January 2019

Is Nathan Phillips Lying About His Military Service in Order to Raise Money?

Disinformation, Fact Checks / By /

In the wake of the days-long Covington Catholic controversy, rumors spread about its central figures, Native American rights activist Nathan Phillips of the Omaha Nation and student Nick Sandmann. As the story continued to unfold, pushed along by a toxic social media brew of rumors, backtracking, and the usual swarms of bots and paid trolls, claims appeared about Phillips …

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Was Activist Nathan Phillips in a Skrillex Video About ‘Attacking Police’?

Disinformation, Fact Checks / By /

After a mid-January 2019 Covington Catholic controversy made Native activist Nathan Phillips and student Nick Sandmann virally famous, dueling narratives struggled in a public narrative muddied by smears. Phillips was quickly accused by Big League Politics of “attacking police” in a video for the Skrillex and Damien Marley song “Make It Bun Dem,” despite the video …

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Did a Covington Catholic Student’s Mother Tweet That She Wished Natives Received More ‘Smallpox Blankets’?

Disinformation, Fact Checks / By /

In the middle of the Covington Catholic controversy on January 21 2019, rumors circulated that Julie Sandmann (mother of Nicholas Sandmann) had published a tweet wishing “smallpox blankets” had killed additional Native Americans. Julie Sandmann’s name entered the story when the outlet Heavy.com reported making initial contact with her about her son, Nicholas Sandmann. Not …

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Is This a Picture of Covington Catholic Students in Blackface Harassing a Basketball Player?

Fact Checks, Viral Content / By /

During an uproar following a viral video of Covington Catholic students surrounding a Native American man at the National Mall on January 19 2019, allegations surfaced that students from that institution had been photographed in blackface. On January 21 2019, the Facebook page “The Other 98%” shared a status update and image purportedly demonstrating sanctioned blackface …

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Did the President Tweet in Support of a Covington Catholic Student?

Disinformation, Fact Checks / By /

On January 19 2019, Covington Catholic student Nick Sandmann was named in a viral video after a clip of his interaction with Native American activist Nathan Phillips at the National Mall spread across social media. In the ensuing controversy, a tweet attributed to U.S. President Donald Trump spread in screenshots on social media: The purported tweet said: …

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Is Facebook Removing Inactive Members from Groups?

Fact Checks, Viral Content / By /

In January 2019, various posts appeared in myriad Facebook groups urging users to provide engagement with the post to avoid a purported purge of “inactive members.” Iterations of the same warning spread across Facebook groups of all types: Y’ALL, FB IS DELETING INACTIVE PEOPLE OUT OF GROUPS. IF YOU SEE THIS COMMENT AN EMOJI, PLEASE …

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Did Texas Ranchers Find ‘Prayer Rugs’ Near the U.S.-Mexico Border?

Disinformation, Fact Checks / By /

Amid a flurry of headlines about the government shutdown and Michael Cohen on January 18 2019, President Donald Trump tweeted a highly dubious claim that ranchers on the southern United States border had found “prayer rugs” as part of a plea to fund his plan to build a wall to separate the U.S. from Mexico: Border …

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Did Marie Kondo Tell People They Could Only Keep Thirty Books at a Time?

Fact Checks, Viral Content / By /

After Netflix’s Tidying Up with Marie Kondo debuted in January 2019, social media lit up with takes lambasting Kondo’s supposedly draconian position on the possession of books: Wait Marie Kondo is telling people to toss their books? THEIR BOOKS? was very intrigued by marie kondo’s konmari method until she got to the category of throwing out books…………. …

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