PolitiFact
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PolitiFact is the Pulitzer Prize-winning fact-checking project of the Poynter Institute, founded in 2007 and now one of the standard references for US political fact-checking [source: politifact]. The project rates the accuracy of claims by elected officials and political figures on a Truth-O-Meter scale ranging from True to Pants on Fire, with intermediate ratings such as Mostly True, Half True, Mostly False, and False [source: politifact]. PolitiFact is a signatory of the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) Code of Principles and operates as a non-partisan project within the Poynter Institute’s editorial oversight [source: politifact].
Coverage: PolitiFact’s fact-checks span US federal, state, and local political claims; election-cycle messaging (where the Promise Tracker series tracks whether campaign pledges were kept); viral misinformation; and policy-specific claims (healthcare, immigration, climate, economic policy) [source: politifact]. The project publishes a State Network of affiliated local-USA outlets, producing fact-checks specific to US state and local politics; PolitiFact also partners with the Miami Herald on cross-state misinformation coverage [source: politifact].
A campaigner reaches for it when verifying a specific US political claim, when citing the Pulitzer-recognized fact-checking authority in a campaign brief, or when designing a media-literacy intervention built on PolitiFact’s claim ratings [source: politifact]. Treat as link-only; Poynter retains copyright on individual fact-checks. [source: politifact]
Use it for
A campaigner can use PolitiFact to verify the accuracy of claims made by political figures, opponents, or in public discourse. [source: politifact] By relying on PolitiFact’s independent and transparent fact-checking, a campaigner can ensure their own communications are based on verified information and can counter misinformation with credible, sourced facts. [source: politifact]
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Learn more
- On Wikipedia: PolitiFact — CC BY-SA 4.0