Is a video of a dancing man "leaked from Kash Patel's Gmail account"? No, that's not true: While there have been reports about FBI Director Kash Patel's personal Gmail account being hacked, this video has been online since at least 2021. It has been described in the past as "Man's enthusiastic dance to celebrate wife leaving for her home." The…
Did President Donald Trump react with an angry Truth Social post after "only 17 people" turned out for a "Pro Kings" rally in Lexington, Kentucky? No, that's not true: The story originated on the satirical Substack page of comedy writer Andy Borowitz. Trump's Truth Social account showed no posts about such an event, despite what some social media posts claimed…
Did President Donald Trump make a post on Truth Social urging Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to pardon golfer Tiger Woods after he was charged with a DUI? No, that's not true: No such post appeared on Trump's Truth Social account, despite a viral image making the rounds that looked like one. Google did not index any such post either. One…
Was a President Donald Trump quote from a video really about Iran hitting the "world's biggest aircraft carrier" from "17 angles" while planes were taking off every 32 seconds at one in the morning? No, that's not true: The quote was pulled from a longer video in which it is clear Trump was describing the hypothetical reaction of a Venezuelan…
Does a video of a burning ship actually show an oil tanker hit in the Strait of Hormuz on March 27, 2026? No, that's not true: No credible news organizations reported an oil tanker being hit in the Strait of Hormuz on that day. The video showed signs of AI generation. The claim appeared in a post (archived here, here…
Did California Gov. Gavin Newsom criticize Nick Shirley, or did Sen. John Neely Kennedy criticize Adam Schiff, saying "Lock him up for lying to Congress, abusing power, and betraying the public trust!"? No, that's not true: Nearly identical stories mentioning those and other names were published by a network of foreign websites and Facebook pages. A search of Google News…
Did Mark Twain say, "If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you do read it, you're misinformed"? No, that's not true: There's no reliable evidence that the American author and humorist ever made such a statement. It does not appear in quote compilations searched by Lead Stories. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) by the @KnowledgeArchiv…
Does a viral video show real-life confrontations involving transgender and LGBTQ+ people trying to access women's restrooms? No, that's not true: The clip was AI-generated. The account that posted it first had a corresponding label, and the video contained multiple artifacts that ruled out the possibility of it being authentic footage. The claim originated from a post (archived here, here…
Is this a real photo of Hillary Clinton pulling Jeffrey Epstein's tie in front of Bill Clinton? No, that's not true: An online AI image detection tool found it to be 99.8% likely AI-generated. A separate analysis further revealed a SynthID watermark, indicating the image was created or edited using Google AI tools. The claim appeared in a post (archived…
Does a video of an ICE agent taking a U.S. citizen off a plane in Texas show a real incident? No, that's not true: The video was a scripted skit performed by actors, showing a person wearing a face covering and flashing a badge before removing a man from a plane. The TikTok account where it was originally posted features…
Lead Stories is a fact checking website that is always looking for the latest false, misleading, deceptive or inaccurate stories, videos or images going viral on the internet.
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