Category: News

Did Trump share Easter post threatening Iran to open Strait of Hormuz or be ‘living in hell’?

April 6, 2026

“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran,” Trump wrote, …

Read More

CDC. “Measles Cases and Outbreaks.” Measles (Rubeola), 1 May 2024, www.cdc.gov/measles/data-research/. Accessed 9 May 2025.

—. “Measles Vaccination.” Measles (Rubeola), 17 Jan. 2025, www.cdc.gov/measles/vaccines/index.html?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fvaccines%2Fvpd%2Fmmr%2Fpublic%2Findex.html. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Christensen, Laerke. “Trump Claimed Autism Rates Are Rising. Here Are the Facts.” Snopes, Snopes.com, 8 Mar. 2025, www.snopes.com/news/2025/03/09/trump-autism-rates-facts/. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Dubé, Ève, et al. “Vaccine Hesitancy, Acceptance, and Anti-Vaccination: Trends and Future Prospects for Public Health.” Annual Review of Public Health, vol. 42, no. 1, Apr. 2021, pp. 175–91, https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-publhealth-090419-102240.

Gorvett, Zaria. “The Controversial Cells That Saved 10 Million Lives.” BBC, 4 Nov. 2020, www.bbc.com/future/article/20201103-the-controversial-cells-that-saved-10-million-lives. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Hayflick, L., and P. S. Moorhead. “THE SERIAL CULTIVATION of HUMAN DIPLOID CELL STRAINS.” Experimental Cell Research, vol. 25, no. 1, May 1961, pp. 6–7, cogforlife.org/Hayflick1961ExpCell.pdf. Accessed 9 May 2025.

“Human Cell Strains in Vaccine Development.” Cpp-Hov.netlify.app, historyofvaccines.org/vaccines-101/how-are-vaccines-made/human-cell-strains-vaccine-development. Accessed 9 May 2025.

‘Immunization’. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, https://www.hhs.gov/immunization/basics/types/index.html.

Kasprak, Alex. “Did the Government Censor an Expert Witness Who Changed His View on Vaccines?” Snopes, Snopes.com, 21 Jan. 2019, www.snopes.com/news/2019/01/21/witness-view-vaccines-autism/. Accessed 9 May 2025.

—. “FACT CHECK: Would Breaking a Vaccine Vial Necessitate Evacuating a Building?” Snopes, Snopes.com, 15 May 2017, www.snopes.com/fact-check/vaccine-vial-evacuating-building/. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Krow-Lucal, Elisabeth. ‘Measles, Mumps, Rubella Vaccine (PRIORIX): Recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices — United States, 2022’. MMWR. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, vol. 71, 2022. www.cdc.gov, https://doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm7146a1.

Leonard Hayflick (1928- ) | Embryo Project Encyclopedia. https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/leonard-hayflick-1928. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Mangtani, Punam, et al. “Safety Profile of Rubella Vaccine Administered to Pregnant Women: A Systematic Review of Pregnancy Related Adverse Events Following Immunisation, Including Congenital Rubella Syndrome and Congenital Rubella Infection in the Foetus or Infant.” Vaccine, vol. 38, no. 5, Jan. 2020, pp. 963–78, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2019.11.070. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Measles Rubella Vaccine – an Overview | ScienceDirect Topics. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/immunology-and-microbiology/measles-rubella-vaccine. Accessed 9 May 2025.

NewsNation. “RFK Jr.: Measles Cases in US Not as Bad as in Other Countries | CUOMO Town Hall: Trump’s First 100 D.” YouTube, 30 Apr. 2025, www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4i7kGh63jo. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Q&A – DNA, FETAL CELLS & VACCINES: WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW. Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Vaccine Education Center, Summer 2022, https://www.chop.edu/sites/default/files/vaccine-education-center-dna-fetal-cells-vaccines.pdf.

Serrano, Manuel. “Leonard Hayflick (1928-2024) – Obituary.” Npj Aging, vol. 10, no. 1, Springer Science and Business Media LLC, Oct. 2024, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41514-024-00174-0. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Shmerling, Robert H. “Measles Is Making a Comeback: Can We Stop It? – Harvard Health.” Harvard Health, 6 Mar. 2025, www.health.harvard.edu/blog/measles-is-making-a-comeback-can-we-stop-it-202503063091. Accessed 9 May 2025.

“Vaccine Ingredients: Fetal Cells.” Chop.edu, 2024, www.chop.edu/vaccine-education-center/vaccine-safety/vaccine-ingredients/fetal-tissues. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Vally, Hassan. ‘The MMR Vaccine Doesn’t Contain “Aborted Fetus Debris”, as RFK Jr Has Claimed. Here’s the Science’. The Conversation, 2 May 2025, http://theconversation.com/the-mmr-vaccine-doesnt-contain-aborted-fetus-debris-as-rfk-jr-has-claimed-heres-the-science-255718.

West, Michael D., et al. “Leonard Hayflick (1928–2024).” Nature Aging, Nature Portfolio, Sept. 2024, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43587-024-00720-1. Accessed 9 May 2025.. Archived: https://archive.is/adlw1.

