Fact-Checking the First 2020 Presidential Debate

Sep 29
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The first presidential debate between Joseph R. Biden Jr. and President Trump is underway in Cleveland, and being moderated by Chris Wallace of Fox News.

  • President Trump and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. squared off for the first of three scheduled debates. They faced over 90 minutes of questions in Cleveland from the moderator, Chris Wallace of Fox News. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, there was only a small audience inside the auditorium and the two candidates were spaced apart.
  • The debate was broken into a series of 15-minute segments and Mr. Wallace focused the questions on Mr. Trump’s and Mr. Biden’s political records, the Supreme Court, the coronavirus, the economy, race and violence in cities, and the integrity of the election.
  • A team of New York Times reporters fact-checked President Trump and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., providing context and explanation.

“Almost everything I see is from the left wing.”

— Mr. Trump

The statement came as the president was being pushed to forthrightly condemn white supremacists, and in an important moment in the debate, Mr. Trump did not condemn violent white racism. His own F.B.I. director said this month that “racially motivated violent extremism,” mostly from white supremacists, has made up a majority of domestic terrorism threats. Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, the acting deputy secretary at the Department of Homeland Security, said days later that “when white supremacists act as terrorists, more people per incident are killed.”

The Homeland Security Department also singled out the white extremist threat as a primary threat in a domestic terrorism assessment published last year. That framework also flagged anti-government groups, including antifa and armed militia groups. But former top officials in the Homeland Security Department have accused the Trump administration of downplaying the rise of domestic terrorism and even suppressing intelligence warning of the rise of white supremacy.

At the debate, Mr. Trump continued a record going back to the 2016 campaign of reluctance to distance himself from white racists who back him.READ MORE

By Nick CorasanitiDomestic Correspondent, Politics

“They cheat. They found ballots in a wastepaper basket three days ago, and they all had the name military ballots, they were military, they all had the name Trump on them.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump was referring to a case involving nine ballots in Luzerne County in northeastern Pennsylvania.

Earlier this month, federal law enforcement officials disclosed that they were investigating whether local elections officials improperly discarded the ballots, at least seven of which were cast for Mr. Trump.

The investigation is ongoing and the announcement unnerved election experts, who saw politics at play, in part because of the disclosure about whom the ballots were cast for. County election officials have attributed the discarded ballots to a clerical error and have said it was not a sign of widespread fraud or cheating.READ MORE

By Coral Davenport

“I want crystal clean water, and air. I want beautiful clean air. We have the lowest carbon. Look at our numbers now. We are doing phenomenal.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump’s administration has rolled back or weakened over 100 environmental laws and rules, among them an Obama-era clean-water regulation that had been designed to reduce pollution in the nation’s rivers, lakes, wetlands and other public bodies of water. The administration has also significantly rolled back or weakened multiple Clean Air Act regulations designed to reduce pollution of both planet-warming greenhouse gases as well as soot and toxins from auto tailpipes, power plant smokestacks and oil and gas drilling sites. It is accurate that the United States’ carbon dioxide emissions have fallen slightly in recent years, but they are expected to increase in the coming years in part as a result of the Trump administration’s regulatory rollbacks.

By Michael CrowleyWhite House Correspondent

“The fact is that I’ve gone head-to-head with Putin and made it clear to him, we’re not going to take any of his stuff. He’s Putin’s puppy. He still refuses to even say anything to Putin about the bounty on the heads of American soldiers.”

— Mr. Biden

In July, Mr. Biden publicly announced that he was “putting the Kremlin and other foreign governments on notice” that as president he would “impose substantial and lasting costs on those who interfere with American elections.” Mr. Trump has offered virtually no words of concern or criticism about election meddling directed by Russian President Vladimir V Putin.

Nor has Mr. Trump condemned or warned Mr. Putin over a C.I.A. assessment that Russia’s military intelligence service covertly offered bounties for the killing of Americans service members in Afghanistan. Mr. Trump said that he did not bring up the report during a phone call with the Russian leader after it was released by the C.I.A. Mr. Trump has called reports of the bounties a “hoax,” but Secretary of State Mike Pompeo took them seriously enough to warn his Russian counterpart.

