‘Stop trying to play both sides’: Readers share their 2024 election fact-checking feedback

With a busy 2024 heading toward a close, PolitiFact readers sent us thoughtful questions and plenty of election-year feedback through email and social media comments. Readers weighed in on the presidential race, President Joe Biden’s pardoning of his son, Hunter Biden, and more.

Here’s some of that feedback, edited for clarity and style. Readers can send us fact-check ideas and feedback at [email protected]. 

Fact-checking the 2024 presidential candidates

We heard from many readers comparing our Vice President Kamala Harris fact-checks with the checks we did of President-elect Donald Trump. 

One reader criticized our fact-checking of Harris’ claims about Project 2025. On the campaign trail, Harris frequently tied Trump to the 900-page conservative policy document the Heritage Foundation created. 

Trump repeatedly distanced himself from Project 2025 on the campaign trail. CNN reported that at least 140 of the document’s writers have connections to Trump’s first administration and Axios reported a number of Project 2025 authors have found positions in his second administration.

The reader said in an email: 

“I am deeply troubled with some of PolitiFact’s fact-checking. I have noticed that your coverage of Kamala Harris’ criticism of Project 2025 has been rating many of her statements as Half True or False. I understand that the convicted felon candidate has verbalized some distance between himself and the document, however when the construction of this manifesto has been authored by a majority of his former staffers, including his VP pick, I find this ‘fact-check’ misleading at best.

“I understand that the media has a difficult role striving to be balanced, but I am concerned that your organization is playing into the double standard of partisan politics. For example, most of Trump’s rallies or interviews are filled with incoherent rambling, i.e., the recent ‘child care is child care’ statement. I am unsure how this would even be fact-checked because it lacks any substance, and sheerly on face value is ‘true.’ 

“With Kamala, she speaks clearly and in full complete sentences, which conceivably makes your job much easier as fact-checkers.

“Instead of falling into the outdated tropes of legacy media, I would like to see PolitiFact use data as a way to showcase a candidate’s honesty. For example, you could publish an Infograph that measures where a candidate’s statements are rated within a given time frame. You could contrast the (Republican National Convention) and the (Democratic National Convention): where did the majority of statements fall on your spectrum? Is there a median for one party or the other? 

“I’m sure pollsters and political scientists have even more insights into how to innovate the space of fact-checking, but I don’t want to see this organization fall into headline news. Facts are facts regardless (of whether) they obtain views or popularity, and that sanctity shouldn’t be disrupted by your organization’s quota for engagement.”

PolitiFact fact-checks statements, not parties. Because we can’t feasibly check all possible claims, we pick the most newsworthy and significant ones. We try to select facts to check from both Democrats and Republicans, but we don’t keep count. At the same time, we more often fact-check the party that holds power or people who repeatedly make attention-getting or misleading statements.

Although PolitiFact doesn’t have political party scorecards, we do keep individual scorecards for any speaker who has been rated on our Truth-O-Meter, including Harris and Trump. Readers can click on speakers’ names from our fact-checks to see a breakdown of how we have rated their previous claims. 

Another reader also asked about the number of times we fact-checked each candidate and about our fact-checkers’ political leanings. 

“You call yourself ‘the Truth Squad,’ but it certainly seems you do a lot more checks on Trump than Harris,” the reader wrote. (The Truth Squad is the name for individual donors who support our nonprofit newsroom.) “The other day, I was listening to Ms. Harris’ New Hampshire speech while also folding clothes. Even though my focus wasn’t all on the speech, I still caught her repeating statements that have been fact-checked as false over and over. Many were in her DNC speech as well. I would certainly be interested in hearing how many times you fact-checked Trump versus Harris to know if I can really trust you. I also wonder how many Democratic, independent and Republican fact-checkers you employ.”

PolitiFact journalists may participate in the political process as voters, because we have responsibilities as individual citizens of the United States. But we keep our votes to ourselves as a matter of principle. Our goal is to be open-minded in all of our work and uphold principles of independence and fairness. 

