Category: News

Claim:

Texas state Rep. James Talarico, a Democrat, voted against SB 17, a bill meant to prevent China from buying land in Texas.

Rating:

Context

It’s true that Talarico voted nay on the bill in question, SB 17, even though he had previously voted in favor of continuing to amend its language. The final version of SB 17 included amendments that its opponents said would broaden it beyond its intended scope. A spokesperson for Talarico said he voted nay on the final version to prevent giving the governor more power. The bill ultimately passed and became law in September 2025.

Rumors that Texas state Rep. James Talarico voted against a bill that would prevent the Chinese Communist Party from buying land in the state circulated on the internet in early September 2026 as Talarico, a Democrat, campaigned for a U.S. Senate seat. 

People on social media claimed Talarico voted against a bill called SB 17, some accusing him of rejecting “the basic responsibility to protect the state’s soil and food system.” 

(X user @EricLDaugh)

Supporters of Talarico’s Republican opponent in the November 2026 election, state Attorney General Ken Paxton, unleashed a campaign ad amplifying the claim.

It’s true that Talarico voted against SB 17, a bill aimed at preventing foreign interests from purchasing land in Texas. However, as Talarico and others pointed out, the bill had been amended such that it was likely to have effects beyond the scope of its original intent. 

The legislation was initially aimed to prohibit real estate deals involving Texas land by countries identified by U.S. intelligence officials as national security threats: primarily China, Iran, North Korea and Russia. 

The bill eventually passed by the Texas House in May 2025 was amended so that the governor, rather than federal intelligence officials, could ultimately “determine the countries whose residents, governments and other entities could be banned from buying property here,” according to reporting by The Texas Tribune.

In the Texas House Journal from May 8, 2025, which also recorded Talarico’s nay vote, a fellow critic, Democratic Rep. Mihaela Plesa, explained, “While the intent to safeguard critical infrastructure and land interests is valid, CSSB17, as amended, became too broad and open-ended. The bill now permits the governor and state agencies to unilaterally add entire countries to its prohibitive list, restricting land ownership by nationals of those countries without requiring future legislative approval or public oversight.” 

A spokesperson for Talarico told Snopes via email that Talarico voted nay on SB 17 to avoid giving the governor increased power. Talarico’s team elaborated:

James doesn’t support the Chinese Communist Party owning Texas land and his record reflects that, including by voting to stop countries like China from purchasing land near critical infrastructure like military bases. Ken Paxton is spreading lies about bills that sought to ban American citizens from buying land in this country — undermining our neighbors’ God-given rights — in an effort to distract from his career of corruption. Paxton is the only candidate in this race that has cozied up to the Chinese Communist Party, going on a lavish all-expenses-paid trip to China and meeting with CCP officials while he was supposed to be serving us. There’s a reason Republicans call him “Commie Ken.”

The bill ultimately passed and was signed into law in September 2025.

The record also showed Talarico had voted yea previously on one of the amendments of the bill aimed at protecting U.S. visa holders, but ultimately voted nay on the final bill. 

SB 667 and other related votes

Legislators voted on a different bill, SB 667, aimed at “prohibiting state entities from investing in Chinese-affiliated entities” as a means of funding state-funded pension plans on May 28, 2025. According to the Texas House Journal transcript of that meeting, Talarico had an excused absence that day and did not vote on the final version of the bill, which ultimately passed. 

Talarico’s votes on other bills with potential impact on Texans’ dealings with foreign entities included:

• Yea on SB 1349, which was part of the legislative package that included SB 17, described as “creating the criminal offenses of transnational repression and unauthorized enforcement of foreign law.” (The House Journal shows Talarico as first voting nay, with a correction that it was meant to be recorded as yea.)
• Yea on SB 2116, which was aimed at “business or governmental entities from entering into contracts or other agreements relating to state critical infrastructure with certain foreign-owned companies.”
• Yea on HB 130, aimed at preventing the “use of biotechnology by foreign adversary countries as a component of military power and commercial advantage.

The “Commie Ken” reference in the statement from Talarico’s team referenced to a 2023 report that alleged Paxton went on a “lavish” trip to China to meet with government officials, reportedly against the advice of his staff.

Paxton’s opponent in the 2026 Texas Republican primary, incumbent four-term Sen. John Cornyn, called out Paxton’s trip during his campaign and even built a website called CrookedKen.com that also labeled him “Commie Ken” and described him as “cozying up to the CCP.”

For further reading, we’ve investigated other claims about Talarico, including that he once said he “hated” Christianity and that U.S. President Donald Trump once called him an “insult to Jesus.”

Claim:

A screenshot authentically shows a post U.S. President Donald Trump made to Truth Social saying that there were “too many non-working holidays in America” that cost the country “billions of dollars” to keep businesses closed.

