Fact Checking Biden's 2024 Announcement Video, Trump's Response

On Tuesday, President Joe Biden formally announced his 2024 reelection campaign with a three-minute video featuring a number of claims aimed at political opponents on the right. Biden’s video, and former president and 2024 opponent Donald Trump’s response, led to fact-check articles across the spectrum. 

Social Security Cuts: In the video, Biden claims that “around the country, MAGA extremists are lining up to take those bedrock freedoms away,” including “cutting Social Security that you've paid for your entire life.” Both Townhall and FactCheck.org pushed back on this claim, with FactCheck.org’s article stating, “there seems to be little appetite in Congress for any significant changes.”

Book Bans: Biden also accused “MAGA extremists” of working to ban books in libraries across the country. Townhall took issue with this claim, focusing on book removals in Florida libraries to state, “As for the 175 books that were removed, 153 of them (87%) were identified as pornographic, violent, or age-inappropriate material.”

Socialist Spending: In his response video, Trump claimed that Biden’s “socialist spending calamity” led to the “worst inflation in half a century.” The Washington Post fact-check article cited global inflation rates and the pandemic to determine inflation to be “not a problem resulting only from presidential spending priorities.”

Border Security: Trump also criticized Biden’s border policies and claimed Trump-era policies resulted in the “most secure border in U.S. history.” The Washington Post fact-check article determined this claim lacked the context of the impact of the pandemic, when immigration “dwindled to virtually nothing.”