Category: Fact Check

A Facebook video shows the perspective of a man trying to help a person sleeping in a tent at a Walmart. The helper takes the person to a hotel and, soon after, presents him with a check from a new program that provides monthly financial help. 

“The government is paying you $2,000 every single month,” the man says in the post shared from Nov. 15. “It’s a new program, any American who needs $2,000 a month can get it now.”

The Facebook post was 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.)

PolitiFact has fact-checked similar claims that promised stimulus checks and stimulus loans. So we did some digging to find out whether the program the video describes exists.

A close-up of the footage of the $2,000 check shows an Internal Revenue Service logo and some text: “Under the New Deal Program, the current Administration has issued you incentives for the following total amount. Total Health Allowance Incentive: $2000 Monthly Credits.”

There are several reasons to doubt the video’s accuracy.

“One huge red flag to watch out for is that checks that go out to the taxpayers never show the IRS as the payer,” IRS spokesperson Octavio O. Saenz told PolitiFact. “All checks generated due to tax credits/refunds show the U.S. Treasury Department as the payer.”

The Facebook post provides a link to a Health Insurance Marketplace subsidy calculator run by Blue Cross Blue Shield Association. It helps people estimate whether they are eligible for tax credits to offset the cost of health insurance.

The Facebook post mentioned a “health allowance incentive,” but there is no record of Congress and the Biden administration creating such a program. 

A “premium tax credit” to help people who are at or below the federal poverty line purchase insurance in the federal health marketplace, but this has been available since 2014. To receive this credit, people must be U.S. citizens or lawfully present in the U.S. They also cannot have other types of health insurance such as Medicare or Medicaid.

The amount of the premium tax credit varies based on the person’s income, and it’s supposed to be used to pay for health insurance in advance (by the government sending the money to the insurance company directly). The credit can also be received at the end of the year when a beneficiary files taxes, but that means that beneficiary has already paid the monthly cost of the insurance during the year, according to an IRS fact sheet.

We rate the claim that a new government program will pay Americans $2,000 a month False.

Soon after Hamas launched its Oct. 7 attack in Israel, journalists on the scene recorded images documenting the violence. Now, questions by an Israeli media watchdog group about those images are fueling inaccurate and harmful online claims.

“So, recently people started asking a very good question,” says a man in a Nov. 11 TikTok video. “They wondered how CNN and The Associated Press were able to get such up close footage of the massacre on Oct. 7. And, once attention was drawn to that question, CNN and The Associated Press had to admit the horrific truth: they knew it was going to happen and, to make sure that they were the only ones who got to report on it, they didn’t tell anyone.”

TikTok identified this video as part of its efforts to counter inauthentic, misleading or false content. (Read more about PolitiFact’s partnership with TikTok.) 

The video’s claim is inaccurate. Neither CNN nor The Associated Press “admitted” knowing anything about Hamas’ planned assault before it happened. Representatives from the news outlets rejected the claim and said that freelance journalists in the region began sending in photos more than an hour after the attack began. 

How a website post led to false claims

HonestReporting.com, an Israeli watchdog group that later told the AP it doesn’t “claim to be a news organization” said it was only “raising questions” when it made a Nov. 8 post asking how Gaza photojournalists were able to capture up-close shots of Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault.

The report, titled “Broken Borders: AP & Reuters Pictures of Hamas Atrocities Raise Ethical Questions,” asked what the journalists were doing so early on an ordinarily “quiet Saturday.”

“Was it coordinated with Hamas? Did the respectable wire services, which published their photos, approve of their presence inside enemy territory, together with the terrorist infiltrators?” the report said. “Did the photojournalists who freelance for other media, like CNN and The New York Times, notify these outlets? Judging from the pictures of lynching, kidnapping and storming of an Israeli kibbutz, it seems like the border has been breached not only physically, but also journalistically.”

Photos some of these journalists took Oct. 7 showed burning buildings, Hamas invaders outside a kibbutz, and Hamas attackers bringing kidnapped Israeli citizens into Gaza.

The report had serious consequences. At least two Israeli politicians suggested the journalists targeted by these claims be killed.

Several news organizations, including CNN, the AP, Reuters and The New York Times, released statements denying having any prior knowledge about the attack. 