Rating:

Context

Trump made the post on June 19, 2025 — it was not a 2026 “Labor Day message,” as some people claimed.

Rumors spread in early September 2026 that U.S. President Donald Trump posted a message to social media claiming that it costs America “billions of dollars” to keep businesses closed on federal holidays. 

People on social media platforms and Reddit shared a screenshot of the alleged post and added comments like, “a president notorious for spending weekends at Mar-a-Lago to golf and ham it up at sycophantic dinner parties, thinks American workers get too many non-working holidays.”

The screenshot circulated as the United States approached the annual Labor Day holiday on Sept. 7. 

Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., wrote a lengthy criticism of what she called Trump’s “Labor Day message” on her X account on Sept. 2. 

Trump shared the post on Truth Social, but it wasn’t a Labor Day message, nor was it posted in 2026. 

Trump posted the message at 7:03 p.m. on June 19, 2025. It can also be viewed on Trump’s Truth, an archive of all of Trump’s Truth Social posts.

The full post read: 

Too many non-working holidays in America. It is costing our Country $BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to keep all of these businesses closed. The workers don’t want it either! Soon we’ll end up having a holiday for every once working day of the year. It must change if we are going to, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!

A search revealed 29 Truth Social posts from Trump on June 19, 2025, including the post in question, but none of the others appeared to be related to that post. 

While it was unclear what specifically Trump was posting about at the time, June 19 is recognized as Juneteenth, a holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the U.S. Juneteenth became a federally recognized holiday under then-President Joe Biden in 2021. 

Given Trump’s track record at criticizing Biden in speeches, online posts, debates and in interviews, it’s possible this post was another attempt at diminishing his predecessor’s accomplishments.

We reached out to the White House to clarify whether Trump’s post from June 19, 2025, was indeed meant as commentary on Juneteenth and/or Biden and will update this article if we receive a response.

A rumor that U.S. President Donald Trump diverted 300 first responders to Washington, D.C., to work on his administration’s beautification projects circulated online in early September 2026. People sharing the claim suggested they would have proved key in rescue efforts, possibly saving lives, had they been available immediately following the Aug. 29 flash floods inside Arizona’s Grand Canyon National Park. We have not yet found evidence that would confirm or debunk this rumor.

The National Park Service, an agency under the Interior Department, announced closures to bridges, the Colorado River, lodging and trails, as well as confirming two deaths, one person missing and around 80 people rescued or evacuated.

An NPS news release said the two people who died, John Giusti, 46, and Brent Rosenkranz, 42, both of Granbury, Texas, were hiking in Bright Angel Canyon and were a part of the same group as the missing person. A key water pipeline sustained severe damage, as well.

In one example of the rumor, on Sept. 1, an X user posted (archived) a message appearing to place blame for the deaths on Trump. 

(@factpostnews accessed via X)

Other posts featured the claim on Bluesky (archived), Facebook (archived), Instagram (archived), TikTok (archived) and X (archived).

Some posts directly cited the online publication The Lever, which published an article on Sept. 1 with the headline “Before Deadly Floods, Trump Diverted Emergency Responders To Beautify D.C.” The story’s subheading reads: “Trump reassigned 300 National Park Service emergency responders to golf course and reflecting-pool renovations before the Grand Canyon flooded.”

The Lever’s article cited a CNN story published prior to the floods on Aug. 25, telling of Trump’s administration sending 300 NPS incident management team workers — a division responding to wildfires and other incidents — to work on what CNN dubbed Trump’s Washington, D.C., “pet projects,” such as the past renovations for the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and the future overhaul of the East Potomac Park golf course. The CNN article does not say exactly when the purported staffing shifts occurred.

The CNN reporters cited their own review of internal communications and department data, as well as anonymous sources regarding other information.

Neither the Lever’s article nor users’ posts explicitly said the Trump administration’s reported diversion of 300 workers hampered rescue efforts surrounding the flash floods. Either way, users inferred it, some believing Trump very recently diverted the workers, with one Snopes reader emailing, “Did tRump divert 300 specialized emergency first responders from American national parks to work on his Reflecting Pool, in the midst of needing them for Grand Canyon rescues?”

Snopes has not been able to review the same internal documentation CNN cited, nor have we located information that might allow us to conclusively rule on the veracity of the claim that Trump’s reported diversion of first responders hindered Grand Canyon flood rescue efforts. This claim is therefore unproven and we have left it unrated. 

Via email, the White House referred us to the Interior Department, where a department spokesperson said of the rumor that the reported diversion of workers to Washington harmed the flood response, “That is 100% false.”

We requested documentation, information and/or comment from the Arizona Department of Public Safety, CNN, Coconino County Emergency Response, Grand Canyon National Park, The Lever and NPS, and will update this article if we receive further information.

