A chart on misinformation that will blow your mind

"They're eating the pets"

I came across this chart — via Dave Weigel’s Americana newsletter — today:

Before I get into the meta point I think this all makes, let’s go through each of these claims individually.

Haitian migrants are eating pets

This one was kicking around the Republican fever swamps for a few weeks but didn’t really pick up steam until Donald Trump famously/infamously insisted that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio were “eating the pets” of other residents in the city during his debate last Tuesday with Kamala Harris.

This is false — and has been debunked, repeatedly, by people who actually are in a position to know.

In a statement last week, a spokesperson for the Springfield police department said: “In response to recent rumors alleging criminal activity by the immigrant population in our city, we wish to clarify that there have been no credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”

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What Trump — and, especially his running mate JD Vance — appear to be trying to do is find some random anecdote about a missing goose or a missing cat to prove they aren’t totally wrong and making, um, stuff up. I give you the curious case of “Miss Sassy”:

If you want to actually understand the complexities of what is happening in Springfield, I would recommend listening to this episode of “The Daily”:

Venezuela is releasing prisoners into the U.S.

This claim has been part of Trump’s campaign stump speech for months now. He usually says that Venezuela is sending its criminals and residents of mental institutions to America — and, as a result, the crime rate is down 75% in the country.

Almost none of this is accurate.

What is true — as CNN reported in June — is that some members of a Venezuelan gang have made their way into the U.S. (and other countries.) But there is zero evidence that these gang members have come to America at the behest of Venezuelan authorities.

In fact, there is no evidence at all to back up Trump’s claims that Venezuela is sending prisoners purposely to the U.S..

As for Trump’s claims that crime has dropped 75% in the country, that’s false as well. Here’s FactCheck.org:

Reliable crime statistics in Venezuela are notoriously difficult to obtain. The government hasn’t provided dependable crime reports in many years, Mike LaSusa, deputy director of content at InSight Crime, a think tank focused on crime and security in the Americas, told us via email.

Although Venezuelan security officials in May reported a 25% drop in crime this year compared with the same period in 2023, “the absence of official reports makes it impossible to verify the data,” LaSusa said in a May 28 report.

In the absence of reliable government reporting, media and nongovernmental organizations have become the most trusted sources for documenting and tracking crime, LaSusa said.

One such NGO, the independent Venezuelan Observatory of Violence, in December reported a 25% decrease in violent deaths between 2022 and 2023. (Violent deaths include homicides, deaths by police intervention and suspected violent deaths under investigation.) That drop was widely reported in U.S. media. If Trump is citing the murder tally as a proxy for overall crime, he is vastly overstating the one-year drop.

Inflation is the highest in history

Again, this claim comes directly from Donald Trump. Here’s Trump at the September 10 debate:

“We have inflation like very few people have ever seen before,” Trump said. “Probably the worst in our nation's history.”

Erroneous! Erroneous on both counts!

Here’s the chart of inflation in the U.S. since 1957 — via the Bureau of Labor Statistics:

As Louis Jacobson wrote last week:

The highest year-over-year inflation rate on Biden’s watch was around 9% in summer 2022. That was the highest in about 40 years. Cumulatively over Biden’s presidency, prices have risen by 19.4%, but that increase came over three and a half years, so per year, the inflation rate was about 5.5%.

The highest sustained, year-over-year U.S. inflation rates were recorded in the 1970s and early 1980s, when the price increase sometimes ranged from 12% to 15%. For one year — 1946, after the U.S. won World War II — the overall year-over-year inflation rate exceeded 18%.

My guess is you likely already know these things are false. What worries me is that lots and lots of people do not — as evidenced by the chart above, which is taken from a recent YouGov poll.

A few other numbers from the poll:

• 75% of Republicans, and 44% of independents think inflation is higher now than ever in history

• 72% of Republicans think the Venezuelan criminals stuff is true

• 52% of Republicans believe that Haitians are abducting and eating pets in Springfield

So, yeah. We — or at least some decent chunk of us — are living in a post-facts world. There are simply lots of people who have taken to heart Trump’s urgings to not believe what they see or what they hear.

This is useful for Trump’s political purposes. He can tell his base anything and they will believe it — even if there are objective facts that make clear he is wrong. When you are trying to win an election, having that sort of loyalty among your base is of value.

But this trend towards a create-your-own-reality world is devastatingly bad for democracy. If we can’t even agree on basic facts — like Haitians NOT eating pets — then how are we going to solve problems like our burgeoning national debt and climate change???

The short answer is we are not. And whether you are a Republican, Democrat, independent or something else, that should worry you for the future of our country.