“The Associated Press had no knowledge of the Oct. 7 attacks before they happened”  a Nov. 9 statement by the news organization read. “The first pictures AP received from any freelancer show they were taken more than an hour after the attacks began. No AP staff were at the border at the time of the attacks, nor did any AP staffer cross the border at any time.”

The watchdog report mentioned multiple freelance photojournalists, but singled out one named Hassan Eslaiah after photos surfaced of him standing next to an Israeli tank and posing with a Hamas leader. Several news organizations that have worked with Eslaiah, including CNN and AP, said they cut ties with the photographer after the images emerged.

“We had no prior knowledge of the October 7th attacks,” a CNN spokesperson wrote in an emailed statement. “Hassan Eslaiah, a freelance journalist who has worked for us and other international and Israeli outlets, was not working for the network on October 7th. As of Thursday November 9th, we have severed all ties with him.”

Other news organizations, including The New York Times and Reuters, were also accused of having advanced warning about the attack. Both rejected the claims.

Another journalist named in the report, Yousef Masoud, whose photographs of an Israeli tank captured by Hamas were used by The New York Times and AP, did not know about the attack in advance, The New York Times reported. His first photographs that day were filed 90 minutes after the attack began.

“It is reckless to make those allegations, putting our journalists on the ground in Israel and Gaza at risk,” the Times said in a statement. “The Times has extensively covered the Oct. 7 attacks and the war with fairness, impartiality, and an abiding understanding of the complexities of the conflict.”

In its own statement, Reuters said it “categorically denies that it had prior knowledge of the attack or that we embedded journalists with Hamas on Oct. 7. Reuters acquired photographs from two Gaza-based freelance photographers who were at the border on the morning of Oct. 7, with whom it did not have a prior relationship.” Those photographs, it said, were taken two hours after Hamas fired rockets across southern Israel and more than 45 minutes after Israel said gunmen had crossed the border. 

HonestReporting.com told the AP it had no evidence to back up the suggestions behind its questions, but said they were “legitimate questions to be asked” and that it doesn’t “claim to be a news organization.”

Journalism experts said news organizations working with freelance reporters to document events around the world is an essential role of the press, especially during wartime. Julie Pace, AP’s senior vice president and executive editor, said the organization carried out a typical news-gathering process during a big event. “We need to figure out what it is and inform the world about it,” she said. Part of that process involves handling calls from freelancers who have footage to offer.

As of Nov. 20, 50 journalists have been killed in the conflict, most Palestinian. Eleven more have been injured and three are reported missing, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Our ruling

A TikTok video claimed CNN and the AP “admitted” that they knew about Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack in advance and didn’t tell anyone.

This is wrong. There is no evidence that either news organization, or others that have been accused of being tipped off about the attack, had any prior knowledge about it. CNN and the AP, as well as other news outlets, rejected the claims and said photographs from freelance journalists documenting the attack were filed more than an hour after it began.

We rate this claim False.

Dean Phillips, the Minnesota U.S. representative who’s taking on President Joe Biden in the Democratic primaries, decried a lack of knowledge about the Holocaust among American youth. 

With a war in the Middle East, pro-Palestinian demonstrations on college campuses and polls showing widespread criticism of Israel among younger Americans, Phillips expressed support for Israel.

“When half of American high school students are not familiar with the Holocaust, is it surprising that we’re in a circumstance now where they do not understand why there must be one nation in the world with a Jewish majority that … Jews can take refuge in?” Phillips said Nov. 13 at Dartmouth College.

Half of U.S. high schoolers are not familiar with the Holocaust? We checked the most relevant and recent polls available that examined what young people know about the Holocaust and found that Phillips’ claim is exaggerated.

Two polls surveyed school-aged children. A third — the one Phillips cited when we inquired — surveyed young adults.

None of the polls, from the Pew Research Center, Liberation75 and the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, shows rates of ignorance of the Holocaust’s existence as high as 50%. But the polls found that high schoolers were less familiar with the details, including how many Jews were murdered (6 million), what a ghetto was (an area where Jews were forced to live), and how Adolf Hitler came to power (democratically). Many could not name a concentration camp, such as Auschwitz.

Hutton Cooney, a spokesperson for Phillips’ campaign spokesperson, told PolitiFact that Phillips was likely referring to the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany survey, “though I realize it’s not exact.”

