President Bola Tinubu has appointed Kemi Nanna Nandap as the Comptroller-General (CG) of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), effective from March 1.
Nandap’s appointment follows the upcoming expiration of Caroline Wura-Ola Adepoju’s term as CG on February 29.
The appointment was announced on Wednesday in a statement signed by Ajuri Ngelale, the president’s spokesman.
Nandap, who previously served as the Deputy Comptroller-General overseeing the migration directorate, has been entrusted with advancing the ongoing reforms within the NIS.
According to the statement, Tinubu tasked the new CG to “deepen the ongoing reforms in the service and create a robust mechanism for efficient and dedicated service delivery to Nigerians, as well as strengthen the nation’s security through proactive and effective border security and migration management.”
President Tinubu emphasized the need for a robust mechanism that ensures efficient and dedicated service delivery to citizens.
He also charged the new CG with enhancing national security through effective border security and migration management.
Tinubu Names Kemi Nandap? New Comptroller-General Of Immigration is first published on The Whistler Newspaper
Un video en Facebook dice que la NASA dejó de investigar el océano para concentrarse en el espacio, pero esto no es cierto.
“La NASA, en algún punto, La NASA obviamente estaba investigando el mar y dejaron de investigarlo y se fueron para el espacio verdad”, dice la publicación del 20 de febrero. “Yo tengo la razón por la cual ellos decidieron irse para el espacio… Hay una teoría que dice que los mismos ancestros de nosotros creían que había una conexión entre el cielo, las estrellas con el océano”.
El subtítulo del video también dice: “PORQUE LA NASA DEJO DE INVESTIGAR EL OCEANO”.
La publicación fue marcada como parte del esfuerzo de Meta para combatir las noticias falsas y la desinformación en su plataforma. (Lea más sobre nuestra colaboración con Meta, propietaria de Facebook e Instagram).
Pero esta declaración está equivocada.
La NASA se creó en 1958 cuando el presidente de Estados Unidos de ese entonces, Dwight D. Eisenhower, firmó el National Aeronautics and Space Act, luego de que la Unión Soviética lanzara Sputnik, el primer satélite artificial.
Esta agencia federal se creó desde el principio con el interés de investigar el espacio y supervisar las actividades espaciales de Estados Unidos.
Un portavoz de la NASA dijo que lo que se afirma en el video no es cierto. Sin embargo, añadió que la NASA también investiga el océano. La página web de oceanografía de la NASA dice que parte de la misión de la agencia es entender el sistema de la Tierra y sus efectos. Los océanos juegan un papel fundamental en los cambios en el ambiente global, influenciando el clima del mundo y el tiempo.
La agencia también le dijo a PolitiFact que uno de los ejemplos de investigación del océano incluye el lanzamiento el 8 de febrero de su misión PACE, (acrónimo en inglés para Plancton, aerosoles, nubes y ecosistemas oceánicos). Esta recopilará mediciones que ayudarán a la NASA a entender cómo el océano y la atmósfera intercambian dióxido de carbono, medir variables atmosféricas clave asociadas con la calidad del aire y el clima de la Tierra, y vigilar la salud del océano.
El video en Facebook que dice que la NASA estaba investigando el mar y dejó de hacerlo para investigar el espacio, es engañoso. La NASA se creó principalmente para la exploración espacial, pero esta también ha investigado el océano desde sus comienzos.
Así que calificamos la declaración como Falsa.
Lea más reportes de PolitiFact en Español aquí.
Debido a limitaciones técnicas, partes de nuestra página web aparecen en inglés. Estamos trabajando en mejorar la presentación.
A new campaign ad from former President Donald Trump makes two misleading claims about Nikki Haley’s opposition to border policies championed by Trump.
The ad claims Haley, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, “joined Biden in opposing President Trump’s border wall.” In calling for a more comprehensive approach on the border, Haley said in 2015 that “just” building a wall was not going to solve illegal immigration.
The ad further claims that Haley “opposed President Trump’s ban on visitors from terrorist nations.” Haley opposed Trump’s campaign calls in 2015 for a blanket Muslim travel ban, but she supported his more targeted proposal to ban visitors from certain majority-Muslim countries hostile to the U.S.
The ad began airing on Newsmax on Feb. 20, just four days before the Republican primary on Feb. 24 in South Carolina, where Haley served as governor.
The ad cites an article in Time on Feb. 1, 2023, that claimed to document several instances in which Haley “flip-flopped” on Trump, “oscillating from criticizing the 45th President to praising him.”
The story said Haley “slammed his [Trump’s] plan to build a border wall and his other positions on immigration.”
The story quoted Haley at a National Press Club luncheon on Sept. 2, 2015.
“Republicans need to remember that the fabric of America came from these legal immigrants,” Haley said. “If you want to talk about tackling illegal immigration, then let’s talk about it, but we don’t need to attack so many millions of people who came here … and done it the right way, like my parents.”
