Trump Distorts the Facts in Attacks on Harris

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At a campaign rally in St. Cloud, Minnesota, former President Donald Trump rattled off several criticisms of Vice President Kamala Harris, his presumptive opponent in the presidential race. But some of Trump’s attacks ran afoul of the facts.

• Trump falsely claimed that Harris voted to “cut Medicare by $237 billion” and “betrayed American seniors.” The legislation allows Medicare to negotiate drug prices and reduces costs for some seniors.

• He pointed to Harris’ support in early 2019 for Medicare for All, saying she “endorsed outlawing private health insurance entirely.” Harris also proposed a plan later that year that included private insurance, but regardless, she isn’t supporting Medicare for All now.

• Trump claimed that Harris “said that a 80% tax rate is a bold idea that should be discussed.” Harris didn’t endorse that rate. Instead, she said a Democratic lawmaker’s ideas, which included a rate that high for people making more than $10 million a year, “should be discussed,” adding that “when we are able to defend the status quo, then do it.”

• Trump said Harris “just turned him free,” referring to Shawn Tillman, who committed murder in 2022, weeks after he was bailed out of jail by a nonprofit Harris promoted on social media in 2020. But it was not her decision to release Tillman, nor was he someone she sought to help get out of jail.

• He distorted the facts in claiming that Harris, a former prosecutor, “couldn’t pass her bar exam” to become a licensed lawyer. She did pass California’s bar exam on her second attempt.

• Trump claimed that Harris previously “supported mandatory gun confiscation,” without mentioning that she talked about having a mandatory buyback program only for so-called assault weapons. Harris’ campaign told us she is no longer pushing a buyback program.

• The former president said Harris “called for slashing consumption of red meat to fight climate change.” Harris once said she supported encouraging and incentivizing Americans to eat better, but she did not say she would restrict how much red meat is consumed.

• He claimed Harris’ votes “created the worst inflation in half a century.” Economists say the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic is primarily to blame.

• He wrongly said inflation was the worst “we’ve ever had” under this administration. The worst was in 1919-1920.

• Trump falsely said Harris supported abortion “even after birth,” and he wrongly said “all legal scholars” wanted the issue of abortion rights to be returned to the states.

• He baselessly said that Harris would let “40 to 50 million more people in our country,” referring to illegal immigration, and added that it would “kill Social Security and Medicare.” Those concocted figures aside, workers who aren’t authorized to be in the country can’t receive the benefits of those retirement programs.

Trump spoke in Minnesota on July 27. The day before, in Florida, Trump made some of the same claims on Medicare, inflation and abortion.

Medicare Benefits, Not Cuts

Trump falsely claimed that Harris “cast the tiebreaking vote to cut Medicare by $237 billion,” telling the crowd in Minnesota that “she betrayed American seniors.” He’s referring to the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which passed the Senate with Harris’ tie-breaking vote, but the law doesn’t cut benefits for seniors. In fact, it could lower what some seniors pay for prescription drugs.

The Medicare provisions of the law are expected to lower federal deficits by $237 billion over 10 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office, by, among other things, allowing Medicare to negotiate the prices it pays for some drugs and requiring rebates from drug companies if their prices increase faster than inflation.

The provisions will lower out-of-pocket costs for some beneficiaries, and lowering Medicare spending overall strengthens Medicare’s finances. The nonpartisan health policy research group KFF said in a 2023 analysis that the number of beneficiaries who will pay lower drug costs and how much they save “will depend on how many and which drugs are subject to the negotiation process and the price reductions achieved through the negotiations process relative to what prices would otherwise be.”

The law also caps seniors’ out-of-pocket costs at $2,000 a year for Medicare’s prescription drug plan next year, and it has already capped monthly insulin copays at $35. Those provisions cost the federal government money, as we’ve explained.

We often see politicians, of both parties, falsely claiming or suggesting that legislation to reduce Medicare spending would harm seniors.

Private Health Insurance

Trump highlighted Harris’ support in 2019 for Sen. Bernie Sanders’ Medicare for All legislation, which aimed to expand Medicare to everyone, creating a universal health care system. Trump said Harris “endorsed outlawing private health insurance entirely.” But at the time, Harris wasn’t as steadfast as Sanders that private health insurance would have to be eliminated, and Harris is no longer supporting such a plan.

