On Tuesday, Politifact, which purports to be a neutral fact-checking website but in fact leans heavily to the left, got caught protecting a member of the Democratic Party: Democratic Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill.
Politifact took issue with the ad from The Senate Leadership Fund, a pro-Republican super PAC, that claimed that McCaskill said “normal people” could afford private planes.
Politifact asked, “Did McCaskill really say that ‘normal people can afford’ private planes?” Politifact stated:
She did, but the ad takes her literal words out of context … By showing her words in isolation, the Senate Leadership Fund exaggerates McCaskill’s remark.
After they were corrected, Politifact acknowledged the mistake, writing,
Initially, we published this fact-check with a rating of False, because based on the video available, it did not appear that McCaskill was talking about private planes. After publication, we received more complete video of the question-and-answer session between McCaskill and a constituent that showed she was in fact responding to a question about private planes, as well as a report describing the meeting. We re-assessed the evidence, archived the original version here, and published the version you see here with a new rating of Half True. We apologize for the error.
Politifact has been called out on its left-leaning fact-checks before, as seen here, here, and here.