By Alan RappeportEconomics Reporter

“I’m OK with electric cars too. I’m all for electric cars. I have given big incentives for electric cars.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump offered his backing for electric cars as evidence that he cares about reducing carbon emissions. But the president has actually tried to do away with tax incentives for consumers who buy them.

In 2019, Mr. Trump’s budget called for eliminating a $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles, which his administration said would save $2.5 billion over a decade.

In 2018, Mr. Trump also threatened to punish General Motors over its plan to cut jobs by dangling the possibility that he could end the federal tax credits that have helped underwrite that automaker’s electric-vehicle fleet.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who used to drive a Tesla, has also said that he believed the subsidy was unnecessary and that the segment of the industry should stand on its own.READ MORE

By Linda QiuFact-check Reporter

“They want to take out the cows.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump was misleadingly referring to the Green New Deal, a proposal to combat climate change released by Representation Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Senator Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts. It is not Mr. Biden’s plan. Though the Green New Deal would significantly alter the transportation and agriculture sectors, it does not literally call for the elimination of cars, airplanes or cows.

Outside the text of the legislation, however, a blog post on Ms. Ocasio Cortez’s website describing the plan did note, “The Green New Deal sets a goal to get to net-zero, rather than zero emissions, at the end of this 10-year plan because we aren’t sure that we will be able to fully get rid of, for example, emissions from cows or air travel before then.” Her staff retracted the post and said that it was incomplete and published by accident.

By Zolan Kanno-YoungsHomeland Security Correspondent

“Somebody has to do something about antifa and the left. This is not a right-wing problem. This is left wing.”

— Mr. Trump

Some members of antifa, a loose movement of “anti-fascists,” have committed acts of violence. Michael Forest Reinoehl, a self-proclaimed supporter of the movement, was also suspected of fatally shooting a right-wing activist who was part of a pro-Trump caravan in Portland, Ore. Mr. Reinoehl was shot and killed by law enforcement agents before he could be taken into custody.

But Mr. Trump’s own top national security officials have said the movement has not represented the most lethal threat to the United States in recent years. Just this month, the F.B.I. director, Christopher Wray, said “racially motivated violent extremism,” mostly from white supremacists, make up a majority of domestic terrorism threats. Mr. Wray and other top law enforcement officials have expressed alarm about antifa, but also armed militia groups that tend to be aligned with right-wing ideology.

The Trump administration often cites the killing of a Federal Protective Service officer in Oakland, Calif., as an example of the violence within demonstrations protesting police violence. But that fatal shooting was not committed by a protester but rather a member of the anti-government group the Boogaloo, an extremist ideology that seeks to bring about a second civil war. Members of the movement have sought to exploit the demonstrations to commit violence.READ MORE

By Jim TankersleyEconomics Reporter

“We left him a booming economy. And he caused the recession.”

— Mr. Biden

The economy was not “booming” in the final year of Mr. Biden’s time as vice president, and Mr. Trump did not “cause” the pandemic recession. When President Barack Obama and Mr. Biden left office, the economy was healthy, though growth had dipped below 2 percent in 2016 in part because of a contraction in business investment stemming in part from a plunge in oil prices rippling through America’s energy industry. Unemployment had fallen steadily.

Under Mr. Trump, economic growth accelerated from 2016, spurred by the fiscal stimulus of tax cuts and increased government spending and continued monetary stimulus from the Federal Reserve. The first three years of Mr. Trump’s presidency were similar, in terms of economic and job growth, to the first three years of Mr. Obama’s second term.

The coronavirus pandemic plunged the United States into recession this spring. Mr. Biden and others have criticized Mr. Trump’s response to it, blaming him for deaths from the virus and a contraction in economic activity. But there is no evidence Mr. Trump’s actions caused the recession: every major wealthy country in the world has experienced a sharp economic contraction along with its outbreak of the virus.READ MORE

By Sheryl Gay StolbergHealth Reporter

“You know one of the reasons I’ll have so many judges? Because President Obama and him left me 128 judges to fill. They left 128 openings.”