Her campaign told us Harris “will not push Medicare for All as President.”

At a January 2019 town hall on CNN, Harris indicated that Sanders’ plan, which she supported, would lead to the elimination of private insurance. But the next day, her press secretary noted that she also supported other health care legislation that wouldn’t go that far. Later in the campaign, Harris proposed her own version of Medicare for All that would include a role for private insurance.

But now, Harris isn’t advocating Medicare for All.

Taxes

Trump went on to hit Harris on taxes, saying: “She said that a 80% tax rate is a bold idea that should be discussed. It’s very interesting to her.”

He appeared to be referring to comments that Harris made during a January 2019 appearance on ABC’s “The View.” Harris was asked if she believed that “socialist left” policies proposed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, such as a “70% to 80% tax rate,” could splinter the Democratic Party. Harris said “no,” and added that Ocasio-Cortez was “challenging the status quo” which is “fantastic.”

“I think that she is introducing bold ideas that should be discussed. And I think it’s good for the party, and frankly I think it’s good for the country,” Harris continued. “Let’s look at the bold ideas and I’m eager that we have those discussions. And when we are able to defend the status quo, then do it. And if there’s not merit to that, then let’s explore new ideas.”

At the time, Ocasio-Cortez had floated increasing the top income tax rate to 70% or more — but only for U.S. residents making at least $10 million annually. Moreover, Harris never said she supported that hypothetical policy.

While running for president in 2019, Harris proposed raising the top income tax rate on the top 1% of earners back to 39.6%. Trump had reduced it to 37% in 2017, when he signed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

Harris’ Connection to Shawn Tillman

Being in Minnesota, Trump attacked Harris for soliciting donations in 2020 for a Minnesota-based nonprofit that later paid bail for a man who went on to commit murder.

“Kamala urged her followers to donate to the so-called Minnesota Freedom Fund, helping raise $35 million to set loose violent offenders after they shot at police, looted your stores, sexually assaulted innocent victims and committed all sorts of other heinous crimes.” Trump said. “One of the criminals Kamala helped bail out of jail was Shawn Michael Tillman, very famous now unfortunately, a repeat offender, who, with Harris’ help, was set free –  she set free many very bad people – then he went on a murder rampage. He killed a man on a train platform in St. Paul, shooting him six times in the head. She just turned him free.”

But Harris did not have the authority to free Tillman or other criminals. Tillman is not even someone Harris tried to help get out of jail.

Days after George Floyd was murdered in Minneapolis by a police officer in May 2020, Harris encouraged donations “to help post bail for those protesting on the ground in Minnesota.” The group that she highlighted, the Minnesota Freedom Fund, pays bail for individuals who cannot afford to secure their release from jail while their court case is pending. The bail amount is set by a judge.

After Harris and other public figures promoted the nonprofit, it raised almost $40 million in 2020, the group’s then-interim executive director told us in February 2021. MFF did use some of the money to pay bail and legal expenses for people who were arrested while protesting, and in some cases rioting, but there is no indication that Tillman was a protester.

MFF said it paid a bail amount of $2,000 in April 2022 for Tillman, who was in jail on a misdemeanor charge of indecent exposure. That was almost two years after Floyd’s death.

Weeks after his release, Tillman shot and killed Demitri Ellis-Strong at a rail station in St. Paul. He was sentenced in March to life in prison for the murder.

Trump blamed Harris for Tillman’s release, but there is no evidence that she had any say in the judge’s decision to grant Tillman bail or the nonprofit’s decision to pay it. Harris requested financial assistance specifically for protesters in Minnesota – not people arrested for any other reason.

“We have no connection to Harris or her campaign beyond a four-year-old tweet,” an MFF spokesperson told us in an email. “All our clients have been made eligible for pre-trial release by a judge, and are in jail until trial simply because they cannot afford bail.”

Bar Exam

In an attempt to insult her intelligence, Trump distorted the facts in claiming that Harris “couldn’t pass” the state exam required to become a licensed lawyer.