Here’s a rundown.

• Pew Research Center survey, 2019

The Pew poll, which surveyed U.S. people ages 13 to 17, may offer the strongest evidence for Phillips’ claim. Using a multiple-choice format, the survey asked to name the decades the Holocaust occurred (57% answered correctly), what Nazi-created ghettos were (53% got it correct), how many Jews were killed (38% were correct), and how Hitler became chancellor (33% were correct).

This poll’s four questions were geared toward gauging how accurately respondents could recall the Holocaust’s granular details rather than whether they knew about it at all.

The other two polls asked broader questions like the one Phillips framed, producing results that don’t align with his statement.

• Liberation75 survey, 2021

This survey’s age group, ages 10 to 19, is reasonably close to “high school,” but the respondents were mostly Canadian, not American. It was sponsored by the Ontario-based Holocaust education group Liberation75. About 15% of respondents were from the U.S.

The survey found that 80% had definitely heard about the Holocaust. Seven percent said that they might have heard of it. 

• Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany survey, 2020

The third poll was the one Phillips’ campaign cited when we asked for corroboration for his claim. But its age range was out of sync; it surveyed U.S. respondents 18 to 39 — and so excluded most high schoolers. Those ages were chosen because they represented members of the millennial and Gen Z population.

When the poll asked, “Have you ever seen or heard the word Holocaust before?” 12% of respondents said they definitely hadn’t heard about the Holocaust or didn’t think they’d heard about the Holocaust. That was a far lower rate of uncertainty about the Holocaust than what Phillips said. Also, virtually all of those who said they had heard about the Holocaust said they learned about it in school.

As with the Pew survey, respondents’ knowledge of the Holocaust’s details was narrower. More than half believed, incorrectly, that 2 million Jews or fewer were killed, while nearly half of respondents couldn’t name a concentration camp or ghetto.

Alexis M. Lerner, an assistant political science professor at the U.S. Naval Academy who designed the Liberation75 poll, said that even the middle school students she surveyed displayed higher rates of knowing that the Holocaust occurred than what Phillips said.

“It’s harmful to the cause of Holocaust education to inflate the numbers” of students who don’t know about the Holocaust, she said. Now that about two dozen states require Holocaust education, “it would be hard to believe that students haven’t heard about it.”

Experts cautioned that even if the Holocaust knowledge gap is not as broad as Phillips signaled, Holocaust knowledge among younger Americans stands to be improved.

For instance, the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany survey found that 20% of millennials and Gen Z respondents in New York believed the Jews caused the Holocaust, said Greg Schneider, the group’s executive vice president, a finding he called “shocking.”

“These results underscore the need for more Holocaust education, mandates and curriculum,” Schneider said.

Alan Cooperman, Pew’s religion research director, said that the polls together signal that there are legitimate concerns about how much young people know about the Holocaust. But he added that Phillips’ statement “is more sweeping and less precise than I’d like.”

Our ruling

Phillips said, “Half of American high school students are not familiar with the Holocaust.”

Recent polls we found don’t support this claim and reveal that well more than half of younger Americans broadly understand that the Holocaust occurred. 

However, Phillips’ statement contains an element of truth, because the polls show young people are less familiar with granular details, such as the number of Jews killed or about concentration camps.

We rate the statement Mostly False.

The singer Pink is calling attention to book bans and taking aim at Florida.

Pink announced she planned to give away 2,000 books during her mid-November Sunshine State performances in response to book challenges.

“The following are some titles of books that have been banned from schools in Florida…. Lmk which book is pornography….” Pink wrote in a Nov. 13 X post. “To Kill A Mockingbird, The Hate (U) Give, Forrest Gump, A Catcher In The Rye, The Hill We Climb, Girls Who Code, Atlas Shrugged, 1984, The Kite Runner, The Bluest Eye, A Wrinkle In Time, The Diary of Anne Frank, The Fault In Our Stars, etc etc.”

The post was tagged with a community note that included a USA Today fact-check about a different list of banned books. Pink’s X post also drew ire from some conservatives.

Pink announced Nov. 13 she was partnering with PEN America, a group that opposes and tracks book bans, to distribute copies of four banned books during her Nov. 14 and Nov. 15 shows in Miami and Sunrise.