A brief timeline of rescue efforts

Within three hours of the flooding on Aug. 29, NPS Grand Canyon shared details about officials evacuating 50 people by air. By the next morning, the division reported 62 total evacuations out of the roughly 80 rescues to date, and said it had gotten assistance from the Arizona Public Safety Department.

A Sept. 1 notice from NPS Grand Canyon announced the continuation of search-and-rescue operations, as well as that the “NPS Western Type 3 Incident Management Team” — the same as the incident management teams CNN and The Lever reported about — would be taking over command as of that morning. The Arizona Daily Sun published a photo reportedly showing a member of that same team observing an Aug. 31 news conference, two days following the flooding.

For further reading about Trump’s beautification efforts in the nation’s capital, we previously reported about an allegation that his administration chopped down dozens of beloved cherry trees to renovate a golf course, as well as that his motorcade ride inside the reflecting pool caused damage he later blamed on others.

Sources

Claim:

In the summer of 2026, U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the removal of weeping willow trees outside the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

Rating:

Context

Matthew Floca, the Kennedy Center’s vice president of facilities, said in April 2026 sworn testimony that the center felled its weeping willows “because they were falling down.” He also confirmed Trump was not involved in the decision.

In late August and early September 2026, a claim (archived) circulated online that U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the removal of weeping willow trees outside the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

“The iconic weeping willow trees outside the Kennedy Center have been cut down by Trump,” Adam Parkhomenko, a former Hillary Clinton adviser, wrote on X.

The iconic weeping willow trees outside the Kennedy Center have been cut down by Trump. pic.twitter.com/5bZ0AnaPDx

— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) September 1, 2026

Similar claims also circulated on Facebook (archived), Instagram (archived), Threads (archived), Bluesky (archived) and Reddit (archived). Snopes readers contacted us to verify them. One reader asked, “Did Trump have the willow trees at the JFK center cut down?”

That was not the case. Rather, Matthew Floca, the Kennedy Center’s vice president of facilities, said in April 2026 sworn testimony that the center felled its weeping willows “because they were falling down” (Page 27). Floca’s testimony was part of a lawsuit seeking to block Trump’s planned renovations of the center.

Floca said in his testimony that the center felled the trees because of a “maintenance need” (Page 28) and that it was “contemplating” their replacements. Floca added that he had not spoken to Trump, who is the chair of the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees, about the weeping willows or what should replace them (Page 28).

Given the above, we rate the claim that Trump ordered the removal of the Kennedy Center’s weeping willow trees false. Rather, the center’s management said it felled the trees because of a maintenance need and confirmed Trump was not involved in the decision.

We contacted the Kennedy Center to ask when it cut down the weeping willows and whether it had any plans to replace the trees, but did not receive a response by the time of publication. A White House spokesperson referred our request for comment to the Kennedy Center.

Citing a spokesperson for the Kennedy Center, Newsweek reported that the center removed its weeping willow trees in October 2025. Snopes found one image published by Reuters that showed weeping willows at the Kennedy Center in September 2025 and a geo-tagged image from Google that showed at least one such tree cut down in October, supporting this reported timeline.

The neighborhood blog PoPville, which covers Washington, D.C., reported on the removal of the weeping willows on October 14, 2025. Snopes could not view metadata for the images in order to establish their authenticity, but had no reason to believe they were inauthentic.

What we know about the trees

Floca told a Washington, D.C. district court on April 29, 2026, that the weeping willows at the Kennedy Center had to be removed because they were in poor health. He said (Page 28):

Ninety percent of the trees were decaying and every time there was a heavy wind or rain a tree would fall down. If you walk around the center at that time, you would see limbs falling and trees falling down.

When asked whether he discussed what tree would replace the weeping willows with the Kennedy Center chairman (meaning Trump), Floca said (Page 28):

We haven’t specifically talked about the weeping willows or the replacement. I think that a weeping cherry tree would be perfect. But we are going to come up with a complete landscape — a comprehensive landscape plan that doesn’t only talk to the planters and the willow trees, and that will be part of the plan, the replacement.

As of this writing, it was unclear what tree would replace the weeping willows, which lawyer Abbe David Lowell claimed were meant to represent “the grief of the nation” for the death of former U.S. President John F. Kennedy (Page 27).

Trump posted digital renderings of his suggested “new, highly improved” Kennedy Center in March 2026 that replaced the weeping willows with either pink or orange-leafed trees. Though weeping willows change color in the fall, their leaves turn yellow or gold, not orange, red or pink like the trees in Trump’s renderings, which appeared to suggest the president wanted to replace the weeping willows with a different kind of tree.

Floca’s testimony was part of a lawsuit brought by several conservation groups that sought to stop Trump and the Kennedy Center’s board from carrying out proposed renovations without third-party review. On May 29, a federal judge denied the conservation groups’ request for a preliminary injunction that would stop the renovations while the court case was ongoing.