In that speech, while talking about the need for a comprehensive solution to illegal immigration, Haley did not say that she opposed construction of a border wall, only that building a wall alone was not enough.
“If you notice, they’re all saying, ‘We want to secure the borders.’ That’s a big deal,” Haley said. “What does that mean to you in terms of your commitment to work with Congress to actually secure the border? Don’t say you’re just going to build a wall, because a wall’s not going to do it. You’ve got to have commitment of ground troops, equipment, money, all of that, to bring it together. Then you’re being serious about tackling illegal immigration.”
During a Republican presidential debate in January, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis tried to twist those words — as the Trump campaign ad has — into Haley opposing construction of a border wall.
“I said you can’t just build a wall, you have to do more than build a wall,” Haley said at the debate. “It was having the wall and everything else.”
During her presidential campaign, Haley has advocated building more border wall. During a trip to the border in April 2023, Haley pointed to fencing built by the Trump administration and said, “We need to finish what we started.”
Haley on Travel Ban
The Trump campaign ad also claims that Haley “opposed President Trump’s ban on visitors from terrorist nations.”
The ad refers to comments Haley made in December 2015 about then-candidate Trump’s proposal to ban Muslims from traveling to the U.S.
“It’s just an embarrassment to the Republican Party,” Haley said. “I mean, it’s absolutely un-American, it’s un-constitutional, it defies everything this country was based on. And it is just wrong.”
Days earlier, Trump had issued a “Statement on Preventing Muslim Immigration,” which he read at a Dec. 7, 2015, rally. Trump called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what the hell is going on. We have no choice.” A statement released by Trump’s campaign cited polling that indicated “there is great hatred towards Americans by large segments of the Muslim population.”
After taking office, Trump issued a series of executive orders to follow through on his campaign promise, though none proposed the sweeping reach of that campaign statement. The first, Executive Order 13769 on Jan. 27, 2017, sought a 90-day travel ban on people coming from seven majority-Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Less than a week later, a federal judge halted implementation of the order.
Although it was often referred to as a “Muslim ban” by proponents and opponents alike, the Pew Research Center estimated in January 2017 that the order would affect only about 12% of Muslims in the world.
About a month later, on March 6, 2017, Trump issued a revised executive order, temporarily banning travel from six majority-Muslim countries (this time not including Iraq). That order, too, was initially blocked by the courts, but was ultimately allowed by the U.S. Supreme Court to partially go into effect.
On March 16, 2017, Haley — who had since been appointed by Trump as the ambassador to the United Nations — defended that order, saying “it’s not a Muslim ban,” such as Trump had promised during the campaign, and had nothing to do with religion.
“It’s not a Muslim ban. I will never support a Muslim ban. I don’t think we should ever ban anyone based on their religion,” Haley said in an interview with the “Today” show. “That is un-American. It is not good. What the president is doing, everybody needs to realize that what he’s doing is saying, ‘Let’s take a step back. Let’s temporarily pause.’”
“He’s saying let’s temporarily pause, and you prove to me that the vetting is okay, that I can trust these people coming through for the American people,” Haley said.
On Sept. 24, 2017, Trump issued a proclamation that indefinitely banned travel to the U.S. for many nationals of five majority-Muslim countries as well as Venezuela and North Korea.
The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 on June 26, 2018, that the president had “lawfully exercised the broad discretion granted to him” under the Immigration and Nationality Act to restrict entry to some foreign nationals in order to protect the interests of the United States. The majority found that the proclamation “is facially neutral toward religion.”
As we wrote at the time, none of Trump’s executive actions went as far as his campaign rhetoric.
When he was elected president, Joe Biden revoked all of Trump’s travel ban executive actions. If reelected, Trump has said he will reinstate them.
During a Republican presidential debate on Dec. 6, moderators played a video of Trump at a rally in Iowa on Oct. 16 saying, “No longer will we allow dangerous lunatics, haters, bigots, and maniacs to get residency in our country. We’re not going to let them stay here. If you empathize with radical Islamic, terrorists and extremists, you’re disqualified. You’re just disqualified.”
Asked to respond, Haley said, “Well, I don’t think that you have a straight-up Muslim ban, as much as you look at the countries that have terrorist activity that want to hurt Americans. You can ban those people from those countries, that’s the way we should look at it is which countries are a threat to us.
“You look at what came across the southern border, what worries me the most are those that came from Iran, from Yemen, from Lebanon, those areas where they say death to America,” Haley said. “That’s where you want to be careful. It’s not about a religion, it’s about a fact that certain countries are dangerous and are threats to us. A president has one job, and that’s to keep Americans safe. And that’s what we’ve got to do is make sure that we have good national security in that process, and that’s the way you should look at it, is where the terrorist threats are, how we’re going to deal with it and what we’re doing about it.”
So, while the ad claims Haley “opposed President Trump’s ban on visitors from terrorist nations,” that’s not accurate. Haley opposed Trump’s blanket campaign call for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” When, as president, Trump issued an executive order to restrict travel from six majority-Muslim countries — not all Muslims — in order to “protect its [U.S.] citizens from terrorist attacks,” Haley supported that.
