In her closing argument to voters on Tuesday night, Vice President Kamala Harris characterized her Republican opponent as a “petty tyrant,” motivated by vengeance and past grievances, and presented herself as the candidate of the future, motivated by a “to-do list.”
Since ascending to the top of the Democratic ticket in July, Ms. Harris has hewed closely to scripted talking points and stuck to the facts, delivering far fewer half-truths than former President Donald J. Trump and even fewer outright falsehoods.
Her speech Tuesday night on the Ellipse in Washington, days before the election, and her remarks in the closing days of the campaign have underscored those differences, as she repeatedly and accurately highlights her rival’s own words and the opinions of his former advisers that Mr. Trump is a fascist. On some occasions though, she has been less accurate or omitted context when describing social and border policy and statistics.
Here’s a fact check of some of her recent claims.
What Was Said
True. Mr. Trump has threatened to weaponize the Justice Department against political foes. He has also repeatedly vowed to issue full pardons to those who participated in the attack on the Capitol.
Mr. Trump said in 2023 that he would appoint “a real special prosecutor to go after” President Biden and his family, and said in June that he would have “every right to go after” his rivals, including Mr. Biden.
In a book under his name released in September, Mr. Trump falsely accused the Meta chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, of plotting against him and warned that he “will spend the rest of his life in prison” should he do “anything illegal this time.” And on social media this fall, Mr. Trump reposted images of Mr. Biden, Ms. Harris, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Dr. Anthony Fauci and the Microsoft founder Bill Gates in orange jumpsuits. In other posts, he called for the prosecution of former President Barack Obama, former Representative Liz Cheney and the special counsel Jack Smith.
Additionally, Mr. Trump has specifically referred to Ms. Pelosi and Representative Adam Schiff of California as the “enemy within.”
Ms. Harris is also correct that Mr. Trump has promised to pardon rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. In March, he pledged on social media that one of his first acts as president would be to “free the January 6 Hostages being wrongfully imprisoned.” In an April interview with Time magazine, he said he would “absolutely” consider pardoning every person prosecuted for the attack, adding that “if somebody was evil and bad, I would look at that differently.” Asked in July if he would pardon those who attacked police, Mr. Trump again answered “absolutely.”
What Was Said
This needs context. Mr. Trump’s position on a federal abortion ban is muddled and has shifted several times this campaign alone. And he has not said he would mandate states to monitor women’s pregnancies, but that it is their prerogative to do so.
In March, Mr. Trump suggested he would support a federal ban on abortions after 15 week — a cutoff, he said, that “people are agreeing on” — with exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother.
Then in April, Mr. Trump said he would not sign a federal abortion ban. In the presidential debate in September, Mr. Trump again said he would not sign a ban because “this issue has now been taken over by the states.”
But when asked about a claim by his running mate, Senator JD Vance, that he would veto such a ban, Mr. Trump said he “didn’t discuss it with JD.”
In October, Mr. Trump then said he would veto a federal ban.
In April, asked by Time magazine whether states should monitor women’s pregnancies and prosecute violators, Mr. Trump did not say that they should. He said that “they might do that” and that “the states are going to say.” His views are “totally irrelevant,” he added, because the states make those decisions.
What Was Said
This needs context. Ms. Harris omitted several elements of Mr. Trump’s tax proposals that would benefit working Americans. Mr. Trump has vowed not to cut Social Security or Medicare, though an independent analysis has found that his overall agenda would harm Social Security’s financial health. And it is unclear where Mr. Trump stands on the $35 monthly cap on insulin for Medicare beneficiaries, given that he started a pilot program that introduced the cap but has also indicated support for repealing the law that expanded that cap.
While the 2017 tax measure was disproportionately beneficial to the rich and corporations, a majority of people received a tax cut. The law’s reductions to the individual tax rate are set to expire in 2025, and Mr. Trump supports extending those cuts and further reducing the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 15 percent for some companies. But several of his other tax proposals would benefit middle- and lower-income Americans, including eliminating taxes on tips and Social Security benefits.
During his 2024 presidential campaign, Mr. Trump has said repeatedly that he would not cut Social Security or Medicare, though he had previously shown brief and vague support for such proposals.
It is worth noting, though, that a recent analysis by the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget found that Mr. Trump’s policies would “dramatically worsen Social Security’s finances.” Those proposals, the think tank said, would hasten the depletion of Social Security’s trust funds from 2034 to 2031. In contrast, Ms. Harris’s proposals “would not have large effects on Social Security Trust Fund solvency.”
As for the insulin price cap, Mr. Trump has made no specific proposals to eliminate it.
In fact, the Trump administration started a Medicare pilot program in 2020 that laid the groundwork for it. Under the voluntary program, insurers could cap the price of insulin at $35 a month for Medicare prescription drug coverage plans, known as Part D, covering an estimated 800,000 enrollees.
The Inflation Reduction Act, signed into law by President Biden in 2022, expanded that cap to all Medicare Part D plans, covering 3.3 million enrollees, and also added a $35 cap to co-pays under Medicare Part B, which covers doctor visits, lab tests and other medical services.
Ms. Harris has a point that Mr. Trump has said that he would “terminate” or “end the green new scam,” his derisive term for the Inflation Reduction Act. He has offered few specifics on what this would entail, and whether it would include repealing the expanded cap, and his campaign did not respond when asked. But on some occasions, he and his advisers have indicated that the repeal may be partial, and targeted to rescinding funding intended to combat climate change.
Mr. Trump, in an interview with the AARP, said he would “continue my efforts to protect Americans from unaffordable drug prices.”
He added, “I will keep any drug savings in Medicare, and I will finish what we started in my first term.”
What Was Said
False. Ms. Harris was referring to the amount of fentanyl seized by border officials, but those numbers are open to interpretation.
The amount of fentanyl seized by border officials has doubled from 11,200 pounds in the 2021 fiscal year to nearly 22,000 pounds in the 2024 fiscal year.
Ultimately, the amount interdicted at the border is a proportion of all drugs illegally trafficked into the United States, but what proportion those seizures represent is unknowable. A greater amount seized does not necessarily mean a reduction in supply into the country, as Ms. Harris suggests. The data could also be interpreted as a proxy measure for the overall supply. In fact, most experts have said the latter is the case: More seizures indicate increased supply.
The Drug Enforcement Administration’s 2024 national drug threat assessment noted that “no D.E.A. field office reported that fentanyl is less available or more expensive, either of which would point to a decrease in the supply.”
A 2023 White House report noted that a decrease in heroin seizures at the border, coupled with a decline in heroin overdose deaths, “indicate decreased availability of heroin in the United States suggesting Mexican heroin is going to other drug markets.”
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