FactChecking the Final 2020 Presidential Debate

Summary

President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden faced off in the final presidential debate of the campaign. We found:

• Trump accused Biden of receiving “$3.5 million from Russia.” There’s no evidence of that.
• Biden said there’s “no evidence” that raising the minimum wage causes business bankruptcies. There is, a little.
• Trump erred when he said it’s “proven” that a minimum-wage boost would lead to many firings. There’s a chance that the effect could be “about zero,” according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
• Trump falsely said “I don’t take” money from Wall Street. He and groups supporting him got about $13.8 million from Wall Street.
• Biden claimed Social Security’s chief actuary said if Trump “continues his plan to withhold the tax on Social Security” the program “will be bankrupt by 2023.” Trump hasn’t proposed ending the tax without providing alternative funding, the scenario the actuary assessed.
• The president falsely claimed that his bank account in China was “closed in 2015.” Trump’s own attorney said it remains open.
• Trump claimed that the $750 the New York Times reported he paid in federal income taxes in 2016 and 2017 was a “filing fee.” There is no such fee.
• Trump repeated his claim that “we’re rounding the turn” on the pandemic. Cases actually are increasing in many parts of the country.
• Though Biden claimed Trump’s travel restrictions on China were imposed “late, after 40 countries had already done that,” most of those countries did it around the same time Trump did.
• Biden misleadingly claimed that “38,000 prisoners were released from federal prison” during the Obama administration. The total number went down by about 12,000.
• Trump misleadingly suggested the Obama administration was to blame for his administration’s policy that caused the separation of immigrant families.
• Trump falsely claimed that “less than 1%” of those caught crossing the border and released pending immigration hearings appear in court. The rate is about 50%, according to his own Justice Department.
• The president falsely claimed murderers and rapists are released under a so-called “catch and release” policy. In fact, immigration laws require such criminals be detained.
• Biden claimed the U.S. trade deficit with China went “up, not down” under Trump. In fact it was lower in 2019 than it was in Biden’s last year as vice president.
• Trump said African American income grew “nine times” more under his administration than under his predecessor. But that relies on figures Census says suffer from a pandemic-induced survey bias.
• The president quoted Anthony Fauci as saying the coronavirus was “not going to be a problem.” Fauci didn’t say that.
• Trump claimed that Biden wants to raise “everybody’s” taxes. Analysts say 80% would get a cut.
• Biden misquoted Sen. Mitch McConnell as saying, “Let them go bankrupt,” about cities and states that have lost revenue as a result of the pandemic. McConnell said bankruptcy should be a legal option for states with unrelated money woes.
• Trump again falsely claimed Biden would get rid of private health insurance. Biden opposed Medicare for All.
• Trump wrongly attributed the term “super-predator” to Biden. It was Hillary Clinton — not Biden — who applied the term to some “gangs of kids.”

And there were more repeated claims on the border wall, wind energy, face masks, North Korea and the Green New Deal.

The final debate was held in Nashville, Tennessee, on Oct. 22 and was moderated by NBC News’ Kristen Welker.

Analysis

Russia

The president baselessly accused Biden of receiving “$3.5 million from Russia and it came through Putin.”

Trump: Joe got $3.5 million from Russia and it came through Putin because he was very friendly with the former mayor of Moscow. And it was the mayor Moscow’s wife. And you got $3.5 million. Your family got $3.5 million. And, you know, some day you’re going to have to explain why you got $3.5 [million].

The president is distorting the facts of a disputed account in a partisan report from a Republican-controlled Senate committee about Biden’s son, Hunter.

That report claimed that “an investment firm co-founded by Hunter Biden” received $3.5 million from Russian businesswoman Elena Baturina in 2014. Baturina was the wife of the former mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov, who was removed as mayor in 2010 by then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. At the time of the alleged payment, Baturina was living in London and Austria.

The report says nothing about Joe Biden receiving any money from that transaction, and it is not clear that Hunter Biden did, either. George Mesires, a lawyer for Hunter Biden, told the Washington Post that the allegation is false. Mesires said Hunter Biden was “not a co-founder of” the company, Rosemont Seneca Thornton LLC, that is named in the report as receiving the payment from Baturina.

Biden & Trump on Minimum Wage

Both Trump and Biden erred on the likely effects of increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Biden went too far when he said there is “no evidence” that raising the minimum wage causes businesses to go bankrupt.

Biden: And there is no evidence that when you raise the minimum wage, businesses go out of business. That is simply not true.

He would have been correct to say