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The Warriors’ first game out of the All-Star break against the Lakers will be much less glamorous than anticipated.
LeBron James (left ankle peroneal tendinopathy) is listed as out for Thursday night’s Lakers-Warriors matchup in the Chase Center.
James, 39, played 14 minutes in the All-Star Game on Sunday. The Lakers are currently 1.5 games ahead of the Warriors for ninth place in the Western Conference standings.
Each of the final 29 games are crucial for the Warriors, who need to jump several teams in the standings to escape the play-in round. In the team’s first film session after the All-Star break, Warriors coach Steve Kerr displayed the West standings to remind them what’s at stake.
“I think Steve told us today that we’re 23-3 in our last 26 playoff series,” rookie guard Brandin Podziemski said. “So, we’ve got the utmost confidence that we can beat any team, no matter the seed, in a seven-game series. Once you get above that seven mark, you’re guaranteed at least four games. So we’re not really focused on seven-eight-nine-10, we’re looking at number six and number five.”
Their quest for a true playoff berth will begin with James — who’s averaging 24.8 points, 7.2 rebounds and 7.8 assists in his 20th season — on the sideline. Chris Paul, who’s recovering from hand surgery, will also miss the contest but is nearing a return.
Paul was a full participant in Golden State’s Wednesday practice, including 5-on-5 work, Kerr said. The veteran point guard has missed the past 18 games, but his return is on the horizon.
“He’s getting close,” Kerr said. “He’s feeling really good, he played a lot over the All-Star break, he told me. The next step is for the training staff to get a feel for where he is conditioning-wise and just making sure everything is set for him to be out there.”
Even with some much-needed rest, the Warriors will need as many bodies as they can to get through the home stretch. Their 29 games remaining is tied for the most in the league, and they open their second half with seven games in 11 days.
James’ absence to start off the run should ease the Warriors into post All-Star life, but that won’t mean it’ll be easy. Basketball Reference’s playoff probabilities report gives the Warriors an 86.4% chance at claiming a seed between seven and 10, which would put them at risk of playing do-or-die games to earn a standard playoff series.
“We’re in 10th,” Kerr said. “We’ve been on a good run, but we’ve got to carry that forward. And there’s no reason why we can’t keep winning and do what we did a year ago, which was climb up the standings and put ourselves in a favorable position for the playoffs.”
Buzzer-beaters
The Warriors are reportedly converting Lester Quinones’ two-way contract into a standard one and backfilling the roster with former college lacrosse superstar Pat Spencer on a two-way deal, but the team hasn’t made either move official. The deadline to convert Quinones is Thursday, so both moves are likely imminent.Spencer, who starred at Loyola on the lacrosse field before transferring to Northwestern to play hoops, has been with the Warriors organization for the past two seasons. He isn’t expected to play this year because of a season-ending wrist fracture suffered on Jan. 27. Still, count rookie center Trayce Jackson-Davis as a fan.“Amazing teammate,” Jackson-Davis said. “Hard, hard worker. So those are two things that you can control, and that’s what he controls very well. Having him up here as another dude that’s going to be a great teammate and show leadership, that’s going to be great.”
According to sports business outlet Sportico, the Warriors franchise has vaulted into the second most valuable in the world, at $8.2 billion. In 2009, Steph Curry’s rookie season, the franchise was valued at an estimated $315 million.For as much credit as team owner Joe Lacob deserves for consistently spending on payroll — and he deserves a lot — the Curry Effect makes a world of difference.
The Warriors’ decision to move Klay Thompson to the bench might not end up being permanent, but all signs point to them continuing with the Curry-Podziemski-Kuminga-Wiggins-Green starting lineup for now.“I think with the starting five, I think Brandin’s skill set is very complementary to JK and Wiggs, in particular,” Kerr said. “Rebounding, taking charges, moving the ball, cutting. It seems to unlock that group really well. The numbers show it, the eye test shows it. And so I really like this idea going forward of that starting five. We’re going to get Chris Paul back, and Chris Paul and Klay Thompson coming off the bench — that’s pretty good.”
In his first game coming off the bench, Thompson dropped 35 points in 28 minutes against the Jazz. He referenced Manu Ginobili in his postgame comments as someone who disregarded ego and embraced his bench role. Kerr added Warriors great Andre Iguodala as a model of a player who can come off the bench and make a great impact, even winning a Finals MVP.
Thompson’s move to the bench is bound to hit occasional rough spots. The future Hall of Famer rarely seems to hide his emotions, both on the court and with the media. A cold shooting night could lead to limited minutes, and he’ll have to learn how to bounce back from that mentally.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Kerr said. “Everybody’s going to have to sacrifice and understand it may not be their night that particular night. I love our guys, I love the chemistry they have together. I think we can make a really good push this way.”