— Mr. Trump

While it is true that Mr. Trump had vacancies to fill when he assumed the White House, the reason is not simply that former President Barack Obama “left” the positions vacant. The Republican-led Senate refused to confirm many of Mr. Obama’s judicial nominees, including Judge Merrick Garland, whom Mr. Obama named to fill the vacancy left by the death in February 2016 of Justice Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court.

By Danny HakimInvestigative Reporter, Politics

“His own former spokesperson said, you know, ‘Riots and chaos and violence help his cause.’ That’s what this is all about.”

— Mr. Biden

Mr. Trump’s former counselor, Kellyanne Conway, told Fox News in August that Mr. Trump would benefit politically from unrest in American cities.

“The more chaos and anarchy and vandalism and violence reigns, the better it is for the very clear choice on who’s best on public safety and law and order,” she said.

“Seattle, they heard we were coming in the following day and they put up their hands and we got back Seattle, Minneapolis. We got it back, Joe, because we believe in law and order.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump is taking undue credit for the relative calm that has settled in Minneapolis, a city roiled by protests in May. The governor, not the president, sent the National Guard there. Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota activated the state’s National Guard on May 28, three days after George Floyd’s death. The guard tweeted at about 4 p.m. local time that it was ready to respond to the governor’s request.

Mr. Trump tweeted around midnight telling Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis to “get his act together” or “I will send in the National Guard & get the job done right” — an hour after the state National Guard said it had deployed 500 members to the city.

Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan told the Washington Post, that a conversation that Mr. Trump described “just never happened.”READ MORE

By Ana SwansonTrade Reporter

“We have a higher deficit with China now than we did before.”

— Mr. Biden

The trade deficit with China — the gap between what America exports to China and what it imports — fell sharply between 2018 and 2019 as Mr. Trump’s trade war suppressed commerce between the world’s largest economies.

So far this year, the trade deficit in goods with China is running below last year’s levels, as the United States imports fewer products. But while Mr. Trump has lowered the trade deficit with China, deficits with other countries have grown and the overall trade deficit is once again trending up.

American consumers have shifted to buying more goods from countries like Vietnam and Mexico, in part because Mr. Trump’s tariffs on $360 billion worth of Chinese goods have raised prices on those imports.

The overall United States trade deficit shrank last year for the first time in six years. So far this year, it is once again climbing sharply, as both imports and exports remain below pre-pandemic levels. The monthly trade deficit in July hit the highest level in 12 years, and the trade deficit in goods with Mexico hit a new record.READ MORE

By Kenneth P. VogelInvestigative Reporter

“The mayor of Moscow’s wife gave your son $3.5 million.”

— Mr. Trump

This claim is based on an investigative report released last week by Senate Republicans that accused members of Mr. Biden’s family of cashing in on his vice presidency. The report claims that Hunter Biden “had a financial relationship” with Elena Baturina, a wealthy Russian businesswoman and the widow of a former mayor of Moscow. The report based this claim on an unidentified “confidential document” showing that Ms. Baturina transferred $3.5 million in 2014 for “a Consultancy Agreement” to a bank account associated with a company called Rosemont Seneca Thornton, which was associated with Hunter Biden’s business partners.

Hunter Biden’s lawyer has said that he was not a co-founder of Rosemont Seneca Thornton, had no interest in it and did not have a financial relationship with Ms. Baturina. He did not respond to a question about whether Mr. Biden was paid by Rosemont Seneca Thornton or did consulting work for Ms. Baturina.READ MORE

By Alan RappeportEconomics Reporter

“I’ll have 25,000, 35,000, people show up at airports. We use airports.”

— Mr. Trump

Airport hangars cannot accommodate crowds of that size. While Mr. Trump’s rallies in the past have attracted tens of thousands of attendees, in recent weeks the rallies that he has been holding at airport hangers have been far smaller. According to local news reports this month, a rally at an airport in Virginia drew an estimated 3,000 people, an airport rally in Michigan drew an estimated 10,000 people and a rally in Pennsylvania drew an estimated 7,000 people. Mr. Trump has a tendency to exaggerate his crowd sizes, starting with his inauguration in 2017.