Different organizations define “bans” differently, but we zeroed in on Pink’s 13-title list to determine how accessible these books really are in Florida’s public schools. We found that although many of the books Pink listed had been temporarily or permanently removed or restricted from shelves in some Florida schools, using PEN America’s most liberal definition of a “ban,” this happened in 17 school districts out of 67 in the state.

The state Department of Education and Collier County, meanwhile, reported removals in four districts. Collier County, which removed 313 books, more than any district in the state, released its list in November after the state’s September report.

None of the books were banned statewide.

After receiving feedback to her post, Pink wrote more about her list on X, clarifying that some of the books were banned in one or more Florida school districts.

What’s happening in Florida?

Florida lawmakers in 2022 passed H.B. 1467, which made it easier for parents to find out about and object to books in public schools. Another law, H.B. 1069, took effect July 1 and clarified how school districts should respond to book objections and the steps they should take when removing texts from classrooms and library shelves. 

A September Florida Department of Education report shows 20 of Florida’s 67 school districts and the statewide public Florida Virtual School removed 298 books in the 2022-23 school year. Some of those books were banned in multiple districts. Overall, school district officials received 1,218 objections about books.

The American Library Association defines a “ban” as the removal of a book based on a person or group’s objection. It distinguishes a ban from a “challenge,” which it categorizes as any push to remove or restrict materials. 

PEN America has a broader definition of what constitutes a “ban.” The organization records a book ban whenever access to a previously available book is removed or restricted — temporarily or permanently — because of parent or community challenges, administrative decisions, or in response to direct or threatened action by lawmakers or other governmental officials. Books that are removed temporarily may not make it back to shelves for months. That’s a ban, PEN America said. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in May said no books had been banned in Florida, a statement we rated False.

PEN America said 40% of school book bans nationwide happened in Florida school districts in the 2022-23 school year. Many of the objections were for books containing sexual or LGBTQ+ content and came from a small group of parents, some affiliated with conservative groups, such as Moms for Liberty, a Tampa Bay Times analysis found.

Suzanne Trimel, a PEN America spokesperson, said “there are 814 unique book titles that have been banned in Florida schools since 2021.”

Pink, who partnered with PEN, didn’t respond to a request for comment through her record label.

Florida school reports reflect some removals

The state’s report shows four books on Pink’s list were removed from some Florida school districts in the 2022-23 school year. After the state report was published, Collier County in November updated its website to show 313 books were removed from all grade levels to comply with state law. Collier’s count included three other titles that appear on Pink’s list. The district said some books may be reinstated after an additional review.

None of the books were banned statewide. Here are the books from Pink’s list that were removed, according to the state and Collier County:

• “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini, which described sexual violence involving minors, was removed in Clay, Martin and Collier counties.

• “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison, which also described sexual violence involving children, were removed in Clay and Martin counties. 

• “The Hate U Give,” a young adult novel by Angie Thomas about racial profiling and a teenager coming of age, was removed in Martin and Collier counties.

• “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation” was removed in Indian River County schools. The text version of Frank’s book was not banned. The graphic illustrated adaptation contains references to Frank’s sexuality and description of her genitals, which prompted challenges. Both of the references are taken from the published text versions of her diary.

• “Forrest Gump,” Winston Groom’s novel of a mentally challenged man that became a hit 1994 movie starring Tom Hanks, was removed in Collier County because of an explicit sex scene and descriptions of nudity.

• “Atlas Shrugged,” Ayn Rand’s novel about individualism, was removed in Collier County.

• “Many Waters,” the fourth novel in Madeleine L’Engle’s quintet that began with “A Wrinkle in Time,” was removed in Collier County.

Jennifer DeShazo, a Martin County School District spokesperson, confirmed the three books the state report identified as removed in that district are not in circulation there. She said students may bring personal copies to school.

None of the six other books that Pink cited was on the state or Collier County’s list of removals.

PEN America’s definition of ‘ban’ puts the number of removed books higher

PEN America, meanwhile, puts the total number of Florida school districts where those titles were removed or restricted at 17. By its count, “The Kite Runner” was removed from schools in 10 districts; “Bluest Eye,” 12; “The Hate U Give,” 11; and “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation,” four. 