WI-38 – CCL-75 | ATCC. https://www.atcc.org/products/ccl-75. Accessed 9 May 2025.

Claim:

During a weather broadcast, meteorologist John Morales said of his ability to predict hurricanes in Florida, “I am not sure I can do that this year because of the cuts, the gutting, the sledgehammer attack on science in general.”

Rating:

Context

Morales said these words in June 2025, not in the summer of 2026, as some posts implied. Snopes reached out to him, asking if he felt the same way a year on, and awaits a response.

In August 2026, a rumor spread that Florida weatherman John Morales, of NBC 6 South Florida, had gone off-script during a weather broadcast saying he feared he could no longer accurately predict hurricanes due to government funding cuts enacted by the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. 

As Snopes readers emailed and searched the website seeking to confirm this was true, the claim spread on social media. One Facebook post showed an image of Morales and said he had “suddenly shifted gear” during a broadcast to tell the audience he was no longer certain he could predict the weather “this year” due to “the cuts, the gutting, the sledgehammer attack on science in general” (archived):

Morales did say these words, and as a result we’ve rated the quote correctly attributed. However, he did not say it in the summer of 2026, but in June 2025.

We reached out to Morales to ask if he still felt he could no longer confidently predict the path of hurricanes. We will update this report should he respond.

Snopes identified the video clip in which Morales said he feared he could no longer predict hurricanes due to government funding cuts. It was posted to the YouTube channel of NBC 6 South Florida, a local NBC affiliate, on June 3, 2025:

After re-airing a clip from 2019 in which he discussed Hurricane Dorian, a violent hurricane that had devastated the Bahamas and was moving up the east coast of the U.S., Morales said (at the 00:50 mark):

Lots of people in Florida were concerned the hurricane was heading here. And as you’ve grown accustomed to my presentations over my 34 years in South Florida newscasts, confidently I went on TV and I told you, it’s going to turn. You don’t need to worry. It is going to turn. 

And I am here to tell you that I am not sure I can do that this year because of the cuts, the gutting, the sledgehammer attack on science in general. 

And I could talk about that for a long, long time and how that is affecting the U.S. leadership in science over many years and how we’re losing that leadership. And this is a multigenerational impact on science in this country. All right. 

But specifically, let’s talk about the federal government cuts to the National Weather Service and to NOAA. Did you know that Central and South Florida National Weather Service offices are currently basically 20 to 40% understaffed from Tampa to Key West, including the Miami office? Twenty to 40% understaffed. 

Now, this type of staffing shortage is having impacts across the nation because there’s been a nearly 20% reduction in weather balloon releases, launches that carry those radio signs. And what we’re starting to see is that the quality of the forecasts is becoming degraded. There’s also a chance, because of some of these cuts, that NOAA hurricane Hunter aircraft will not be able to fly this year, and with less reconnaissance missions, we may be flying blind, and we may not exactly know how strong a hurricane is before it reaches the coastline, like happened a couple of years ago in Hurricane Otis in Acapulco, Mexico.

At the time, reputable news outlets such as The Independent and The New York Times reported on Morales’ broadcast. 

For further reading, Snopes covered several claims related to Trump administration government funding cuts, including the rumor that such cuts caused a screwworm outbreak in the U.S.

In August 2026, an image appeared online claiming to show (archived, archived) U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., with the late financier and sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein. 

According to some posts, the photograph was supposedly taken at an event in 2013. Snopes readers wrote in asking whether the image was real.

(David J Harris Jr. via Facebook)

We found that the photo not real, and was generated with artificial intelligence tools. The post was a good example of AI slop — low quality content produced using AI aiming to play the algorithm to go viral and make money.

August 2026 wasn’t the first time the image went viral. Snopes debunked it months earlier. 

Performing a reverse image search on Google showed the earliest example of the image was dated Feb. 11 and originated from the X account @DumbFckFinder — a finding supported by the “DFF” watermark to the right of Jeffries’ head. We reached out to the owner of that account hoping to confirm they created the photo, but had not heard back at time of publication. 

That account describes its output as parody and satire. When Snopes first investigated the image, the account’s bio said it is “an AI-powered meme engine that turns stupidity into content,” reading:

We use AI to create memes, songs, stories, and visuals that call things exactly how they are — fast, loud, and impossible to ignore. If something looks dumb, sounds dumb, or feels off, we turn it into something shareable.

(The account’s bio has changed since then.)

A reverse image search revealed the image had been posted only to social media, and never by prominent news media outlets. Given the scale of the Epstein case, prominent news media outlets would have widely reported this rumor, if true.

Finally, we ran the image in the post through Google’s Gemini AI. Any image generated by Gemini contains a watermark called a SynthID. Gemini found that “most or all of this image was edited or generated with Google AI.” 

To avoid errors, we recommend checking for other signs of AI on top of using SynthID screening tools since they can show false positives. In this case, our primary evidence was the X account’s original disclaimer that its output is “AI-powered.” 

For further reading, Snopes previously reported on another story from the same account of a fake photo with Epstein and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

For background, here is why we alert readers to rumors created by sources that call their output humorous or satirical.

