Trump’s assertion that 10,000 of 300,000 ‘missing’ children have been found
The president undercuts his claim of progress by repeating a ginned-up figure from the 2024 campaign.
“Something that you should have that you haven’t reported. As you know, 300,000 children are missing, right, 300,000 under Biden. We’ve already gotten back 10,000 of those children, and we have a lot more planned to come back. We’re getting them back by the thousands, but 300,000 and as of this morning, over 10,000, we’ve gotten back.”
— President Trump, speaking to reporters at the White House, July 11
“Look, we need to find those hundreds of thousands of children that were missing during the Biden administration and get them from whatever situation that they’re in.”
— Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez (R-Florida), remarks on Fox Business, July 14
This is an example of how government initiatives can begin with falsehoods.
Related Knowledge Center: Fact-checking and its detractors
Fact-checking has become a familiar tool for political reporters to hold office-holders and candidates accountable. But critics ask if fact-checkers sometimes miss the forest for the trees, and if the practice often struggles with false equivalency the way conventional political coverage does.