Nonetheless, the center remained open at the time of this writing, despite Trump initially saying it would close on July 4, 2026, for renovations.

For further reading, Snopes previously investigated whether Trump cut down dozens of cherry trees in Washington, D.C., to make way for a golf course.

Sources

In September 2026, a rumor spread that a U.S. airman’s widow was denied death benefits because he died in the context of the war in Iran, which Congress hadn’t officially declared. 

The rumor appeared on Facebook, Reddit and X. One meme in particular made the rounds. For example, one X post shared it, saying “it’s a bad look” (archived):

The meme included two images: one of a young man smiling as he posed in front of a U.S. flag and another of a couple posing on a tarmac, in which the man wore Army fatigues and a woman with long blonde hair smiled in his arms. The meme read:

This is Major Alex Klinner, a U.S. Air Force airman from Alabama. He was killed in Iran on March 12 during Trump’s ILLEGAL “Operation Epic Fury” war.

On Sunday, his widow exposed that Trump is REFUSING to give her death benefits, as Trump never actually formally declared war.

Let that sink in. Trump and Republicans are too weak to actually declare war as the Constitution demands, and they’re leaving dead soldiers’ families holding the bag.
BEYOND DEPLORABLE!

Several Snopes readers shared the meme via email, asking us to verify its claims.

The rumor stems from an Instagram post by a woman named Libby Klinner, whose bio says she is the “surviving spouse of Maj. Klinner,” a former teacher and a mother to a toddler and twins. On Aug. 29, 2026, she posted a video of herself rocking a baby, with on-screen text that read “The Air Force recently told me that because we haven’t officially declared war, my kids and I aren’t eligible for some benefits.”

A review of Klinner’s Instagram feed indicated she lost her husband Alex Klinner, who had been deployed to the Middle East, on March 12, 2026. According to a March 14 announcement from the U.S. Department of Defense, Maj. John A. Klinner died two days earlier in a plane crash in Iraq, 12 days after the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran. (A separate post by Klinner said her husband went by his middle name, Alex, though his first name was John.)

On Sept. 1, 2026, Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Anthony Tata said on X that someone had reached out to Klinner and her family “to confirm they have received all of the entitlements they are owed,” though he did not specify if these included the alleged missing benefits Klinner referred to in her post.

Snopes found no reason to doubt Klinner’s assertions. However, we were unable to independently verify details about the benefits in question without access to documentation or correspondence between Klinner and the Air Force. As a result, we also could not confirm whether Klinner was denied benefits because Congress hadn’t declared war on Iran. For these reasons, we’ve left the claim unrated.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Air Force told Snopes via email that they had spoken with Klinner to ensure she is receiving the benefits she’s entitled to and to answer her questions. We reached out to Klinner for further confirmation and await a response.

Klinner’s claims about missing benefits

Klinner regularly posted on Instagram until March 11, talking about the difficulties of a loved one’s deployment and sharing teaching tips. On March 14, she shared several photos of her husband, saying he had died. Her next post was dated May 9, asking her followers to support the families of other service members who died in the March 12 plane crash. The text in her images discussed grief and her husband’s death.

On Aug. 29, Klinner posted on Instagram a video of her rocking a baby with the caption “Six months of a war we can’t call a war…” (archived).

“The Air Force recently told me that because we haven’t officially declared war, my kids and I aren’t eligible for some benefits,” the video’s on-screen text read. “So not only was my husband killed in a war he never wanted to participate in, but now the benefits we’re left with are being dictated by semantics and public perception.”

“The missing benefits are combat pay-related and were missing from his final paycheck,” the caption said.

On Aug. 31, Klinner posted again, saying the director of Air Force Mortuary Affairs Operations told her the agency was launching an audit into her benefits to ensure that she receives everything to which she is entitled, but provided no further details (archived).

We reached out to Air Force Mortuary Affairs Operations but did not receive a response by the time of publication.

Officials’ response

In an email to Snopes on Sept. 2, the Air Force spokesperson said officials had talked to Klinner on Aug. 31:

We understand this matter has been difficult for Mrs. Klinner and her family, and we are committed to addressing her concerns with care and respect. Department of the Air Force officials spoke with Mrs. Klinner on Monday [Aug. 31] to ensure she is receiving all eligible benefits she and her family are entitled to, as well as ensure all her questions are fully addressed.  We remain committed to providing clear information and continued support to Mrs. Klinner, as well as all the families of the Airmen who died in the KC-135 crash. 

In his Sept. 1 post on X, Tata underscored the Department of Defense’s commitment “to providing Major Klinner’s wife and children with seamless, long-term support,” but he did not reveal any details about possible missing benefits or whether Klinner may have received them (archived):

For further reading, Snopes has covered several claims about the war in Iran, including one rumor that said U.S. soldiers were “openly refusing” deployment orders.