Our annual recap of the worst falsehoods of the year.
The Whoppers of 2025
Person: Pete Hegseth
Pentagon Inspector General Report Not ‘Total Exoneration’ for Hegseth
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth claimed that he received “total exoneration” in an investigative report by the Defense Department’s Office of Inspector General regarding a Signal group chat about a military attack in Yemen. But the report contradicts that assessment, concluding that Hegseth’s messages “created a risk to operational security that could have resulted in failed U.S. mission objectives and potential harm to U.S. pilots.”
Assessing the Facts and Legal Questions About the U.S. Strikes on Alleged Drug Boats
At least 61 people have been killed in 14 U.S. military strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean since early September. Here, we will address what is known about the targets of the strikes, the trafficking of illicit substances from South and Central America to the U.S., and what experts are saying about the legality of the Trump administration’s escalation of the war on drugs.
Questions Linger About Iran’s Enriched Uranium Stockpile After U.S. Airstrikes
The location of some enriched uranium is still in question after the U.S. bombed three key nuclear facilities in Iran, according to the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency and experts on arms control and global security.
Iranian Nuclear Program Damaged, Not ‘Obliterated’ by U.S. Attack
The bombing of three Iranian nuclear facilities on June 21 by American B-2 aircraft damaged the sites and set back Iran’s nuclear enrichment program, but didn’t completely destroy the sites or Iran’s nuclear capabilities, according to experts we spoke with and a classified U.S. intelligence report released on June 24.
Was the Signal Chat Illegal?
As fallout from a Trump administration group chat about a military attack in Yemen continues to unfold, some Democrats are saying the inadvertent inclusion of a journalist in the chat goes beyond incompetence — they say it was criminal.