Election integrity

As it became clear on election night that Trump would return to the White House, some Harris supporters spread misinformation about the 2024 election results, including claiming that millions Democratic votes had “disappeared.”

We rated these claims Pants on Fire! There have been no credible allegations of election fraud or evidence of votes that disappeared during the 2024 election. And as  these claims were being made, votes were still being counted. 

One social media user disagreed with our framing that liberals were perpetuating misinformation about the 2024 election. 

“I don’t know about framing this as a ‘democratic conspiracy.’ Very few have alleged this let alone any mainstream platform or individual. Dinesh D’Souza a Republican pundit (who made “2000 Mules”) also alleged this as well as other Republicans to ‘prove’ there was fraud, it’s why the new Republican slogan is “too big to rig,” which is still false. Please stop trying to play both sides, it’s quite clear one is evidently far gone and holding a double standard isn’t solving anything.”

D’Souza, who was behind the widely discredited 2022 movie “2,000 Mules,” shared on X that the 2024 election results were proof that Biden’s 2020 win was a “lie.” We also rated that claim Pants on Fire! PolitiFact has debunked the claim that the 2020 election was fraudulent numerous times. 

Another social media user shared how personal experience shaped perspective on election integrity. 

“This is a big reason I volunteered as a poll worker following the 2016 election and encourage EVERYONE to volunteer as a poll worker at least once. It’s impossible to pass along all this absurd election d/misinformation when you actually know how the process works and are aware of the checks and balances that are in place to protect the integrity of our elections . .. not to mention the absolute commitment and fidelity of poll workers and volunteers to protect the election process. … Anyone who passes along these lies is more interested in undermining our elections than in protecting them.”

Before the 2024 general election, PolitiFact spoke with election officials from across the country about how their offices keep elections secure and voting results accurate. The full series is on our YouTube channel. 

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Joe Biden’s pardon of his son

After months of saying he would not pardon his son, Hunter Biden, on federal gun and tax charges, Joe Biden said he was issuing a sweeping pardon going back to 2014. The pardon immunizes Hunter Biden from potential prosecution by the incoming Trump administration. 

Biden’s reversal earned him a Full Flop on our Flip-O-Meter, which measures politicians’ consistency on issues. (The rating is not making a value judgment about a politician who changes positions on an issue.) It also meant a Promise Broken rating on Biden’s campaign promise to prevent the White House from interfering in federal investigations and prosecutions. 

“I’m glad he did,” one reader wrote in an email. “Funny how no media source has called out the over 150 pardons Trump did in his first term and pardoning at least  four convicted people. And the public is saying shame on Biden? I also believe the gun charges on his son were far beyond any other gun issues seen before Hunter. Did look like an out-of-character sentence compared to other people’s similar charges.”

One social media reader commented, “It’s probably worth reforming the pardon powers, but good luck getting any amendments passed in this climate.”

Another social media user wrote, “While I understand the need to remind people that he has changed his mind on this point. But do your full job, he did this because his family is under threat of being targeted by the MAGA crowd for no good reason other than revenge for some perceived injustice. Bad form here, PolitiFact.”

Some words of appreciation from readers

“Brilliant is an often-overused word, but it does apply to the expansion of your partnerships with news outlets in battleground states and Al Jazeera, reported in the most recent Politifact newsletter. I thank you for the clarity you brought to the controversy over the JD Vance ‘fact of life’ quote regarding school shootings.”

“We all need to know the truth, no matter if we are Democrat or Republican, and with so much false information out there it’s nice to know there is one place I can rely on to get the real story.”

“Everyone gets stuff a little wrong, but in politics and media, honest errors themselves can be dangerous — and too often, the errors aren’t honest. Right now, the lies are so bad, it’s becoming real, global damage. We need to reverse that, best we can.”

“This country needs fact-based, well-sourced assessments of political statements/decisions. The global ‘soapboxes’ of social media give instant credence in this community merely by unsourced examples of the conspiracy du jour. PolitiFact provides the facts.”