Fact checking Trump, supporters at convention
Hope Yen, Amanda Seitz and Calvin Woodward
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump made a dizzying array of misleading claims about voting fraud and health care as fellow Republicans opened their convention with speeches distorting the agenda of his Democratic rival, Joe Biden.
Trump falsely asserted that he was the one who ensured that people with preexisting medical problems will be covered by health insurance; actually that was Democratic President Barack Obama. Several speakers accused Biden of proposing to defund police, ban fracking, take over health care and open borders — none of that true.
A look at statements Monday at the Republican National Convention:
Health care
TRUMP: “We protected your preexisting conditions. Very strongly protected preexisting ... and you don’t hear that.”
THE FACTS: You don’t hear it because it’s not true.
People with preexisting medical problems have health insurance protections because of Obama’s health care law, which Trump is trying to dismantle.
One of Trump’s alternatives to Obama’s law — short-term health insurance, already in place — doesn’t have to cover preexisting conditions. Another alternative is association health plans, which are oriented to small businesses and sole proprietors and do cover preexisting conditions.
Neither of the two alternatives appears to have made much difference in the market.
Meanwhile, Trump’s administration is pressing the Supreme Court for full repeal of the Obama-era law, including provisions that protect people with preexisting conditions from health insurance discrimination.
With “Obamacare” still in place, preexisting conditions continue to be covered by
Voting fraud
TRUMP, on mail-in voting: “Absentee — like in Florida — absentee is good. But other than that, they’re very, very bad.”
THE FACTS: He’s making a false distinction. Mail-in ballots are cast in the same way as absentee mail ballots, with the same level of scrutiny such as signature verification in many states.
In more than 30 states and the District of Columbia, voters have a right to “no excuse” absentee voting. That means they can use mail-in ballots for any reason, regardless of whether a person is out of town or working.
In Florida, the Legislature in 2016 voted to change the wording of such balloting from “absentee” to “vote-by-mail” to make clear that a voter can cast such ballots if they wish. So there is no “absentee” voting in that state, as Trump alludes to.
More broadly, voter fraud has proved exceedingly rare.
Only nine states currently have plans for “universal” mail-in voting, where ballots are sent automatically to registered voters. Five of those states relied on mail-in ballots even before the coronavirus pandemic raised concerns about voting in person.
Police
U.S. REP. STEVE SCALISE of Louisiana on the police: “Joe Biden has embraced the left’s insane mission to defund them.”
THE FACTS: No, Biden has explicitly rejected the call by some on the left to defund the police. He has proposed more money for police, conditioned on improvements in their practices.
Biden’s criminal justice agenda, released long before the protests over racial injustice, proposes more federal money for “training that is needed to avert tragic, unjustifiable deaths” and hiring more officers to ensure that departments are racially and ethnically reflective of the populations they serve.
Specifically, he calls for a $300 million infusion into federal communitypolicing grant programs. That’s more money, not less.
Taxes
RONNA MCDANIEL, chairwoman of the Republican National Committee: “You deserve to know about their plans to raise taxes on 82% of Americans.”
THE FACTS: That’s not the plan. Biden says he won’t raise taxes on anyone making less than $400,000.
An analysis of Biden’s tax plan by the University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Wharton Budget Model in March found that the bottom 90 percent of income earners would not pay more in federal income taxes under Biden’s proposal.