Investigating claims US sank unarmed Iranian ship and refused to rescue survivors

March 6, 2026

The IRIS Dena was headed back to Iran from Visakhapatnam, India, where it participated in a mult …

Read More

In August 2026, Republican and right-leaning social media accounts shared posts attempting to tie Michigan Secretary of State and gubernatorial candidate Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, to the Ku Klux Klan. 

These posts claimed Benson held a leadership role at the Southern Poverty Law Center — a prominent civil rights group known for tracking extremist groups — while it supposedly funneled money to the KKK.  

“Secretary of State @JocelynBenson must explain to the people of Michigan her involvement with the Southern Poverty Law Center while it funded radical groups like the KKK and others that committed acts of racism against Americans,” said one X post from the official Michigan House Republicans account. 

Similar posts circulated on Facebook. A conservative dark money group, America Next, ran an attack ad tying Benson to the KKK. Snopes readers searched the website for information about whether Benson was involved with the KKK or if she funneled money to it. 

These claims are missing significant context. It is true that Benson once served on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s board. However, Snopes previously determined that there was no evidence the SPLC funneled money directly to extremist hate groups. The U.S. Department of Justice has alleged that the SPLC improperly funneled donor money to individual informants in extremist groups, including the KKK. 

Benson is not named as a defendant in that case, nor is there any evidence she was involved in the SPLC’s now-defunct practice of paying informants. 

We have not rated this claim as the Justice Department’s court case against the SPLC is ongoing as of this writing. 

According to a May 2026 report from the The Detroit News, Benson described her role at SPLC as “mostly ceremonial” and said she was not aware of the group’s previous practice of paying informants. Benson also reportedly said the Justice Department’s indictment “smacks of something that’s purely political and retaliatory.” 

We reached out to Benson for additional information about her time at SPLC and await a response. 

Conservative groups have long criticized the SPLC for allegedly targeting right-wing groups. In 2025, during President Donald Trump’s second term, the FBI severed ties with the SPLC, claiming it “long ago abandoned civil rights work and turned into a partisan smear machine.”

Legal experts have called the Justice Department’s case against the SPLC “not a valid indictment” and potentially a “targeted attack.” 

Benson and the SPLC 

Benson’s relationship with the SPLC started when she was a 19-year-old unpaid intern who worked as a researcher and undercover investigator. She posed as a freelance journalist to uncover and expose the plans of white supremacist leaders and groups, according to reports of her memoir. 

According to Detroit Legal News, Benson moved to Alabama after college to work at the SPLC full time, which reportedly inspired her to go to law school. 

In 2014, Benson joined the SPLC’s board of directors in an unpaid role, where she remained until at least 2018, according to tax filings.

“Jocelyn Benson has spent her career advancing the unfinished work of the civil rights movement and expanding economic opportunity, including helping dismantle white supremacist and neo-Nazi extremist networks,” Benson campaign spokesperson Alyssa Bradley reportedly said to Bridge Michigan, a nonpartisan news outlet. 

In July, Michigan House Republicans said emails from the Michigan Department of State indicated Benson had an ongoing relationship with SPLC. However, news outlets who reportedly obtained the emails said they mostly involved media inquiries about Benson’s time at SPLC. 

If the emails included information about the informant program or the Justice Department’s indictments, Michigan Republicans certainly would have shared that in their news release. They didn’t. 

DOJ indictments against SPLC 

The indictments allege the SPLC secretly paid informants within various extremist groups more than $3 million in total to supposedly defraud banks and donors from 2014 to 2023, overlapping with Benson’s time as a board director. 

However, as of this writing, Benson’s name does not appear in any of the Justice Department’s SPLC indictments. 

Contrary to a claim from John James, Benson’s Republican opponent for governor, the indictments also did not claim that the SPLC funneled millions to the KKK, specifically. 

According to the indictments, more than $3,500 allegedly went to one KKK member, more than $70,000 went to a former KKK member and more than $160,000 was funneled to an informant who “then sent funds to various violent extremist group leaders including the former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.” 

The SPLC has not contested the existence of the informant program, instead stating it had a “long history” of assisting law enforcement using its informants. 

“The government is blatantly mischaracterizing our efforts to successfully fight hatred and violent extremism, something we have done for decades,” SPLC’s interim president and CEO, Bryan Fair, said in an April statement. “At one moment, they are appreciating our work in destroying the Klan and now, they are saying the SPLC funded and promoted the Klan.” 

The bottom line 

It’s true that Benson worked for the SPLC and it’s true that the Justice Department accused the prominent civil rights organization of defrauding donors by secretly paying informants in extremist groups, including the KKK. 

However, it’s misleading to claim that Benson has connections to the KKK, particularly because the Justice Department did not name her in the indictments. Furthermore, contrary to the framing of this claim, the SPLC has a long, documented history of fighting white supremacist ideology and filing lawsuits against the Ku Klux Klan. Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has not proven its allegations against the SPLC in court. 

That’s not to say the SPLC hasn’t received its fair share of criticism from both sides of the aisle — just that there’s far more evidence the SPLC is anti-KKK than pro-KKK.