Regina King as Shirley Chisholm in “Shirley.” (Glen Wilson/Netflix via CNN Newsource)
By Rashad Walker, CNN
(CNN) — Regina King runs for the White House in her next project.
The Academy Award-winning King stars as political trailblazer Shirley Chisholm in a newly released Netflix trailer for the biopic, “Shirley.” The movie chronicles Chisholm’s historic 1972 bid to become president, the first Black candidate to seek a major party’s nomination for the White House.
“I’m paving the road for a lot of other people looking like me to get elected,” King as Chisholm says in the preview.
Long before her bid for the presidency, Chisolm was already a history-making lawmaker as the first Black woman elected to the US Congress in 1968. She represented New York’s 12th congressional district for seven terms.
“Shirley” is written and directed by John Ridley. King and Ridley previously collaborated on the limited series “American Crime,” for which she won two Emmy Awards.
King told Harper’s Bazaar that “Shirley” took nearly fifteen years to come to fruition. The film’s release heading into another presidential election is intentional.
“Instead of trying to release it during any normal cycle, we thought, wouldn’t it be more impactful to release it during a presidential election year?” King said. “As a team, we felt that is probably the best way we could possibly honor Shirley: to release her in a space that she created for herself.”
Lucas Hedges, André Holland, Christina Jackson, Terrence Howard and the late Lance Reddick also star in the film.
“Making the decision to run for president as a Black woman in those times, it really made people think, ‘Is she crazy?’ But if you want to call it crazy, then crazy is a good thing,” King added.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) signed a bill Wednesday allowing public officials to refuse to perform same-sex marriages.
State lawmakers approved Tennessee House Bill 878 last week. The legislation states people “shall not be required to solemnize a marriage” if they refuse to doing so based on their “conscience or religious beliefs.” According to the Tennessee Legislature website, the governor signed the bill Wednesday.
Lee has not publicly commented on the bill yet per his social media and his office’s website.
The bill does not allow officials to deny marriage licenses to couples based on their beliefs but prevents officials from being required to solemnize a marriage. The State House first passed the bill in March 2023, but the State’s General Assembly booted it to 2024 for consideration.
Lee was thrown into the spotlight last year after signing a bill that became the first-in-the-nation restriction on drag performances, and banned gender-affirming health care for transgender youth. A federal judge later ruled that the restrictions on drag shows were unconstitutional.
The legislation has faced some criticism from LGBTQ advocacy organizations. Molly Whitehorn, associate director of regional campaigns for the Human Rights Campaign, said last week the bill was “intended to exclude LGBTQ+ folks from equal protection under the law.”
Tennessee Republicans argued that the bill was not meant to discriminate against same-sex couples or prevent them from getting married. State Sen. Mark Pody (R), the bill’s primary sponsor in the Senate, said on the Senate floor last week that the bill has “nothing to do with getting a license.”
The Hill has reached out to Lee’s office for further comment.
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The presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the 2023 presidential election, Peter Obi on Wednesday night lambasted the police for what he called “distasteful and humiliating” arrest of the National Chairman of the party, Julius Abure.
Obi, in a statement he shared on social media said the manner in which Abure was arrested left much to be desired, pointing out that such had no place in a civic space.
THE WHISTLERreported that Abure was, on Wednesday in Benin City, Edo State, arrested alongside Kelly Ogbaloi, the Labour Party chairman in Edo State.
Tijani Momoh, spokesperson of the police for Zone 5, confirmed the arrest explaining that Abure was arrested over a petition in a case of attempted murder, conspiracy to commit dangerous harm.
“I wish to confirm the arrest of the factional chairman of the Labour Party, Mr Julius Abure, and I think three or four others due to a written petition that was endorsed to the AIG Benin from the office of the inspector-general of police,” Momoh had said.
But Obi frowned at the manner of his arrest saying, “Like many Nigerians, I observed the distasteful national television news reports detailing the humiliating arrest of the National Chairman of the Labour Party, Barrister Julius Abure, earlier today in Benin City, Edo state.”
He pointed out that, “Throughout my roles as a private individual, public figure, Governor, and Presidential candidate, I consistently advocated for the paramount importance of upholding the rule of law in any sane society.
“I firmly believe that, as citizens, we are all duty-bound irrespective of our status in society to respond to invitations from properly constituted authority. My stance on this matter remains unwavering but does not explain watching the distressing image of our National Chairman lying on the ground in the name of arrest.”
The former Anambra State Governor further described the arrest as an “act” that “is undesirable, demeaning and unequivocally intolerable and must be condemned by any decent and civilised mind within the context of our present civic landscape in Nigeria.
“These deplorable actions epitomise the pinnacle of rascality and serve to egregiously tarnish the already regrettable perception of our nation as one plagued by lawlessness.
“Such behaviour must not only be denounced but also actively addressed to uphold the principles of justice and respect for the dignity of the individual within our society.