But by PEN America’s standards of what constitutes a “ban,” three other titles qualify, based on its index of school book bans and a press release about Collier County’s removals:

• “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Harper Lee’s 1960 novel that contains racial slurs, was temporarily pulled from Palm Beach County schools for review in July 2022. The book was returned to classrooms with “instructional statements” on how to use the book in the classroom, PEN said.

• “The Hill We Climb,” Amanda Gorman’s poem that was read at President Joe Biden’s inauguration, was banned in Miami-Dade County, PEN America said. PolitiFact reported in May that the book, which had been available to all students, was moved to eighth grade shelves at one school’s library and wasn’t banned countywide. 

• “The Fault in Our Stars,” John Green’s young adult novel about a romance between two cancer-stricken teenagers, was pulled pending an investigation in Clay County. 

A Florida Department of Education spokesperson did not respond to questions about whether the other books Pink listed had been temporarily removed.

“We’re used to ill-informed attacks from California’s liberal elites, and sadly, this is another example,” said Florida Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr., in a statement the spokesperson provided to PolitiFact. He said “several of the books on her list are actually required reading in Florida.” 

Three books Pink cited — “To Kill a Mockingbird,” “1984” and Anne Frank’s “Diary of a Young Girl” — are listed in the department’s guide to Florida’s English Language Arts educational standards as examples of books “by authors whose works comprise a rich literary tradition, a tradition with which all students should become familiar.”

We did not find “A Catcher in the Rye,” “1984” or “Girls Who Code” on lists from the state, Collier County or PEN America. 

Our ruling

Pink claimed in an X post that 13 books “have been banned from schools in Florida.”

Different groups define book bans differently, and no single book she cited was banned statewide. We don’t see any records of Florida schools removing three of the titles Pink listed.

Our review found that seven of the books have been removed from at least one Florida school district’s shelves, according to state and Collier County reports. Using PEN America’s broader definition of a book ban, which includes temporary holds, three more books could be said to have been banned. That means seven to 10 of the 13 books Pink cited could be considered banned.

But Pink’s post could give the impression that these books were fully banned from all Florida schools. In reality, these books were removed from schools in four of the state’s 67 districts by the state’s count, 17 districts by PEN’s count. Pink later clarified that some of the books were banned in one or more Florida school districts.

The original statement contains an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression. We rate Pink’s claim Mostly False.

PolitiFact Staff Writers Amy Sherman and Samantha Putterman contributed to this report.

RELATED: Ron DeSantis said that not ‘a single book’ was banned in Florida. Districts have removed dozens. 

RELATED: Amanda Gorman poem moved to middle school shelves in one library, not banned in Miami-Dade County 

RELATED: Texas teacher fired for assigning illustrated adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary, not the diary itself 

RELATED: Viral list of ‘banned’ books in Florida is satire 

Ties to China are front and center in the rivalry between Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, as the two vie to challenge former President Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination. 

DeSantis has attacked Haley for courting Chinese companies during her 2011 to 2017 tenure as governor. That includes the 2016 recruitment of a Chinese fiberglass company with connections to the Chinese Communist Party.

Haley argued that DeSantis recently did something similar.

“Every governor in the country has tried to recruit Chinese businesses over the last how many years because everybody thought, ‘Oh if we’re nice to China they’ll want to be like us,’” Haley said Nov. 10 on “Fox and Friends.” “And, you know, Ron has spent millions of dollars against me on this when the reality is, yes, 10 years ago I brought a fiberglass company, but he did something six months ago. So what’s his story?”

Haley provided no evidence showing DeSantis was involved in a deal as recent as six months ago.

When contacted for comment, her campaign cited two Chinese-connected companies with operations in Florida: JinkoSolar, a solar panel manufacturer headquartered in Shanghai; and Cirrus Aircraft, which manufactures personal aircraft and is a subsidiary of China’s state-owned Aviation Industry Corp. Her campaign told PolitiFact that DeSantis didn’t stop the companies from moving to or expanding in the state. 

The former came to the state before he was governor, while the latter company did so under an anonymous name, without state incentive dollars. 

Haley campaign cites sanctions, federal raid of Chinese companies

In an email to PolitiFact, Haley’s campaign argued that DeSantis allowed “a sanctioned Chinese-owned aircraft company to expand in Florida one year ago,” a reference to Cirrus, and “a raided Chinese company to expand in Florida six months ago,” referring to JinkoSolar.