By Jeanna SmialekEconomics Reporter

“They had the slowest recovery since — economic recovery — since 1929.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump is right that the growth rate of economic output as measured by gross domestic product was slower after the recession that spanned 2007 to 2009 than it had been following other contractions.

But that fact is misleading in isolation. Growth had been slowing for decades as the population aged and other long-run trends caused the economy’s potential run rate to decline. Nor did growth pick up dramatically once Mr. Trump took office, aside from a short-lived jump on the back of his tax cuts.

It is worth noting that the 2007 to 2009 recession was the worst since the Great Depression, and its depth and length led to labor market scarring, which trapped many would-be workers on the sidelines of the job market.READ MORE

By Katherine J. WuScience Reporter

“One in 1,000 African Americans has been killed because of the coronavirus.”

— Mr. Biden

As of mid-September, 1 in 1,020 Black Americans has died of Covid-19 — the highest rate of death when broken down by race and ethnicity. Since the early days of the pandemic, the coronavirus has disproportionately affected Black, Latino, Native, and Indigenous people, who are contracting the virus at higher rates and are more likely to be hospitalized for severe Covid-19.

1 in 1,220 Indigenous Americans, 1 in 1,400 Pacific Islander Americans, and 1 in 1,540 Latino Americans have died from the virus, compared to 1 in 2,150 white Americans and 1 in 2,470 Asian-Americans. Such statistics are supported by data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which note that people who identify as Black or African-American are more than twice as likely to die from the coronavirus, compared to their white neighbors.

By Kenneth P. VogelInvestigative Reporter

“China ate your lunch, Joe. And no wonder, your son goes in and he takes out, he takes out billions of dollars. He takes out billions of dollars to manage. He makes millions of dollars.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, is involved in a Chinese government-linked private equity fund, BHR Equity Investment Fund Management Co., that won a business license from the Chinese government. Hunter Biden was on the board of the fund when it was formed in late 2013, and he later invested roughly $420,000, giving him a 10 percent stake, after his father had left the vice presidency.

But Hunter Biden’s lawyer has said that he has never been paid for his role on the board, and has not profited financially since he began as a part owner. Hunter Biden left the board in April, according to a letter produced by his lawyer. But as of June, he still owned his stake in the fund, which he was trying to sell. His lawyer did not respond to a request for comment about the status of that effort.READ MORE

By Alan Blinder

“I brought back Big Ten football, it was me and, I’m very happy to do it. The people of Ohio are very proud of me.”

— Mr. Trump

President Trump publicly pressed the Big Ten to reverse its decision not to play football this autumn, and he even spoke to the league’s commissioner, Kevin Warren. But Big Ten officials, who voted this month to try to play beginning in October, insisted that they accepted no federal aid and that Mr. Trump was not a pivotal figure in the league’s deliberations.

By Jeanna SmialekEconomics Reporter

“He’s going to be the first president of the United States to leave office having fewer jobs in his economy than when he became president.”

— Mr. Biden

Mr. Biden may be relying on the Bureau of Labor Statistic’s nonfarm payroll survey, which stretches back to the late 1930s, to arrive at this conclusion. But Herbert Hoover, who was president during the Great Depression, left office in 1933 at a time when the economy had fewer jobs than when he was elected in 1929, based on subsequent estimates. Mr. Biden’s statement also requires the unproven assumptions that Mr. Trump will lose the election, and that jobs will not bounce back to pre-crisis levels before November.

By Michael D. ShearWhite House Correspondent

“We’ve had no negative effect and we’ve had 35-40,000 people.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump claimed his rallies have had “no negative effect” because of the coronavirus and that as many as 35,000 or 40,000 people have attended the events. Both are untrue, as is a separate claim that his rallies have all been held outdoors.

At least eight campaign staff members who helped plan President Trump’s indoor rally in June in Tulsa, Okla., including members of the Secret Service, tested positive for the coronavirus, either before the rally or after attending.

Mr. Trump’s rallies have generally attracted just several thousand people, not the tens of thousands he claimed. While the president’s campaign had claimed that more than 1 million people had sought tickets for the Oklahoma rally, the 19,000-seat arena was at least one-third empty during the rally. A second, outdoor venue for an overflow crowd at the same event was so sparsely attended that he and Vice President Mike Pence both canceled appearances there.

