President Joe Biden’s Aug. 16 speech on Afghanistan — after the Taliban took over — highlighted a tough foreign policy issue that some people haven’t paid attention to recently. Here, we’ll answer common questions that Biden’s speech raises and note where his claims lack evidence or context. What was the U.S. mission in Afghanistan? Figure […]
As the numbers of new COVID-19 cases rise in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis has claimed that the ongoing spike is to be expected — that it’s part of a seasonal pattern. “We have a summer season here, just like last year. It started a little later this year. So you’re going to have higher prevalence […]
Question: When will the COVID-19 vaccines get full Food and Drug Administration approval? Answer: That’s a question on a lot of minds as the daily number of COVID-19 cases rise across the U.S., driven by a more contagious mutation of the coronavirus. More public and private institutions are considering or imposing vaccine mandates on their […]
As President Joe Biden seeks to enact national voting rights legislation, he has turned his attention to attacking new state laws that he says will restrict voting. ”This year alone, 17 states have enacted — not just proposed, but enacted — 28 new laws to make it harder for Americans to vote,” Biden said during […]
Donald Trump’s social media posts in the aftermath of the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol got him suspended from Facebook and Twitter amid concerns that his false claims about a stolen election would provoke more violence. His Facebook or Twitter accounts have been off limits to him for more than […]
Ask Americans why Central American immigrants are arriving at the southern U.S. border in ever-larger numbers, and some will say it’s lax border enforcement, disregard for the law and the temptations of U.S. jobs and generous welfare benefits. Others, including the Biden administration and experts in the region, will point to what they call “root […]
The Republican Party’s crusade to enforce allegiance to former President Donald Trump claimed its most high-profile victim this week when Rep. Liz Cheney, Wyoming’s reliably conservative congresswoman and its sole representative in the House, was stripped of her leadership position in a swift voice vote. Her ouster provides a fresh answer to the question: Just […]
In his first speech before Congress, President Joe Biden argued it was time to turn the coronavirus pandemic into a historic opportunity to expand government for the benefit of a wider range of Americans, urging investments in jobs, climate change, child care, infrastructure and more. Biden said that taxes should be increased on corporations and […]
As a candidate for president, Joe Biden promised a very different approach to refugee admissions compared with President Donald Trump. Biden said he would increase the annual number of people let in as refugees, not decrease it as Trump did year after year. So when Biden’s administration made an announcement April 16 that appeared to […]
Two major events are unfolding in Minnesota: the trial of a former police officer charged in the death of George Floyd, and protests over the recent fatal police shooting of Daunte Wright. Both cases involved white police officers and Black men. Many people around the country say that Wright’s April 11 shooting in Brooklyn Center, […]
Overcrowding at southern border facilities has raised concerns that migrants might get sick with COVID-19 since they may not have enough space to safely distance from each other. Some Republican lawmakers who went to Texas in late March to examine Border Patrol operations have also raised alarms about admitting into the U.S. migrants who are […]
President Joe Biden blamed Donald Trump for the surge of migrants at the southwest border, saying his predecessor dismantled the country’s immigration system and failed to provide enough beds for child migrants. At the first press conference of his presidency, Biden downplayed the number of migrants crossing the border, saying past years had seen similar […]