President Donald Trump deserted his teleprompter in favor of impromptu musings in a speech at a retreat for House Republicans on Tuesday. And these ad-libbed Trump feedback had been stuffed with false claims.
Trump littered his meandering deal with with not less than 18 inaccurate statements, most of which have been beforehand debunked. Here is a reality examine of a few of his assertions; this isn’t meant as a complete listing of falsehoods.
Murder in Washington, DC: Trump touted final 12 months’s federal takeover of legislation enforcement in Washington, DC, and he falsely claimed the capital hasn’t had a single homicide “in seven months,” although he did be aware the deadly attack that killed a member of the National Guard in November. In reality, there have been dozens of further murders in Washington, DC, in the final seven months, as police statistics and Washington Post tracking present – together with some in the final two weeks. Local police announced final week {that a} man was shot lifeless on December 31, one other man died December 28 after being shot days prior, and a 3rd man had been shot dead on December 27.
Where the capital ranks on crime: Trump additionally falsely claimed, “Washington, DC, is now the safest city in the country.” Crime knowledge knowledgeable Jeff Asher informed NCS in a textual content on Tuesday: “That’s obviously not true.” It’s not but clear the place the capital at present ranks in comparison with each different US metropolis, since crime knowledge takes time to trickle in from round the nation, however it’s abundantly clear that it’s removed from the number-one most secure. Asher stated: “For example, DC has seen a large drop in shootings over the last two years, including potentially a further drop since mid-August, but there have still been over 100 people shot there in the last 4.5 months.”
The Jan. 6 committee and Trump’s speech: On the fifth anniversary of a pro-Trump mob storming the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, Trump falsely claimed that the House of Representatives choose committee that investigated the assault “didn’t report” that, in his speech at a Washington rally previous to the riot, he had urged folks to go to the Capitol “peacefully and patriotically.” In reality, the committee explicitly talked about the “peacefully and patriotically” remark in its official final report — however appropriately famous that this comment was at odds with much of the rest of Trump’s largely combative speech. The report stated: “President Trump used the phrase scripted for him by his White House speechwriters, ‘peacefully and patriotically’ once, about 20 minutes into his speech. Then he spent the next 50-or-so minutes amping up his crowd with lies about the election, attacking his own Vice President and Republican Members of Congress, and exhorting the crowd to fight.”
Pelosi and Jan. 6: Trump falsely claimed that Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who was House speaker at the time of the riot, “was offered 10,000 soldiers, National Guard soldiers, whatever you want – ‘No, I don’t want them.’” He added: “Nancy got caught when her daughter did a documentary” in which, Trump claimed, “She has her mother saying, ‘It’s my fault, I should’ve taken the soldiers.’”
But Pelosi’s filmmaker daughter, Alexandra Pelosi, didn’t movie her saying “I should’ve taken the soldiers.” And there is no such thing as a proof Pelosi ever turned down a Trump supply of 10,000 National Guard troops; it’s the president, not the speaker, who is in cost of the District of Columbia National Guard, so Pelosi wouldn’t have had the energy to reject such a proposal even when she had acquired it, which she has steadfastly stated she by no means did.
In a video recorded by Alexandra Pelosi on January 6 and later obtained by House Republicans, Nancy Pelosi was proven expressing frustration at the insufficient safety at the Capitol, and she stated at one level, “I take responsibility for not having them just prepare for more.” But that common assertion is clearly not a selected admission that she had rejected a Trump supply of 10,000 troops. And in one other a part of the video, she stated, “Why weren’t the National Guard there to begin with?” That query undercuts, moderately than corroborates, Trump’s narrative that Pelosi turned down the National Guard.
The 2020 election: Trump falsely claimed the 2020 election “was rigged.” Trump legitimately misplaced a free and truthful election to Joe Biden.
Trump and Minnesota: While slamming Minnesota as “corrupt,” Trump falsely claimed: “I won Minnesota.” He misplaced Minnesota in all three of the 2016, 2020 and 2024 elections. (He did add moments later in the Tuesday speech that he was “surprised three times” in Minnesota, a doable concession that he had misplaced, however he instructed this was as a result of “those elections are corrupt.” There’s no foundation for that declare.)
Mail-in voting: Trump falsely claimed: “We’re the only country that votes by mail, essentially.” This is fallacious even with the “essentially” qualifier; dozens of nations use mail-in voting, together with Canada, Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and Spain, although the specifics of their insurance policies vary. Trump repeated the declare with out the qualifier moments in a while Tuesday, saying, “We’re the only country that’s stupid enough to vote by mail.”
Jimmy Carter and mail-in voting: Trump falsely claimed of mail-in voting: “Even Jimmy Carter’s commission said, ‘Don’t do it.’” The fee Carter co-chaired was skeptical of mail-in voting, however it didn’t say that mail-in voting shouldn’t be used.
Specifically, the fee’s 2005 report stated that “absentee ballots remain the largest source of potential voter fraud” and are “vulnerable to abuse in several ways.” But the report additionally highlighted how Oregon had efficiently launched safeguards to stop fraud with mail-in voting. The report made suggestions for the safe use of mail-in voting, and it referred to as for “further research on the pros and cons.”
The 2024 election: Trump stated it was “very unfair” that Biden dropped out of the race throughout the 2024 marketing campaign and was changed by then-Vice President Kamala Harris, and Trump claimed, “I was beating Joe by 30 points, and then they changed him.” The “30 points” declare is a large exaggeration. Trump did lead in most nationwide polls taken after Biden’s disastrous efficiency in a June 2024 presidential debate, however polls typically confirmed his lead in the single digits – and generally within the margin of error.