By Jim TankersleyEconomics Reporter

“They said it would take a miracle to bring back manufacturing. I brought back 700,000 jobs. They brought back nothing.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump did not “bring back” 700,000 manufacturing jobs, even before the coronavirus recession. In his first three years as president, manufacturing employment rose by just under 500,000 jobs. Through August, because of jobs lost to the pandemic recession, the sector it is down by more than 200,000 jobs from when Mr. Trump took office.

By Susanne CraigInvestigative Reporter

“He says he’s smart because he can take advantage of the tax code, and he does take advantage of the tax code.”

— Mr. Biden

Mr. Biden missed the point. Mr. Trump’s taxes reveal he does take advantage of deductions and tax credits available to him. But the main reason he does not pay income tax is because his businesses lose far money than they make.

Because of the way the tax code works, businesses can use losses in one year to avoid paying income tax in future years. Mr. Trump has no shortage of losses. Take Trump National Doral, his golf course near Miami. Mr. Trump bought the resort for $150 million in 2012. Through 2018, his losses have totaled $162.3 million.

Overall, since 2000, Mr. Trump has reported losses of $315.6 million at his golf courses. And his namesake hotel in Washington, D.C., showed losses of $55.5 million through 2018.

By Apoorva MandavilliHealth & Science Reporter

“Young children aren’t. Even younger people aren’t.”

— Mr. Trump

The president was referring to the relative risks to young people from the coronavirus. The vast majority of children do not become visibly ill when infected with the coronavirus. But while a strong immune system may protect them from becoming sick, they are far from immune. Several studies have shown that children can get infected and harbor high levels of the coronavirus. And a small proportion of children seem to develop a condition called multisystem inflammatory syndrome, a severe and sometimes deadly overreaction of the immune system.

The debate on schools has mostly centered on whether children who are infected can transmit to others. The bulk of the evidence here suggests that children under 10 are about half as likely to spread the virus to others, but older children, particularly 15 and above, may transmit the coronavirus as efficiently as adults do. Teenagers are also about twice as likely as younger children to be infected with the coronavirus, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suggesting that high schools and colleges may be important contributors to community spread.

By Katherine J. WuScience Reporter

“If we just wore masks between now — and social distanced between now and January, we would probably save up to 100,000 lives.”

— Mr. Biden

Scientists projecting the death toll of the virus in the United States have noted that, should the country maintain its current levels of physical distancing mandates and masking, more than 370,000 Americans could be dead by January 1, 2021 — about 165,000 more than the current death toll.

Should masking and distancing become very widespread, as Mr. Biden references, the total death count would be around 275,000, potentially saving nearly 100,000 lives. Models have also projected potential deaths if mandates were to ease, allowing further mingling and exposure. Eased mandates could catapult the country onto a path toward reaching 425,000 deaths by January of next year.

By Jim TankersleyEconomics Reporter

“I paid millions of dollars. Millions of dollars.”

— Mr. Trump

While Mr. Trump appears to have paid a variety of taxes in recent years, including payroll taxes for his employees, he has paid very little in federal income taxes, according to tax documents obtained by The New York Times.

They show that in 2017, for example, Mr. Trump chose to pay $750 in federal income taxes. That was the case even though he reported earning some $15 million for the year, through a variety of sources. But on his federal tax return, Mr. Trump offset those earnings by reporting losses from his businesses and claiming a range of tax credits, including one that allowed him to reduce his liability under the alternative minimum tax from $7.4 million to $750. It is unclear how his accountants chose that number: Mr. Trump appeared to have sufficient credits to reduce his liability to zero. That same year, Mr. Biden paid about $3.7 million in federal income tax, his returns show.

“He’ll close down the whole country.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Biden, who has stressed the importance of following scientific expertise in responding to the pandemic, is not promising to shut down the whole economy.

In an interview with ABC News in August, Mr. Biden was pressed on what he would do “if the scientists say shut it down” and did respond, “I would shut it down. I would listen to the scientists.”

