Fact-Checking 'Eating the Pets' and Project 2025 in the Presidential Debate

During Tuesday's debate in Philadelphia with Kamala Harris, among other issues, Donald Trump made a number of incorrect and deceptive statements like immigrants "eating the pets" and his relationship to Project 2025.

When Joe Biden was still the Democratic party's contender in June, during the first debate of this cycle for the presidency, moderators were utterly detached from fact-checking. Due to the lax moderation, during the primetime discussion, Trump's lies and half-truths were mostly uncontested.Donald Trump claimed that crime is way up in the US.Crime is actually down. Data from the FBI found that violent crime decreased during the Trump administration, spiking in 2020 during the pandemic, and continuing to trend downward afterwards.

Preliminary data from the FBI found that violent crime was down 6% in 2023, and 15% in the first quarter of 2024.

Violent crime decreased throughout most of Trump’s presidency, according to FBI data that uses information provided by law enforcement agencies. However, it spiked in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It has trended downward since 2020 across the US, nearing pre-pandemic levels in 2022. Preliminary FBI data for 2023 shows that violent crime overall was down another 6% that year.

Though the data is preliminary, it includes numbers from 80% of the law enforcement agencies in the country.

Trump repeated one of his usual falsehoods: that abortions are taking place in the ninth month of pregnancy.

Fewer than 1% of abortions are performed past 21 weeks of pregnancy; when these abortions do take place, they often occur in medical emergencies or cases of fetal anomalies.

Trump also suggested, at multiple points, that abortions take place after birth. That would be infanticide, and it is illegal in all 50 states.

Donald Trump has spouted off a number of false claims about immigration. Among other allegations, he said immigrants are “taking over the towns … They’re going in violently.”

That’s false. Although some US cities have seen an influx of immigrants, most have arrived legally, with work permits or with authorization to stay while their cases are worked out in the courts.

There has been no widespread violence in these cities and overall, immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than the US-born according to multiple, extensive studies, including from the conservative Cato Institute.

Trump claims immigrants are ‘eating the pets’ in Ohio town

Trump repeated an unsubstantiated claim that immigrants are eating pets in an Ohio town, forcing the moderator to tell him that there is no proof of that.

“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats … they’re eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame,” the former president said.

The story of migrants allegedly eating pets has circulated in rightwing media in recent days and been repeated by Trump’s running mate JD Vance.

“You bring up Springfield, Ohio, and ABC News did reach out to the city manager there. He told us there have been no credible reports of specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community,” moderator David Muir told Trump.

The Springfield News-Sun reported on Monday that police have “received no reports related to pets being stolen and eaten”.

Trump and Harris argue over the ‘best’ or ‘worst’ economy

Trump boasted that the US experienced its “best” economy under his administration, while Harris noted that he left the US with “the worst unemployment since the Great Depression”.

The facts: They’re both wrong – Trump by a lot, and Harris by a shade.

Though unemployment spiked to its worst levels since the Great Depression in the immediate aftermath of the pandemic, it dipped back by the time Trump left office.

Meanwhile, Trump’s “best economy” line has been the bane of fact checkers since he was in office. Best is a very vague term – but by several measures, including GDP, unemployment, the trade deficit – the economy was far from its peak.

Trump denied knowledge of Project 2025, a 900-page plan for the aggressive rightwing overhaul of nearly every aspect of the federal government.

Project 2025 suggests ridding the federal ranks of many appointed roles and stacking agencies instead with more political appointees aligned with, and more beholden, to Trump’s policy prescriptions.

Trump's policies strongly resemble Project 2025, despite his repeated attempts to disassociate himself from the agenda, which aims to take away voting, LGBTQ+, and reproductive rights.

According to Rachel Leingang of the Guardian, "[Kevin] Roberts, the head of Heritage, has previously stated that he and Trump had spoken multiple times. Trump is well-versed in the Heritage Foundation and has spoken at their gatherings. The writers and backers of Project 2025 include numerous former members of the Trump administration.