ABC moderators fact-checked Trump five times during the debate, while Harris was left alone

Former President Donald Trump was name-checked at least five times by moderators during his Tuesday presidential debate clash with Vice President Kamala Harris — while the Democratic nominee was conspicuously left alone.

ABC News moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis stepped in and debunked the 78-year-old Republican nominee nearly a half-dozen times during the 90-minute debate in Philadelphia, as Trump talked about abortion, crime and immigration.

Meanwhile, Harris, 59, was allowed to speak without interruption — despite her lies about the U.S. military being active in combat zones, as well as Trump’s stance on abortion, the far-right Project 2025 and her “very fine people” remark about the Charlottesville race riots.

Trump has since criticized ABC and its moderators, saying the debate was “rigged,” “unfair” and a “three-to-one” affair.

Here’s a look at some of the false and misleading claims made – on both sides – during the debate:

HARRIS

No active military personnel

At one point, Harris falsely insisted that there were no active-duty U.S. military personnel in combat zones — though troops are still stationed in various countries around the world.

“To this day, there is not a single member of the United States military who is on active duty in a combat zone, in any war zone around the world, for the first time in this century,” the vice president said.

Although the United States has not officially declared war in decades, American troops are still stationed in Iraq and Syria, where they are helping local forces fight terrorism.

U.S. forces are also stationed in a handful of African countries, including Somalia.

National abortion ban

On the topic of abortion and reproductive rights, the moderators remained silent when Harris insisted: “If Donald Trump were re-elected, he would sign a national abortion ban.”

Although Trump has said he has “no regrets” about personally selecting the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade, he has never said he would sign a federal law banning abortion.

Instead, the former president promised to leave the issue to the states.

‘Very good people‘

None of the moderators stepped in to correct Harris when she repeated a falsehood that Trump had once said there were “very fine people” on both sides of the 2017 Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally.

His critics have long claimed that he equated neo-Nazis with counter-protesters when he gave a news conference shortly after the race riots escalated.

At the time, Trump insisted he was only referring to people who wanted to preserve a statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Fact-checking site Snopes has since acknowledged that Trump’s remark about “very fine people” was taken out of context.

“While Trump said there were “very fine people on both sides,” he also clarified that he was not talking about neo-Nazis and white supremacists and said they should be “totally condemned.” Therefore, we rated this claim as “false,” Snopes wrote.

Project 2025

Harris also successfully pinned the blame on Trump for Project 2025, a controversial right-wing playbook on how to run the country, despite the former president’s efforts to distance himself from it.

“What you’re about to hear tonight is a detailed and dangerous plan called Project 2025 that the former president intends to implement if re-elected,” Harris said.

Without any help from moderators, Trump categorically denied any connection to the plan.

“I have nothing to do with Project 2025,” he insisted. “It’s something that exists. I haven’t read it. I don’t want to read it, voluntarily. I’m not going to read it.”

The 922-page “Mandate for Leadership” is a manifesto written by the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation that provides instructions for how the next Republican administration should lead the United States by overhauling the federal government.

ASSET:

Democrats are ‘killing babies’

On the subject of abortion, Trump repeated that Democrats support killing babies after birth.

Davis intervened when the Republican referenced former Virginia Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam’s remarks in 2019 about aborting babies after birth, which were part of a lengthy commentary on Trump’s belief in state autonomy and legal access to the procedure in cases of rape, incest and the mother’s health.

“You can look at the governor of West Virginia (sic), the former governor of West Virginia… he said, ‘The baby will be born and we will decide what to do with the baby. In other words, we will execute the baby,'” Trump said, misidentifying Northam’s state.

“The Democrats are radical on this point.”

Davis added: “There is no state in the country where it is legal to kill a baby after birth.”

Crime is soaring

At one point, Trump claimed that crime in the United States had skyrocketed under the Biden administration because migrants were being allowed into the country.

“President Trump, as you know, the FBI says overall violent crime is down,” Muir interrupted, sparking an argument with the former president.

Trump responded by insisting that they “did not include the cities with the highest crime rates,” referring to the omission of data from Los Angeles, New York and Chicago.

Migrants ‘eat cats and dogs’

The moderators also intervened when Trump suddenly referenced a debunked report that illegal immigrants were killing and eating pets in Ohio.

“In Springfield, they eat the dogs, they eat the people who came, they eat the cats… They eat the pets of the people who live there,” Trump said.

He was referring to the wild, viral claim — which has been picked up and turned into a meme by Elon Musk, Republican influencers and Trump’s No. 2, J.D. Vance — that migrants from Haiti have stolen pets from yards and ducks from public parks so they can eat them.

Muir intervened, saying Springfield authorities said there were no credible or detailed reports to support that claim.

“I want to clarify that you are referring to Springfield, Ohio. ABC News reached out to the city manager of the city. He told us that there have been no credible reports of specific complaints about pets being injured, mistreated or abused by individuals within the immigrant community,” the moderator said.

Trump retorted that he had seen it on television.

“People on TV are saying my dog ​​was kidnapped and used as food. Maybe he said that and maybe it’s a good thing for a city manager to say,” he said.

A Stolen Election in 2020

Trump was also asked about his long-standing claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

Muir pointed out that Trump recently conceded three times that he lost the election to President Biden — despite years of not publicly admitting defeat.

Trump, however, retorted that his recent statements were sarcastic.

“I said that sarcastically. You know that. They said, ‘Oh, we lost by a whisker.’ It was sarcastically said. Look, there’s so much evidence. Just look at it. And they should have sent it back to the legislatures for approval. I got almost 75 million votes. The most votes a sitting president has ever gotten. I was told if I got 63, which I did in 2016, I couldn’t be beaten,” Trump said.

Muir replied: “I watched all those videos. I didn’t detect any sarcasm.”

The war in Ukraine

At one point, the 45th president was also taken aback when he referred to Biden’s handling of Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Trump said Biden “sent (Harris) to negotiate with (Ukrainian President Volodymyr) Zelensky and (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, and she did it, and the war started three days later, and that’s the kind of talent we have with her.”

Her remarks were a reference to the vice president’s deployment to Europe, where she did not meet with Putin, in February 2022 to try to prevent Moscow from invading kyiv.

After Trump’s remark, Muir asked Harris: “Vice President Harris, have you ever met Vladimir Putin?”

Harris quickly retorted that this was one of Trump’s “lies.”

With post wires