“Regarding the circumstances surrounding Mr. Abure’s arrest, it is crucial to emphasise that while constitutional authorities must be allowed to execute their statutory functions, officers must adhere to due process, civility, decency and established arrest procedures, embody civility, decorum, respect for the dignity and rights of citizens, and, above all, the presumption of innocence before the law.”
He stressed that, “It is crucial to emphasise that as a leader within the Labour Party, Mr. Abure represents, both personally and statutorily, as the incumbent Chairman of the LP, the face of political opposition in Nigeria.
“Most importantly, political Parties are institutions of democratic statehood and ought to that extent be accorded due respect.
“It is imperative to reiterate that no pretext or subterfuge should be employed to stifle Nigeria’s political opposition. Therefore, I urge that he should be granted bail based on his status while the investigation of his alleged offence continues,” Obi added.
Peter Obi Lambasts Police For ‘Humiliating’ Arrest Of LP National Chairman Julius Abure is first published on The Whistler Newspaper
Former President Donald Trump compared his civil fraud fine with the punishment of Russian opposition leader Alexei A. Navalny, who died Feb. 16 in a Russian prison.
In a Feb. 20 Fox News town hall, host Laura Ingraham asked how Trump will put up the money for the almost half-billion-dollar fine.
“It is a form of Navalny, it is a form of communism or fascism,” Trump replied.
Earlier in the show, Trump also called Navalny’s death a “very sad situation” and described him as “brave.” Then he pivoted to his legal cases, describing himself as a similar target of political persecution.
“It’s a horrible thing. It’s happening in our country, too,” said Trump. “I’m the leading candidate. I never heard of being indicted before. I got indicted four times. I have eight or nine trials. All because of the fact that I’m — and you know, this all because of the fact that I’m in politics.”
Trump made similar comments days earlier, on his Truth Social platform, comparing his legal woes with what happened to Navalny and likening President Joe Biden to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“The sudden death of Alexei Navalny has made me more and more aware of what is happening in our Country,” he said on Truth Social Feb. 19, describing “unfair courtroom decisions.”
We considered not rating Trump’s statement comparing his civil case with Navalny’s situation; we recognize that in speechmaking and political rhetoric, there is license for hyperbole.
But after examining the foundation of Trump’s comparison between his legal troubles and the prosecution of a Putin dissident under an authoritarian regime, and after speaking to six experts in Russian history, politics and the U.S. legal system, we determined there were enough factual elements at play to rate his statement on the Truth-O-Meter.
We emailed Trump’s spokespeople to ask for his evidence and got no reply by our deadline.
The evidence comes down to this: Navalny led protests against an authoritarian regime and returned to his country knowing he was a target and landed in prison. Trump was found by a judge to have inflated his real estate assets and has the legal right to appeal.
“If Biden’s staff oversaw an effort to poison Trump on a campaign trip, and then when he recovered arranged for him to be sent to a prison camp in northern Alaska, and then when he died told (his wife) Melania she would be arrested if she tried to enter the U.S., his complaint might be more convincing,” said Stephen Sestanovich, a senior fellow for Russian and Eurasian studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Navalny lacked due process protections afforded to Trump
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny stands in a cage Feb. 20, 2021, in the Babuskinsky District Court in Moscow. (AP)
Navalny, 47, was an attorney, an anti-corruption activist and a critic of Putin’s. In 2011, he led thousands of Russians in protesting falsified elections. In 2017, he was barred from running for president after a Russian court convicted him of fraud, charges that were condemned by the European Union, European Parliament and Amnesty International.
In 2020, while flying, Navalny became ill and was taken to Germany for treatment; the German government said he was poisoned by a chemical weapon developed by the Soviet Union. Months after he was poisoned, he flew back to Russia, where he was arrested and was sentenced to two years in prison after authorities said he repeatedly violated parole. Amnesty International designated him a “prisoner of conscience,” stating “has not been imprisoned for any recognizable crime, but for demanding the right to equal participation in public life for himself and his supporters, and for demanding a government that is free from corruption.”
In 2023, Navalny was sentenced to 19 years in prison for the charge of “extremism.” Human Rights Watch called it “totally unfounded” and said that “the Russian authorities have abandoned any pretense of justice in dealing with dissenters.”
On Feb. 16, Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service said Navalny died. The next day, a spokesperson for him confirmed his death. Observers believe Navalny died as a result of his incarceration although the specific reasons are not yet known.
Meanwhile, after a trial, Judge Arthur Engoron ruled Feb. 16 that Trump had inflated the value of many of his real estate assets to “make more money.” One example: The judge found that Trump had claimed the Trump Tower penthouse was three times the size.
Trump and his companies and others involved in his business empire owe about $450 million including interest. New York Attorney General Letitia James filed the case.
Some differences between Trump’s civil case and the cases against Navalny, according to experts we interviewed:
Trump has not been barred from political office and is running for the U.S. presidency, on track to win the Republican nomination. Navalny was barred from running. Several cases have been filed seeking to remove Trump from the ballot as a result of his actions leading up to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump has had due process to fight those efforts, and the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments Feb. 8.