Aviation Industry Corp., not the Cirrus subsidiary, was flagged for sanctions by the U.S. government in 2020 because of its connections to China’s military. Cirrus hasn’t been sanctioned or accused of wrongdoing. 

JinkoSolar has operated in Florida since 2018, before DeSantis’ tenure as governor. It already had plans to expand when federal officials issued a search warrant at its facility last spring.

JinkoSolar predates DeSantis, worked with city officials

JinkoSolar opened a Jacksonville factory in 2018 under former Gov. Rick Scott. The city offered JinkoSolar $3.4 million in incentives, with the state adding $800,000 more.

JinkoSolar was poised to receive a $2.3 million grant from the city to expand the company’s operation in 2023. But the city withdrew its proposed funding in June following reports that federal officials served a search warrant at the facility in connection with a Department of Homeland Security investigation. The company said it still plans to expand.

Officials have provided few details about the investigation, but The New York Times reported the probe involves whether the company misrepresented the source of certain imports from China and incorrectly classified the products, resulting in an incorrect duty rate.

State governments typically lack the authority to bar an established business from making operational decisions, unless those businesses are breaking the law. JinkoSolar hasn’t been charged with a crime.

Companies usually need to obtain permits for expansions. And although there could be some behind-the-scenes involvement by state officials to approve or deny requests, local officials handle those decisions.

“The city of Jacksonville or Duval County, they would have approved the current zoning or a rezoning based on the facts of the land,” said Darren Stowe, a former principal planner in Florida with Environmental Consulting & Technology, an environmental and sustainability consulting company. “It’s all on the local level, I can’t see how a state could preempt that.”

A spokesperson for the city of Jacksonville told PolitiFact that it didn’t coordinate with the state on development of the incentive package or retracting it.

Cirrus Aircraft arrived under ‘anonymous’ name

In 2022, Cirrus Aircraft opened two Florida locations, at the Kissimmee Gateway Airport and the Orlando Executive Airport. The latter is about 12 miles from the Naval Air Warfare Center Training Systems Division. 

Never Back Down, the super PAC supporting DeSantis, told PolitiFact that Cirrus came to Florida “of their own accord” under an anonymous project name. 

Aviation Industry Corp., the Chinese state-owned aerospace and defense company that owns Cirrus, manufactures planes, fighter jets and helicopters for the Chinese military. Cirrus, which makes personal aircraft, was founded in Baraboo, Wis., in 1994 before being acquired in 2011 by Aviation Industry Corp. 

PolitiFact did not find any government reports or news stories that mentioned DeSantis’ involvement, or said that he offered the company financial assistance or state incentives. Other fact-checkers reported similar findings. 

Local news reports noted that no city or state economic incentive money was issued in the Kissimmee airport project.

DeSantis’ actions with Enterprise Florida 

Haley’s campaign told us that DeSantis’ actively recruited Chinese investment through Enterprise Florida, the state’s former business-recruitment agency.

DeSantis once chaired the board of Enterprise Florida, but this year he signed legislation to liquidate it and move its contracts and data to the new Commerce Department. The law set up a new organization, Select Florida, to recruit international business.

Enterprise Florida, under DeSantis’ leadership, touted Florida as “an ideal business destination for Chinese companies” in a 2019-20 annual report. The report resurfaced during DeSantis’ presidential run, and the state removed it.

When asked about the removal, DeSantis press secretary Jeremy Redfern said an Oct. 31 Washington Examiner story, which discussed some of Florida’s Chinese contracts, revealed a “large amount of inaccurate and outdated information on a website for an organization that the governor abolished, so it was updated accordingly.” 

DeSantis’ campaign and governor’s office pointed to actions he took as governor to limit Chinese influence in Florida. Redfern told PolitiFact that the governor’s office realized in 2020 the extent of Enterprise Florida’s engagement with Chinese trade and compelled the agency to sever ties.

Our ruling

Haley said that “every governor in the country has tried to recruit Chinese businesses … The reality is, yes, 10 years ago I brought a fiberglass company, but (DeSantis) did something six months ago.”

PolitiFact searched for state incentive deals, news reports and other evidence that would support Haley’s claim and found little to back it. 

