrongdoing was found, people said, ‘Well, he actually did win.’” 

Biden won the state in 2020. Recounts actually expanded Biden’s margin, and multiple reviews — including by conservatives — found there was no widespread voter fraud.

PolitiFact Wisconsin has checked these claims before, and we’ll continue doing so if Trump airs them as he hits the ground in Wisconsin ahead of November. 

We’ve given a Pants on Fire rating for similar Trump claims in the past, and we do the same again here.

Recent Facebook posts would have some users think that former President Donald Trump’s foreign policy agenda includes dispatching Prince Harry back to Great Britain. 

But that overstates reality. 

“Trump calls for Prince Harry to leave U.S.,” a March 20 post said. 

“Trump wants Prince Harry gone,” another post said. 

These posts were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

Both posts linked to a March 20 blog post recounting a March 19 interview Trump gave to former Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage on the British GB News. 

Farage asked Trump questions about Harry’s visa application. A judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to submit the application to the court for review after the agency declined to cede it to The Heritage Foundation ,a conservative think tank, in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. The foundation questions whether Harry disclosed his past drug use on the visa application.

“If Harry lied on his visa application, doesn’t the truth need to come out?” Farage asked Trump in the interview. “Should he get special privileges that nobody else does?”

“No,” Trump responded. “And we’ll have to see — if they knew something about drugs, and if he lied they’ll have to take appropriate action,”
“Appropriate action,” Farage said. “Which might mean not staying in America.”
“Oh, I don’t know. You have to tell me,” Trump responded. “You just have to tell me. You would have thought they would have known this a long time ago.”

But Trump didn’t call for Harry to leave the country. 

We rate that claim False.