President Joe Biden earned the badge “bottomless Pinocchio” from the Washington Times for the number of false claims with increasing frequency, many of which come as part of his midterm campaign trail.
The Washington Post created the “bottomless Pinocchio” rating during the Trump administration to rate the tendency for false claims to be made and repeated. The rating is awarded when claims made receive at least three Pinocchios and are repeated more than 20 times.
Biden earned his “bottomless Pinocchio” from Washington Post’s fact checker, Greg Kessler. Kessler wrote that none of Biden’s recent claims deserved a standalone piece fact-checking their accuracy. However, the fact-checker acknowledges the frequency with which Biden made false or misleading statements — and request from readers to fact-check these — led to the post detailing Biden’s latest untrue statements.
The article debunked four statements Biden’s made since October 23 — including untrue statements about gas, Social Security, student loan forgiveness, and travel with Chinese
President Xi Jinping.
Chinese President Xi Jinping
Biden earned the “Bottomless Pinocchio” for a claim about traveling with Xi Jinping. In his claims — as recently as November 3 — Biden states he traveled 17,000 miles with Xi Jinping.
Repeating it more than 20 times and the White House’s inability to prove its legitimacy made the claim a “form of propaganda.”
Gas Prices
Biden’s claimed that under his leadership, gas prices dropped from $5 a gallon to $3.39 since he’s taken office.
The Washington Post explains that Biden’s retelling of events use figures from June when gas was over $5 a gallon, rather than when the President took office when the average price of gas was $2.48.
Social Security
On November 1, Biden claimed, “On my watch, for the first time in 10 years, seniors are getting an increase in their Social Security checks.”
The same day, the White House tweeted and deleted a similar claim.
The claim doesn’t take into consideration that Social Security is adjusted according to inflation. Social Security will receive an 8.7 percent increase from next year only because inflation has reached that level.
Student Loan Forgiveness
Biden claims he’s “signed a law” Republicans are challenging to forgive student loans.
But as the Washington Post points out, Biden’s claims he signed a law passed in Congress by a “vote or two” are false.
Biden never proposed student loan forgiveness before Congress. Instead, the President used the 2003 HERO Act to authorize student loan forgiveness.