“You know she couldn’t pass her law exam, right? Have you heard that?” Trump asked the crowd. “These are minor details. She couldn’t pass her bar exam. Took the bar exam; she couldn’t pass it. She thought she’d never be able to pass it.”

Harris, a 1989 graduate of the then-University of California Hastings College of Law, failed the first time she took the bar exam in California in July 1989, according to her book, “The Truths We Hold: An American Journey.” (About 28% of those who took the exam for the first time in July 1989 failed, and about 40% of all people who took it did not pass, according to figures sent to us by the State Bar of California.)

However, in February 1990, on her second attempt, she passed the exam, considered to be one of the toughest in the country, and was admitted to the State Bar of California in June 1990.

Harris went on to hold multiple positions as a prosecutor before being elected San Francisco’s district attorney in 2003 and then California’s attorney general in 2010.

Trump raised this issue again when speaking at the National Association of Black Journalists convention on July 31. “She didn’t think she was going to ever pass it. And I don’t know what happened. Maybe she passed it,” he said. One of the journalists interviewing the former president corrected him, saying, “She did pass it.”

Guns

On the subject of Harris’ position on guns, Trump said, “She supported mandatory gun confiscation, ripping firearms away from law-abiding citizens.” That’s misleading.

In multiple interviews during her 2020 presidential campaign, Harris did talk about implementing a mandatory buyback program — but only for so-called assault weapons, not all firearms.

For example, during an October 2019 forum on gun violence, Harris was asked about a potential assault weapons ban and what she would do about millions of those particular guns already in circulation in the country.

“We have to have a buyback program, and I support a mandatory buyback program,” Harris replied. “It’s got to be smart, we got to do it the right way. But there are 5 million [assault weapons] at least, some estimate as many as 10 million, and we’re going to have to have smart public policy that’s about taking those off the streets, but doing it in the right way.”

In an NBC News interview the following month, Harris talked about rejecting the “false choice” that “either you’re in favor of the Second Amendment or you want to take everyone’s guns away.” She added that “there are certain types of weapons that should not be on the streets of a civil society,” and said incentives should be provided for the public to turn in what she called “weapons of war.”

Recently on the campaign trail, Harris has called for an “assault weapons ban.” But the campaign confirmed to us that she was no longer advocating a mandatory buyback program.

Red Meat

Trump suggested that, to combat climate change, Harris was prepared to limit how much red meat is consumed in the U.S.

“Kamala called for slashing consumption of red meat to fight climate change,” Trump said. “Now, you know what that means, because in a couple of countries, they’re actually getting rid of their cows and their cattle … because they say it’s environmentally unacceptable.”

Harris did not explicitly say that she would restrict how much red meat Americans consume, as Trump suggested. During a September 2019 climate town hall, Harris, when asked, said that, for health reasons and because of climate change, she would support modifying U.S. dietary guidelines to encourage a change in eating habits.

“The balance that we have to strike here, frankly, is about what government can and should do around creating incentives and then banning certain behaviors,” she said, before relating her own love of cheeseburgers “from time to time.”

Although Harris did mention “banning certain behaviors” as part of a balanced government approach, her answer primarily focused on motivating, rather than forcing, the public to eat better. After all, Americans are not required to follow the dietary guidelines.

“But there also has to be what we do in terms of creating incentives that we will eat in a healthy way, that we will encourage moderation, and that we will be educated about the effect of our eating habits on our environment,” she said.

Inflation Distortions

Economists say the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic is the primary reason for higher inflation beginning in 2021, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine the following year further compounded the problem. The American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion pandemic relief measure that President Joe Biden signed into law in March 2021, contributed to inflation, economists told us two years ago, though estimates varied as to how much.

But Trump, echoing a claim made throughout the Republican National Convention, claimed in his Minnesota speech that Harris “cast the tie-breaking votes that created the worst inflation in half a century,” going on to falsely claim “they don’t use the real numbers” and he believed it was “the worst inflation that we’ve ever had.”

The worst inflation the U.S. has ever had occurred from June 1919 to June 1920, when the 12-month increase in the Consumer Price Index was 23.7%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Under the Biden administration, the largest increase was 9.1% for the 12 months ending June 2022. BLS said it was the biggest increase since November 1981. So, it was the worst inflation in 41 years.