But this month, Mr. Biden said, “There is going to be no need, in my view, to be able to shut down the whole economy.”READ MORE

By Jeanna SmialekEconomics Reporter

“I had to close the greatest economy in the history of the country.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump often claims that his administration had fostered the best economy in history before the onset of the pandemic. But data show that the expansion that he presided over — which he inherited — failed to measure up to prior economic eras across several dimensions.

The expansion from 2009 through early 2020 was the longest on record. It saw years of strong labor market gains that pushed the unemployment rate steadily lower, until it hit 3.5 percent and held around that half-century low for much of 2019 and early 2020. The robust labor market led to stronger wage gains for low earners and helped to fuel consumer spending.

But many people remained on the job market’s sidelines: the employment rate for men in their prime, for instance, never rebounded to pre-crisis levels.

Output growth, which did receive a temporary boost from Mr. Trump’s tax cuts, has otherwise generally oscillated around 2 percent. That is roughly the level economists see as sustainable given modern productivity and demographic trends, and lower than the run rate that prevailed in prior decades.

And inequality remained very high. The top 1 percent hold almost 40 percent of the nation’s wealth, based on a Federal Reserve survey, while the bottom 50 percent of wealth-holders had only about 1 percent of the overall pie. Those 2019 figures are little changed from 2016, Fed economists said.READ MORE

By Noah WeilandHealth Reporter

“Now we’re weeks away from a vaccine.”

— Mr. Trump

Top health officials have said that a vaccine may not be widely available until next summer. Dr. Moncef Slaoui, the top scientist on the administration’s vaccine development program, recently said that Americans would most likely not be widely vaccinated until the middle of 2021, a timeline echoed by Dr. Robert R. Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Slaoui also said that the chance of having a vaccine by October or November was “extremely unlikely.”

Of the companies with vaccines in late-stage clinical trials in the United States, just one — Pfizer — has said that it could have initial results by the end of October, a time frame the company has clarified is a best-case scenario.

At the same time, Dr. Anthony Fauci and other top health officials in the administration have said that there could be evidence of a vaccine’s effectiveness by November or December. If every aspect of the vaccines’ development and distribution goes exactly as planned, certain people in high-risk groups, including frontline health workers, could get vaccinated this year.READ MORE

By Sheryl Gay StolbergHealth Reporter

“H1N1. You were a disaster.”

— Mr. Trump

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention identified the first case of the H1N1 virus on April 14, 2009. The Obama administration declared swine flu a public health emergency on April 26. The Food and Drug Administration approved a rapid test for the virus two days later.

At the time, the C.D.C. had reported 64 cases and zero deaths. The C.D.C. began shipping test kits to public health laboratories on May 1 (at 141 cases and one death) and a second test was approved in July. From May to September 2009, the agency shipped more than 1,000 kits, each one able to test 1,000 specimens.

A vaccine became available in early October but, amid reports of shortages, President Obama declared the outbreak a national emergency later that month. The estimated death toll in the United States from the H1N1 epidemic was 12,469 from April 2009 to April 2010.READ MORE

By Linda QiuFact-check Reporter

“Did you use the word ‘smart’? So you said you went to Delaware State but you forgot the name of your college.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Biden, at a campaign event in South Carolina last year, claimed that he “got started out” out of Delaware State University, a historically Black university. Many in conservative media interpreted the comment as Mr. Biden claiming to have attended the university, when he attended the University of Delaware. But he was likely referring to the political support he received from the college when he first campaigned for Senate, as he has done in several other appearances.

In a September visit to North Carolina, Mr. Biden called Delaware State University “the best H.B.C.U. in America.” He noted that he began his political career after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr “and a lot of my support came out of that H.B.C.U.”

“I am a political product of Delaware State University, a great H.B.C.U.,” he said in May. “Delaware State University is the best. They’re the ones that brought me to the dance, they’re where I got started,” he said in March.READ MORE

By Katherine J. WuScience Reporter

We in fact have 5 percent — 4 percent — of the world’s population, 20 percent of the deaths.