Haley’s team cited two Chinese companies operating in Florida. JinkoSolar entered the Florida market in 2018, before DeSantis took office. Cirrus Aircraft expanded in the state in 2022 under an anonymous name. We found no evidence that DeSantis lined up state incentives to aid the companies’ projects. 

We rate Haley’s claim False.

Social media users recently shared a video of a digital advertisement in New York City they claim shows an Israeli ad urging the U.S. to support Israel instead of Ukraine.

The Nov. 14 Instagram video shows a digital billboard with an ad displaying the Ukrainian flag on one side and words that say “Stand with Ukraine” above a red heart on the other. The words “Stand with Israel” then appear on screen and push the words “Stand with Ukraine” down and out of the frame, and the flag changes to an Israeli flag. 

Sticker text on the video read, “The Israeli PR machine has no tact.”

The Instagram post was 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.)

We found multiple posts across social media platforms sharing the video.

The digital billboard in the Instagram video shows it sits atop the Majestic Delicatessen, which is at 200 W. 50th St. on the corner of Seventh Avenue in Midtown Manhattan.

We found that location on the website of Clear Channel Outdoor, an outdoor advertising company that manages that digital billboard and others in or near Times Square.

But the pro-Israel ad never appeared on that billboard.

“The ad is a fake and has never run on our displays,” Clear Channel Outdoor spokesperson Jason King said.

In response to a Nov. 14 X post from a BBC Verify journalist, some social media users shared videos of the same digital billboard showing an advertisement for the movie “Trolls Band Together,” which opened Nov. 17 in theaters. In those videos and the altered Israel video, there is a traditional billboard ad for the “Trolls” movie that sits below the digital screen.

Social media posts have presented New York City’s digital billboards  with altered content before. In September, PolitiFact found a billboard at West 42nd Street and Eighth Avenue in Manhattan was altered to say “Glory to Urine” instead of Ukraine during a visit to the city by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Likewise, the claim that a billboard in New York City shows a “Stand with Israel” billboard ad replacing a “Stand with Ukraine” ad is False.

Editor’s note: This story contains references and links to graphic images and videos.

Social media users recently circulated video footage they claimed shows an Israeli helicopter killing Israelis at an Oct. 7 concert in Israel. 

Stew Peters, a far-right radio host and the filmmaker behind the anti-COVID-19 vaccine films “Died Suddenly” and “Watch the Water,” shared the 14-second video clip on X, formerly Twitter. 

“VIDEO PROVES and ISRAEL ADMITS it slaughtered its own people on Oct. 7th,” Peters wrote Nov. 9. “This attack was NOT made by goat herders on paragliders. Footage from Israeli helicopter shows the IDF killing many people at October 7 concert in Israel. IDF helicopters fired on civilians fleeing the PsyTrance Music Festival.”

Other social media users shared Peters’ post, and it was 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.) We also found this video clip misrepresented on TikTok.

(Screenshot from X)

Peters misleads about what the clip shows. The Israel Defense Forces shared this clip Oct. 9 on X, saying it showed a series of Israeli attacks on Hamas fighters. Hamas fighters attacked concertgoers in Israel on Oct. 7, and more than 200 people were killed, according to Zaka, Israel’s rescue service. 

Asked about his post, Peters referred PolitiFact to a series of news reports — some in Hebrew — that he said document “Israelis killing their own.” The information he sent did not include or appear to mention the video footage he shared on X. 

Peters’ X post linked to an Oct. 30 article from a pro-Palestine media research organization that in turn linked to another Oct. 27 article from The Grayzone, a news organization historically on the political left. The Grayzone story included an embedded X post with the Israeli forces’ video footage, with a caption that said the footage showed Israeli forces “attacking Hamas fighters.” 

We found no evidence to support Peters’ claim that the video clip showed Israeli forces killing people at an Oct. 7 concert in Israel. A group that works to geolocate video footage analyzed the Israel Defense Forces’ video and said it was not filmed at the music festival site.

Where did the video footage originate?

Hamas fighters attacked multiple locations in Israel on Oct. 7, including the Tribe of Nova music festival, where at least 260 people were killed, according to Zaka, Israel’s rescue service. Hamas’ attack at the music festival was documented by victims and journalists and confirmed by global heads of state, including the leaders of France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States.