Tom Rice: Trump mocked former Republican Rep. Tom Rice of South Carolina, who misplaced a Republican main in 2022 after voting to question Trump in the wake of the January 6 assault, and Trump stated: “This guy named Rice, he lost by 48 points, right? Remember him?” Rice did lose handily, however Trump vastly exaggerated this margin, too; Russell Fry defeated Rice in the main by about 26.5 points.
Inflation, economy and taxes
Inflation and Biden: Trump falsely claimed he “inherited the greatest inflation in history.” Trump may have pretty stated the year-over-year US inflation rate hit a 40-year high under President Joe Biden in June 2022, when it was 9.1%, however that was not near the all-time record of 23.7%, set in 1920. Trump’s declare was additionally fallacious if he was claiming there was file cumulative inflation over the course of Biden’s presidency; it was lower than half of the cumulative inflation throughout Carter’s presidency. And the year-over-year inflation price had declined to 3.0% by January 2025, the month of Trump’s inauguration.
Prescription drug costs: Trump falsely claimed that he’s decreasing prescription drug costs by “thousands of points, thousands.” He additionally stated, “Depending on the way you calculate it, it could be thousands of percent down; it could also be 90% and 80%. You know, there’s two ways of calculating, I don’t know if you know … but the other way is more accurate.” It’s not. Trump’s declare of a discount of “thousands of percent” is debunked by math itself; a decline of greater than 100 proportion factors would imply that Americans would receives a commission to accumulate their drugs.
Investment in the US: Trump falsely claimed, “We have $18 trillion being invested in the United States.” This determine is fiction. At the time he spoke, the White House’s own website stated the determine was “$9.6 trillion,” and even that may be a main exaggeration; a detailed NCS review in October discovered the White House was counting trillions of {dollars} in imprecise funding pledges, pledges that had been about “bilateral trade” or “economic exchange” moderately than funding in the US, and imprecise statements that didn’t even rise to the stage of pledges.
Tax on Social Security: Trump claimed that he had achieved his 2024 marketing campaign promise of “no tax on Social Security.” The massive home coverage invoice Trump signed in 2025 did create a further, short-term $6,000-per-year tax deduction for people age 65 and older (with a smaller deduction for people incomes $75,000 per 12 months or extra), however the White House itself has implicitly acknowledged that tens of millions of Social Security recipients age 65 and older will proceed to pay taxes on their advantages – and that new deduction, which expires in 2028, doesn’t even apply to the Social Security (*6*).
Gas costs: Trump claimed of gasoline costs: “It’s now $1.99 a gallon in many stations, many stations.” This declare isn’t false, since there’s no agency definition of “many stations,” however context is required: a tiny proportion of US fuel stations had been providing fuel for $1.99 per gallon or much less on Tuesday. Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum evaluation at the agency GasBuddy, stated fuel was being provided for beneath $2 (other than particular reductions) at about 650 out of roughly 150,000 stations the agency tracks – so “about 0.43% of US stations.”
Prisons and “the Congo”: Trump repeated his false declare that the US below Democratic management took in “prisons from the Congo” as migrants. Experts on each the Democratic Republic of Congo and the neighboring Republic of Congo have informed NCS there’s no evidence for Trump’s frequent claims about these nations supposedly emptying prisons to one way or the other get criminals to go to the US; the authorities of every of the nations has told NCS that the claims are baseless; and Trump’s personal presidential marketing campaign and White House workforce have by no means been capable of corroborate the claims.
The Los Angeles wildfires: Trump repeated his baseless suggestion that the Los Angeles wildfires of early 2025 had been affected by California’s use of some water to guard a fish species in the north of the state, saying, “So they cut it off (water) and then they have 25,000 houses burned down.” The wildfires, and efforts to struggle them, had nothing to do with the environmental safety efforts a whole lot of miles to the north, as consultants on California water coverage have lengthy explained.
Olympic boxers and gender: Trump falsely claimed that two 2024 Olympic gold medalists in girls’s boxing who had been the topic of gender-related scrutiny, welterweight champion Imane Khelif of Algeria and featherweight champion Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan, had been males who “transitioned” to feminine. Neither Khelif nor Lin transitioned; as the International Olympic Committee pointed out in 2024, each rivals had been recognized as feminine at delivery and have at all times competed as girls. (A boxing authority with in depth ties to the Russian authorities and a historical past of corruption disqualified Khelif and Lin from a 2023 competitors, claiming {that a} gender eligibility take a look at confirmed they’d “competitive advantages over other female competitors,” however the authority has by no means substantiated the assertion; regardless, it wasn’t an assertion that they “transitioned.”)
Trump’s 2019 name with Zelensky: Trump, talking of the 2019 cellphone name with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that led to his first impeachment, stated, “Thank goodness I had a transcript. Essentially, the call was taped. Because they tape calls, I didn’t even know. ‘So was that call taped?’ ‘Yes sir!’ I said, ‘Oh, well, I don’t even know.’ And we read the transcript, and it was perfect. I told Ukraine not to cheat, and if you see any cheating, report it to the attorney general of the United States.”
There isn’t any identified US tape of the name; presidential calls with international leaders are not typically recorded by the American side. It is true that the White House launched a rough written transcript of the name – however it exhibits that Trump’s description of the name right here is inaccurate by omission. Trump didn’t merely advise Zelensky to report any “cheating” to the US lawyer common; he pressed Zelensky to work with the lawyer common to analyze Biden, then his looming 2020 election opponent.
The tough transcript cites Trump as saying, amongst different issues: “There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it … It sounds horrible to me.” Trump additionally requested Zelensky to take a name from the lawyer common on the topic of a US election conspiracy theory related to a cybersecurity firm, which Trump was urgent Zelensky to “get to the bottom of.”