Trump has not been poisoned or imprisoned, although he faces charges that carry potential prison time. His penalty in the civil case involves paying money and he is banned from serving as an officer or director of a New York corporation for three years.
Trump has been allowed access to a full legal defense team to challenge the judge’s motions, bring forward expert testimony and file an appeal.
The “extremism” charge on which Navalny was convicted doesn’t exist in the United States.
Internationally, the U.S. justice system has checks and balances and has rules that require it operate independently from the executive branch. Putin has power and control over Russia’s justice system.
Navalny was not afforded the due process protections that Trump has had in the New York fraud case.
“Navalny was repeatedly poisoned and then imprisoned for exposing corruption,” said Harley Balzer, an expert on Russian and Soviet social history at Georgetown University. “He had documents, interviews with insiders and photos to prove his allegations. He even had a tape of a conversation with one of the people who ordered one of the poisonings. None of the evidence used in the trials where Navalny was convicted was substantive.”
Navalny in 2020 released the phone call he said he made to a security operative. The man in the recording said he was involved in cleaning up Navalny’s clothes “so that there wouldn’t be any traces.”
Engoron found that Trump committed fraud. The four criminal cases against Trump remain pending trial: two pertain to election interference, while one relates to his possession of classified documents post-presidency and the other case alleges he paid off a porn star.
“He has remained a free man with the right to full access to counsel, the right to travel across the country and campaign for political office, and has remained protected by his Secret Service detail,” said Erik Herron, a political scientist specializing in Russia at West Virginia University.
“These are rights that were not extended to Navalny.”
The United States has an independent judiciary to rule on the cases and a jury to ensure impartiality whereas Navalny was prosecuted in a country without the rule of law or independent courts, said Ric Simmons, Ohio State University law professor.
“Trump has also stated that the criminal cases against him are politically motivated — as the case against Navalny was — but given the procedural protections in this country (which do not exist in Russia), political prosecutions are very rare,” Simmons said. “There will be no way of convicting Trump of any of these crimes unless the prosecutors can prove every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt using admissible evidence that is found to be credible by an impartial jury, regardless of the political motivations of any of the prosecutors.”
University of Chicago political science professor Scott Gehlbach said that given the conditions under which Navalny died, lacking due process and enduring isolation and torture for what he called “trumped-up charges,” Trump’s citation of his civil fraud case “is an insult to Alexei Navalny, to his family, and to the millions of Russians who mourn his passing.”
Putin has used the courts to target his critics and arrest political dissidents. Authorities have introduced restrictions on peaceful assembly and freedom of expression. Torture of prisoners is common. In 2022, Navalny was placed in a punishment cell multiple times in degrading conditions for “violations” of prison rules, such as “wearing the wrong clothes,” according to Amnesty International.
“In a communist or fascist regime the top political leadership tells the judge what verdict it wants,” Sestanovich said.
In the U.S. system, the judges are independent and the proceedings are public, Balzer said.
Kathryn Hendley, a professor of comparative politics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told The Wall Street Journal of Russia’s system “when they really care about something they have no trouble using the law as a blunt instrument,” she said, forbidding criticism of the war or public gatherings. “The Russian criminal justice system is incredibly sticky — once you are in, it’s very, very hard to get out.”
Even if Trump’s fraud fine stands, or if he is convicted in any of the criminal cases, his case bears no legal similarities to Navalny’s.
“Trump may end up poorer, or subjected to probation or a short prison sentence — but he won’t be sent to the Arctic and killed,” said Mark Osler, University of St. Thomas law professor.
Our ruling
Trump said the fine in his New York fraud case “is a form of Navalny, it is a form of communism or fascism.”
Although Trump is embroiled in numerous legal battles, his civil case involved a fine, not imprisonment, not poisoning, not subjugation to a legal system dominated by an authoritarian regime.
Trump is free to express outrage about the fine and a New York judge’s ruling against him. He is free to speak against the government. He is free to hire lawyers. He is free to appeal his cases. He is free to travel the country while he campaigns for president.
Navalny was blocked from running for public office. He was poisoned by a chemical weapon that the German government said was developed by the Soviet Union. He was convicted in Russia and sentenced to prison largely on the charge of “extremism” which does not exist in the United States. Numerous human rights organizations including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said the cases against Navalny were unjust and that Russia was crushing dissent. Navalny died in prison under conditions that have not been fully explained.
Trump has been given due process in the fraud case and has the legal right to appeal. The federal government has not tried to kill Trump, who is running for president of the United States.
We rate this statement Pants on Fire!
RELATED: Fact-check: Trump’s baseless claim that Biden directed the New York civil fraud investigation
RELATED: Lie of the Year 2022: Putin’s lies to wage war and conceal horror in Ukraine
PolitiFact researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this fact-check.