— Mr. Biden

The global population is estimated to be around 7.8 billion; roughly 330 million people live in the United States, accounting for about 4 percent of it. More than 205,000 people have died in the United States — a fifth of the million who have died worldwide. About 40,000 new confirmed cases of the coronavirus are identified each day in the country, and roughly 300,000 each day worldwide.

By Noah WeilandHealth Reporter

“I closed it, and you said, ‘He’s xenophobic.’ You don’t believe we should have closed the country.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Biden wrote on Twitter in March that “banning all travel from Europe — or any other part of the world — will not stop” the coronavirus, which critics seized on to argue that he was against imposing travel restrictions. A top Biden campaign official said in early April that Mr. Biden did support the Trump administration’s restrictions on travel from China.

Mr. Biden did accuse Mr. Trump of xenophobia. On the day the travel restrictions were announced by the administration, Mr. Biden said that “this is no time for Donald Trump’s record” of “hysterical xenophobia and fear-mongering to lead the way instead of science.” But he did not specifically tie the accusation to the day’s announcement.READ MORE

By Margot Sanger-KatzHealth Policy Reporter

“I’m cutting drug prices, I’m going with favored nations which no president has the courage to do, because you’re going against big pharma. Drug prices will be coming down 80 percent. You could have done it in your 47 year period in government. Nobody’s done it.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump has signed four executive orders on drug prices, which direct the Department of Health and Human Services to pursue various policies to lower drug prices. But none of them have gone into effect yet. The policy Trump described in the most detail, his “most favored nations” policy, will be difficult to implement without new legislation, and will be vulnerable to court challenges. And that policy would only influence the prices paid by the Medicare program for drugs, not the prices paid by Americans who buy their own health insurance or get it from their jobs.

By Sheryl Gay StolbergHealth Reporter

“Your party wants to go socialist.”

— Mr. Trump

Mr. Trump was referring to Mr. Biden’s health care platform. The left wing of the Democratic Party has embraced Medicare for All, the universal government run insurance program advocated by Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont, and a self-described democratic socialist.

But Mr. Biden has not embraced Medicare for all. He supports expanding the Affordable Care Act, which relies on the current system of private insurers. Mr. Biden would, however, favor adding a “public option” to the Affordable Care Act — a government run-program that would cover people qualify for Medicaid, the government insurance program for the poor.

By Adam LiptakSupreme Court Correspondent

“She thinks that the Affordable Care Act is not constitutional.”

— Mr. Biden

Judge Amy Coney Barrett, Mr. Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, has expressed reservations about the reasoning in Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.’s opinion in 2012 upholding a central provision of the Affordable Care Act. But she has not expressed a view about the constitutionality of the entire law or about a challenge to it pending in the Supreme Court.

By Margot Sanger-KatzHealth Policy Reporter

“He’s in the Supreme Court right now trying to get rid of the Affordable Care Act which will strip 20 million people from having insurance, health insurance.”

— Mr. Biden

President Trump’s Justice Department is arguing in Supreme Court briefs that the entirety of the Affordable Care Act should be overturned. The effects of that reversal will be far-reaching. Mr. Biden’s estimate that 20 million more Americans will have health insurance is consistent with calculations from the Urban Institute, a Washington research group with a widely respected model that the measures the likely effects of changes in health policy. But that estimate is a bit out of date, since fewer Americans have coverage now than did before the Coronavirus pandemic.

By Adam LiptakSupreme Court Correspondent

“Some of her biggest endorsers are very liberal people.”

— Mr. Trump

Judge Amy Coney Barrett, Mr. Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, has been endorsed by at least one prominent liberal, Noah Feldman, a law professor at Harvard. Many Democrats object to the process used to place her on the court without questioning her qualifications.

Our 2020 Election Guide

Updated  Sept. 29, 2020

  • The LatestThe first presidential debate between President Trump and Joseph R. Biden Jr. devolved into a brawl, as Mr. Trump urgently tried to shake up the race. Read the latest updates.
  • How to VoteMany rules have changed during the pandemic, making it harder to figure out how to cast your ballot. This interactive guide can help you ensure your vote is counted.
  • Paths to 270Joe Biden and Donald Trump need 270 electoral votes to reach the White House. Try building your own coalition of battleground states to see potential outcomes.