Announcing PolitiFact Wisconsin

The Truth-O-Meter has arrived in Wisconsin.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel today is launching PolitiFact Wisconsin, our sixth state site.

Like our other partner sites in Texas, Georgia, Florida, Rhode Island, and Ohio, PolitiFact Wisconsin is integrated with our national site and uses the Truth-O-Meter to rate the accuracy of statements by candidates, elected officials and political parties.

The St. Petersburg Times launched PolitiFact three years ago. Since then, we’ve rated more than 1,500 claims on our Truth-O-Meter and tracked more than 500 of President Barack Obama’s campaign promises.

The Wisconsin team is headed by Greg Borowski, the senior editor for projects and investigations for the Journal Sentinel, and includes Dave Umhoefer, a 2008 Pulitzer Prize winner for local reporting who has covered politics and government for 25 years; Tom Kertscher, who has covered courts and local government for the Journal Sentinel since 1998; and Jim Nelson, the paper’s deputy business editor.

We”re glad to have a PolitiFact site in Wisconsin. The state’s politicians are interesting characters who often have an independent streak. They should keep the Truth-O-Meter quite busy.

The success of our state sites has shown us that the Truth-O-Meter works as well in state and local politics as at the national level. Our expansion around the country is based on our belief that every candidate and elected official in the nation ought to face the Truth-O-Meter.