In a Feb. 20 town hall in South Carolina that aired on Fox News, days before the state’s Republican primary, former President Donald Trump repeated several false and misleading claims we’ve fact-checked before.
Trump and Ingraham at the Greenville Convention Center on Feb. 20. Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images.
He also claimed, contrary to Russia’s track record, that Russian President Vladimir Putin would prefer President Joe Biden to win reelection.
The most newsworthy item from the town hall was Trump comparing the civil lawsuits and criminal indictments against him to Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader who died this month in a Russian prison.
Biden has blamed Putin for Navalny’s death; Trump did not, when given the opportunity at the town hall. Instead, Trump said Navalny’s death was “a very sad situation” and “horrible,” and then called the civil fraud case in New York against Trump “a form of Navalny,” similar to a comparison the former president had made on social media. It’s not comparable, but we’ll leave that for political and legal commentators to parse.
The town hall, held in Greenville, aired on Laura Ingraham’s show.
Putin’s Preferred Candidate?
In a discussion about U.S. presidents negotiating with foreign leaders, Trump said he thinks the leaders of North Korea, China and Russia would prefer if Biden won reelection.
“Well, they want him very badly to be president,” he said. “I’m sure a lot of money’s being spent between Russia and China. No question with China. Russia, too.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin has claimed that he would prefer Biden to remain president, but Russia’s track record suggests otherwise. As we have written before, U.S. officials uncovered evidence that Russia undertook covert operations in support of Trump’s campaigns in 2016 and 2020.
More recently, the Department of Justice on Feb. 15 indicted a former FBI informant, Alexander Smirnov, for lying to the FBI in 2020, when Smirnov claimed that Joe Biden and his son Hunter each received a $5 million bribe from a Ukrainian company, while Joe Biden was vice president. In a Feb. 20 court filing, the Justice Department alleged that Smirnov has ties to Russian intelligence officials and his “efforts to spread misinformation about a candidate of one of the two major parties in the United States continues.”
“He is actively peddling new lies that could impact U.S. elections after meeting with Russian intelligence officials in November,” the court filing said.
There is no evidence that North Korea or China has engaged in covert operations in support of either candidate. However, as we have written, U.S. intelligence officials assessed in 2020 that “China prefers that President Trump … not win reelection,” based on its “public rhetoric” at the time that was critical of the Trump administration.
Wrong on Special Counsel Report About Biden
Trump claimed that the special counsel report on Biden’s handling of classified documents said of the president, “Look, he’s incompetent to go to court, but he can be president.” As we wrote recently when several Republican House leaders made the same claim, the report said no such thing.
The report did refer numerous times to what it characterized as Biden’s “limited” and “poor” memory. But those observations were only included, Special Counsel Robert Hur wrote, because they factored into his decision about whether he could convince a jury that Biden had acted “willfully” to break the law. Hur further posited that Biden’s age and memory might make him a more sympathetic witness, causing a jury to give him the benefit of the doubt.
There were several other factors listed by Hur that convinced him it would be difficult to prove criminal charges against Biden.
Mail-in Voting
Trump continues to claim, without evidence, “If you have mail-in voting, you automatically have fraud.” As we have written, there is no evidence to support claims about large-scale, mail-in voter fraud. While the instances of voter fraud via mail-in ballots are more common than in-person voting fraud, experts have told us the number of known cases is relatively small.
“States can and do take steps to minimize the risks, especially given the great benefits of convenience — and now safety — from the practice,” Richard L. Hasen, a professor of law and political science at the University of California, Irvine School of Law, and author of “The Voting Wars,” told us via email in 2020.
As Ingraham noted in the town hall, there’s mail-in voting in Florida, a state that Trump won handily in 2020. Trump himself hasvoted by mail in Florida, and while he claims it’s safe there because Republican governors run it “extremely professionally,” we noted in 2020 that Florida handles mail-in ballots the same way as the other 33 states that allow mail-in voting without a reason.
Federal, state and local officials overseeing the nation’s voting system called the 2020 election “the most secure in American history,” and Trump’s own attorney general, William Barr, stated that U.S. attorneys and the FBI “have not seen fraud on a scale that could have affected a different outcome in the election” — contrary to Trump’s repeated false claims about widespread fraud costing him the election.
Ukraine Aid Exaggerations
When comparing U.S. and European aid to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia, Trump claimed, “We’re in for over $200 billion. They’re in for $35 billion. … It’s a difference of $150 billion. They’ve got to start paying up.”
We don’t know where Trump gets $200 billion in U.S. aid to Ukraine; Congress has approved about $113 billion in emergency funding related to the Ukraine-Russia war. Roughly $67 billion of that was for military aid, and the rest was for “nondefense concerns such as general Ukrainian government aid, economic support, and aid for refugee resettlement,” according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
As for $35 billion in aid from Europe, Trump may be referring to only bilateral military aid that has been allocated by European Union members and institutions, according to figures from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a German research group that publishes the Ukraine Support Tracker. The military figure is about $44 billion for all of Europe, including European nations not in the EU.
