The Republican presidential primary has three new contenders: former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee; former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina; and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson.
FactChecking Huckabee, Fiorina and Carson
Issues: crime
A ‘Willie Horton’ Ad in Nebraska
Every now and then we see a powerful attack ad that is factually accurate, but makes such a strong appeal to fear that we urge viewers to pause to consider all the facts. That’s the case in Nebraska.
The Rest of Alaska’s Crime Story
A controversial TV ad from Sen. Mark Begich accuses his opponent, former Alaska Attorney General Dan Sullivan, of letting “a lot of sex offenders get off with light sentences” — specifically one ex-con who prosecutors say killed an elderly couple and raped their infant granddaughter in 2013.
Distorting de Blasio’s Words in NYC
A TV ad from Republican New York City mayoral candidate Joe Lhota distorts Bill de Blasio’s words amid violent imagery intending to portray the Democrat as soft on crime.
Biden’s Flint Fiasco, Continued
Murder, rape and robbery are declining in spite of police layoffs in Flint, Mich. — according to the most recent official report released by the State Police. Those and other reported “index” crimes were down 11.5 percent overall during the first six months of this year, compared with the same six-month period last year.
We’ve continued to dig into the statistics for crime-ridden Flint because we caught Vice President Joe Biden misrepresenting them repeatedly as he argued for passage of the administration’s jobs legislation.
Biden’s Whopper in Flint, Mich.
Joe Biden falsely claimed on multiple occasions that the number of reported rapes in Flint, Mich., has skyrocketed since 2008 — providing different accounts at different events that do not square with FBI data.
GAO Report: U.S. Source For “Large Portion” of Mexican Crime Guns
According to a new report issued by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office, the United States is the source for a “large proportion of the firearms fueling Mexican drug violence”:
GAO, June 2009: Available evidence indicates a large proportion of the firearms fueling Mexican drug violence originated in the United States, including a growing number of increasingly lethal weapons. While it is impossible to know how many firearms are illegally trafficked into Mexico in a given year,
WSJ: “GAO Ties U.S. Guns to Mexico Violence”
The Wall Street Journal reports that a new study by the Government Accountability Office says "most firearms recovered in drug violence in Mexico come from the U.S." The WSJ, which obtained and reviewed a draft of the study, says the full report is to be released later today.
This news might seem to confirm the claims made by President Barack Obama and others that "more than 90 percent of the guns recovered in Mexico come from the United States."
Cheney’s Gitmo Recidivism Claims
Former Vice President Dick Cheney used his May 10 appearance on CBS’ "Face the Nation" to, once again, strongly defend the Bush administration’s handling of alleged terrorists taken into U.S. custody. At one point, to back up his characterization of Guantanamo Bay detainees as ultra-bad guys, Cheney claimed that detainees sent home from Gitmo had already demonstrated significant recidivism: "We released hundreds already of the less threatening types. About 12 percent of them, nonetheless, went back into the fight as terrorists."
More on Mexican Guns
After we posted our April 17 story ("Counting Mexico’s Guns") pointing out the absence of data to back up statements from Obama administration officials (including the president), journalists and others that 90 percent of the guns recovered in Mexico come from the U.S, we still had a few questions about the tracing process. At the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), we sat down with Charles Houser, chief of the agency’s National Tracing Center,