Inflation has moderated since that June 2022 peak. It rose 3% in the 12 months ending in June, according to the BLS.

In July 26 remarks in Florida, Trump similarly cast doubt on the official inflation figures, saying, “they say, ‘Sir, it’s only 58 years.’ I say I believe it’s the worst we’ve ever had. The numbers are much higher than they’re showing.” This false claim fits a pattern of Trump rejecting statistical measures when criticizing his political opponents, but accepting the figures when they are favorable to him. For instance, he claimed BLS unemployment rate figures were “phony” when campaigning in 2016, but once in office, he embraced the figures.

As for Harris’ vote, she cast the tie-breaking vote on a motion that moved the American Rescue Plan legislation forward in the Senate, which a few days later passed the bill without Harris’ assistance. As we said, economists cite the impact of the pandemic — a shutdown of the economy followed by a rapid recovery — as the primary culprit for inflation. (See our 2022 story on the issue for more.)

Abortion

Trump repeated false claims he’s made before about abortion. He said that Harris “wants abortion … right up until birth and even after birth.” There are no post-birth abortions. That would be homicide, and it’s illegal.

He also said that “everybody” and “all legal scholars” wanted the issue of abortion rights to be returned to the states. Plenty of legal scholars, and a majority of the American public, didn’t want the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, which it did in June 2022, sending the issue to the states.

We’ve written about both claims before.

Trump said that Harris “wants abortion in the eighth and ninth month of pregnancy. Think of that. And right up until birth and even after birth.” Harris has called for abortion rights to be guaranteed by federal law. “And when Congress passes a law to restore reproductive freedoms — as president of the United States, I will sign it into law,” she said at a July 30 rally in Atlanta.

Republicans have pointed to a September 2023 interview on CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” saying that Harris didn’t explain what gestational limit on abortion she would support. Harris said she wanted to “restore the protections of Roe v. Wade,” adding, “we’re not trying to do anything that did not exist before June of last year.”

As we’ve explained, the 1973 Roe ruling said states could outlaw abortion after fetal viability, but with exceptions for risks to the life or health of the mother. Many Republicans have objected to the health exception, saying it would allow abortion for any reason after viability.

Abortions late in a pregnancy are rare. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 93.5% of abortions in 2021 were performed at or before 13 weeks of gestation, and less than 1% were performed at or after 21 weeks.

Trump also referred to a 2019 bill, saying that Harris “voted against legislation that would require medical providers to give care to babies born alive after an attempted abortion.” The GOP bill would have instituted penalties and jail time for health care providers who don’t provide certain medical care “[i]n the case of an abortion or attempted abortion that results in a child born alive.” As we wrote then, Democrats said the legislation was unnecessary and aimed at restricting access to legal abortion, while Republicans said it was about protecting babies.

The Supreme Court overturned Roe after Trump’s appointment of three conservative justices during his time as president. “I was proudly the person responsible for the ending of something that all legal scholars, both sides, wanted and in fact demanded be ended. Roe v. Wade, they wanted it ended,” Trump said in a video posted on Truth Social on April 8.

He made the same claim in Minnesota, saying that “everybody wanted it back in the states. Democrats, Republicans, liberals, conservatives and legal scholars, every legal scholar wanted it back in the states.”

When we wrote about this in April, legal scholars told us the claim was “utter nonsense” and “patently absurd.”

Legal scholars wrote many amicus briefs supporting Roe and opposing the Mississippi law that prompted the Supreme Court case that led to the court overturning Roe. Several polls since then have found a majority of Americans oppose the court’s decision.

Medicare and Social Security

Trump, who has grossly inflated immigration figures before, baselessly claimed that if Harris is elected “it’ll be 40 to 50 million more people in our country,” referring to illegal immigration, adding that “they’ll be using Medicare and Social Security,” programs that would then be “destroyed.” Harris “will kill Social Security and Medicare,” he said.

The baseless 40-to-50-million figures aside, illegal immigration doesn’t destroy those programs — instead it improves their finances.

That’s because workers who are not authorized to be in the U.S. have to pay a percentage of their paychecks in Medicare and Social Security taxes, even though they can’t receive any of the benefits from those programs. We and other fact-checkers have explained this before.

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