On Oct. 9, the Israel Defense Forces first posted a video showing this overhead footage on X that, starting at the 2:06 timestamp, shows air strikes followed by clouds of smoke and dust rising; at one point, people are visible before the strike. According to Google’s built-in translation, the Hebrew-language caption read: “Throughout the last day, Air Force planes have been carrying out extensive attacks along the length and breadth of the Gaza Strip, wreaking havoc on Hamas terrorists. In just the last three hours, about 130 targets were attacked using dozens of planes. The focus of the attack: Beit Hanon, Sajaya, Al Furkan and Rimal >>”

An Israeli Defense Forces spokesperson provided a translation that largely matched Google’s. 

We used reverse-image searches, but did not find the video shared online before the Israel Defense Forces’ Oct. 9 post. 

An Israel Defense Forces spokesperson told PolitiFact the video Peters shared matched the video it posted on X and said that it shows Israeli soldiers striking Hamas militants.

(Screenshots from X)

GeoConfirmed, a group that works to geolocate video footage, analyzed the Israel Defense Forces’ video, and concluded it was not filmed at the site of the Nova music festival.  

Our ruling

Peters claimed that video footage “shows the IDF killing many people at October 7 concert in Israel.”

The original video was posted Oct. 9 by Israel Defense Forces, which said it showed the Israeli air force striking Hamas militants following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks in Israel. 

We did not find the video being shared online before the Israel Defense Forces’ Oct. 9 post, and a group that works to geolocate video footage analyzed the Israel Defense Forces’ video and said it was not filmed at the music festival site.

We rate this claim False. 

PolitiFact Researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report.

RELATED: Reports of 260 Israeli music fest deaths aren’t unsubstantiated. Photos, videos document toll

A video starring Elon Musk giving an onstage interview in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, is being misrepresented on social media.

“Elon Musk and the Dubai billionaire have unveiled new software called ‘Quantum AI,’” a narrator says in the video that shows the Tesla CEO’s and another man speaking on a stage before an audience. “They have already invested more than $54 billion in this project.”

Text below the video says: “Elon Musk just revealed his secret in an interview, sending banks into panic and thousands of people flocking to ATMs.” 

And a Nov. 15 Facebook post sharing the video adds to the confusion: “Allegations against Tesla confirmed! The news this morning shocked everyone!”

But it’s all nonsense, and this post was 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.)

The post’s video is from 2017 and has nothing to do with software called Quantum AI. It shows Musk talking to Mohammad Al Gergawi, minister of cabinet affairs for the United Arab Emirates, during a world government summit in Dubai. Musk talked about Tesla’s plan for the emirates. 

We’ve fact-checked previous claims trying to link Musk to Quantum AI, a supposed cryptocurrency software, but have found no evidence that he’s connected. 

We rate claims that Musk and a Dubai billionaire debuted “Quantum AI” — much less that this video shows that happening — False.

Princess Diana died in August 1997 after sustaining injuries in a Paris car crash. But a recent video shared in an Instagram post suggests she’s alive, and in cahoots with former President Donald Trump.

“I think Diana is still alive, she possibly could be with Trump, I don’t know,” a woman in the video says. “She talks in code just like Trump.”

The woman also goes on to point to a Telegram channel “as a little confirmation that I’m onto something” because it’s allegedly run by John F. Kennedy Jr.’s wife, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy. (Both Kennedy and Bessette-Kennedy died in a July 1999 plane crash.) 

It also features clips from old interviews Diana gave, such as one in which she said that she “did a lot of work, well, underground, without any media attention.”

“Royal Secret = Diana is alive,” reads text over the video. “Psyops and secrets are sometimes necessary to keep people alive and keep the plan of saving humanity successful.”

But none of this amounts to credible evidence that a former British royal who has been dead for more than 25 years has been alive and incognito and in touch with Trump. 

A Facebook post sharing the video was 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.)

Diana’s funeral was watched by about 2.5 billion television viewers around the world, and a conspiracy theory in which she remains alive would involve the complicity of her family and the criminal justice system. A jury eventually found that she was killed by the negligent driving of her chauffeur and the paparazzi pursuing the car she was in. 

This claim is unfounded and there’s no evidence to support it. We rate it Pants on Fire!