For a direct comparison, the Kiel Institute says the U.S. has allocated over $47 billion in bilateral military aid for Ukraine, as of Jan. 15. However, in total, including financial and humanitarian assistance, the Kiel Institute says Europe has allocated more than the U.S. — about $96 billion in bilateral aid, compared with almost $73 billion from the U.S.
“The data show that total European aid has long overtaken U.S. aid – not only in terms of commitments, but also in terms of specific aid allocations sent to Ukraine,” members of the institute wrote in a Feb. 16 update.
The Kiel Institute’s figures for the U.S. are lower than the congressionally authorized totals because the institute says some of the approved funding is not bilateral aid, meaning it’s not a direct government-to-government transfer of funds.
Immigration Bill Did Not ‘Allow’ 5,000 Migrants a Day
Asked why he opposed a bipartisan immigration bill that failed in the Senate, Trump wrongly said it would have “allow[ed] … 5,000 people a day.”
As we wrote recently when other Republican leaders made a similar claim, he is referring to a section of the bill that would have provided emergency authority to the administration to “summarily remove” people who cross into the U.S. illegally between ports of entry, even if they are seeking asylum. That authority would have been automatically activated if there was an average of 5,000 or more migrant encounters a day over seven consecutive days — or if there were 8,500 or more such encounters on any single day.
But as Republican Sen. James Lankford, one of the architects of the bill, explained, “It’s not that the first 5,000 are released, that’s ridiculous. The first 5,000 we detain, we screen and then we deport. If we get above 5,000, we just detain and deport.”
“The reason we’re doing that is because we want to be able to shut down the system when it gets overloaded, so we have enough time to process those asylum claims,” said Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats.
More Repeats
Biden’s houses. Similar to a claim he made back in 2020, Trump suggested that Biden has financially benefited from his son Hunter’s foreign business dealings because, “he’s got a lot of houses all over the place and he’s never been paid more than about $179,000, I guess is the top.” Biden owns two houses, including a vacation home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. As many politicians do, Biden earned a significant amount of money after he left office in January 2017 on speaking fees and a book tour.
Biden and his wife, Jill, were worth an estimated $9 million in 2019, according to Forbes, which put the value of their two homes at $4 million combined. A Washington Post story the same year detailed how Biden “reaped millions in income since leaving the vice presidency.”
Tariffs on China. As he has done numerous times in the past, Trump falsely claimed that the U.S. did not collect any tariffs on goods from China — until he took office. “Not one other president took in 10 cents,” he said. In fact, the U.S. collected billions in tariffs on Chinese imports years before Trump took office.
Illegal immigration. He claimed that immigrants were “coming in from jails and mental institutions,” adding: “They’re emptying out their prisons.” This echoes his prior claims that countries around the world are “emptying out their prisons, insane asylums and mental institutions and sending their most heinous criminals to the United States.” Immigration experts told us there’s simply no evidence for that. One expert said Trump’s claim appeared to be “a total fabrication.”
Southern border. Apprehensions of those trying to cross the U.S. southern border illegally have gone up substantially under President Joe Biden. But Trump was again wrong to say, “I had the safest border in the history of our country. Recorded history, because I can’t tell you about a thousand years ago, but recorded history of the border by far.” After dropping in 2017, Trump’s first year in office, apprehensions then rose. The total number of apprehensions was higher during Trump’s presidency than either of President Barack Obama’s four-year terms.
Border wall. “We built 571 miles of border wall and that’s what made our border so good,” Trump said. There were 458 miles of “border wall system” built during Trump’s term. Most, 373 miles, was replacement barriers for primary or secondary fencing that was dilapidated or outdated, according to a January 2021 Customs and Border Protection status report.
Gasoline prices. As we’ve written, economists cite several reasons for rising inflation in 2021 and 2022, first and foremost the unprecedented circumstances created by the COVID-19 pandemic. As for energy, the price of crude oil is set on the global market, and it began increasing toward the end of 2020 primarily, experts say, because the worldwide demand for oil began to exceed the international supply.
Yet, Trump suggested that Biden’s policies were to blame for higher energy costs, saying that Biden had “admitted everything about energy” in a 2020 debate. “And that’s what actually happened, and that’s why your energy costs went up three and four times. We had $1.87 and he was up to $5, $6, $7,” incorrectly referring to the price of gasoline. The average price of regular gasoline was as low as $1.77 under Trump, in April 2020 during the pandemic, but it was $2.38 when he left office. Under Biden, the price per gallon peaked at $5 in June 2022, but the latest price is $3.27, according to the Energy Information Administration.
Economy. No matter how many times he says it, the U.S. didn’t have “the greatest economy in the history of the world” under Trump’s presidency. Economists look to real (inflation-adjusted) GDP growth to measure economic health, and that figure exceeded Trump’s peak year of 3% growth more than a dozen times before he took office.
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