Patricia and Mark McCloskey, the couple who pointed guns at protesters who marched past their St. Louis property in June, spoke during the first night of the RNC on Aug. 24. During their remarks, Patricia said that Democrats want to “abolish the suburbs.” Democrats, including nominee former Vice President Joe Biden, do not want to get rid of the suburbs or end single-family housing policy.

This claim is similar to ones President Donald Trump has made recently about the suburbs as he appeals to that demographic ahead of the election. During a July 31 address, Trump spoke about ending a rule “that was a very horrible rule for people in suburbia.” This is a reference to a 2015 Department of Housing and Urban Development rule — Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) — that prevented federal subsides from going to developments with zoning laws or other discriminatory practices.

Former President Bill Clinton used his address during this week’s Democratic National Convention to attack President Donald Trump’s economic record and response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, an international think tank, keeps data on countries’ unemployment rates. The United State’s unemployment rate shot from 3.5% in Jan. 2020 to 11.1% in June 2020, which is a bit more than triple. The height of the United States’ unemployment rate was 14.7% in April, 4.2 times more than the January figure. The United States has seen falling unemployment rates for three straight months amid reopening efforts.

Canada also saw a sharp increase in unemployment, from 5.5% to 12.3% in the same time period, a more than double increase. Columbia’s rate also nearly doubled, from 10.6% to 20.8%.

Vice President Mike Pence told Sean Hannity Wednesday night that the Trump administration helped create more jobs in the previous three months than the Obama administration created in its two terms. There were about 9.1 million jobs added, including 2.5 million in May, 4.8 million in June and 1.8 million in July. But that is coming on the heels of a disastrous two month span when 22.2 million jobs were lost in March and April.

These means the economy is still down about 13 million jobs due to the COVID-19 crisis. Additionally many of these jobs were not “created,” but rather the result of workers returning to work after a temporary layoff.

Betsey Stevenson, an economist who was a member of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisors, shared a graph on Twitter showing the job hole created by the pandemic.

There were about 11.6 million jobs added during the Obama administration.

Tony Dokoupil, the co-host of CBS This Morning, tweeted this claim last week, and it has been picked up by many other Twitter and Instagram accounts. There have been multiple reports of an impending crisis when the United States Postal Service tries to process election mail this fall, as thousands of voters switch to absentee ballots amid COVID-19. An internal memo obtained by the Washington Post even warns of slowed-down mail delivery at the direction of the newly appointed postmaster general. This all comes as President Donald Trump seeks to weaken the USPS, calling it a “joke” during a bill signing in April and demanding the agency increase package rates to stay competitive.

Martha Johnson, a USPS spokesperson, wrote in an email that the “Postal Service is committed to delivering Election Mail in a timely manner.”

“Customers who opt to vote through the U.S. Mail must understand their local jurisdiction’s requirements for timely submission of absentee ballots, including postmarking requirements. Voters must use First-Class Mail or an expedited level of service to return their completed ballots. We recommend that jurisdictions immediately communicate and advise voters to request ballots at the earliest point allowable but no later than 15 days prior to the election date. The Postal Service recommends that domestic, non-military voters mail their ballots at least one week prior to their state’s due date to allow for timely receipt by election officials. The Postal Service also recommends that voters contact local election officials for information about deadlines.”

While the USPS didn’t explicitly say ballots require a 14-day “round trip,” the agency is urging voters to mail ballots 7 days before their state’s postmark date, which is often Election Day. USPS sent a letter to election officials in May detailing mail requirements for these absentee ballots.

According to the Election Assistance Commission, about 332,000 mail-in ballots weren’t counted in 2016 for a variety of reasons, including missing the deadline.

As the debate continues over whether to open schools in the fall, President Donald Trump continued to advocate for in-person instruction during a press conference on Wednesday. His claim echos similar ones from Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, who spoke about how “more and more studies show that kids are actually stoppers of the disease and they don’t get it and transmit it themselves” during a radio interview on July 16.

A recent contact tracing study from South Korea  found that children between the ages of 10 and 19 were equally as likely to spread COVID-19 as adults. Younger children were less likely to spread the virus.

“Although the detection rate for contacts of preschool-aged children was lower, young children may show higher attack rates when the school closure ends, contributing to community transmission of COVID-19,” the report reads.

Another study currently in preprint review focused on transmission following school reopenings in Europe. The researchers found relatively low transmission rates in countries like Denmark and Norway, which have low community spread. In places like Germany that have high rates of community transmission, however, “school reopening can contribute to significant increases in the growth rate.”

These studies join the growing body of research suggesting that children get infected and can transmit COVID-19.

It may be probable that children are less likely to experience the severe symptoms of COVID-19. “Relatively few children with COVID-19 are hospitalized, and fewer children than adults experience fever, cough, or shortness of breath,” the CDC wrote in an article published in May. “Severe outcomes have been reported in children including COVID-19 associated deaths.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics reported 241,904 cases of the virus among children as of July 16, about 8% of all cases. 66 children have died according to the AAP count. A 9-year-old girl from Putnam County, Florida is the youngest child to die in the hotspot state so far.

White House adviser and daughter of the president Ivanka Trump posted a photo of herself holding a can of Goya black beans on Tuesday night, including the caption in both English and Spanish “If it’s Goya, it has to be good.” The post came after intense criticism of the brand from consumers and Hispanic leaders after CEO Robert Unanue praised President Donald Trump in a Rose Garden event. Unanue said the country is “truly blessed” to have a leader like Trump.

Trump later posted a similar image of him with an array of Goya products sitting on the Resolute Desk. Both of these posts were in direct response to the blowback from Unanue’s statements.

The duo likely violated a misuse of position ethics guideline that prohibits executive branch employees from using their status to endorse commercial products: “An employee’s position or title should not be used to coerce; to endorse any product, service or enterprise; or to give the appearance of governmental sanction.”

Walter Shaub, the former director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, asserted that because Ivanka has her official title in her Twitter bio, the endorsement and her executive branch position are strongly linked and make the violation more probable.

The advocacy group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics (CREW) filed an ethics complaint against Ivanka on Friday. “This is not just about beans; it’s another example of a disturbing pattern of this administration acting to benefit the businesses of the president’s supporters,” CREW Executive Director Noah Bookbinder said in a statement.

Reports of University of Alabama students throwing “corona parties” have skyrocketed in the past few days. Students are allegedly throwing parties with friends who are known to be positive for COVID-19 and making bets on who will get infected first. Tuscaloosa City Councilor Sonya McKinstry said that students put money in a pot and whoever got COVID first would get the money. She didn’t clarify where she learned that information.

“We had seen over the last few weeks parties going on in the county, or throughout the city and county in several locations where students or kids would come in with known positives,” Tuscaloosa Fire Chief Randy Smith said at a June 30 city council meeting. “We thought that was kind of a rumor at first….we did some additional research….not only did the doctor’s offices help confirm it but the state confirmed they also had the same information.”

According to reporting from student newspaper The Crimson White, a local urgent care doctor has seen videos of parties where Alabama students attended and that there was money involved. Those videos, however, haven’t been made public. Interviews with current students do not show any knowledge of these parties taking place.

This claim is essentially based on rumors. Going to a party with a known infection, while dangerous, is not the same as intentionally trying to get someone infected.

The Alabama Department of Health released a statement saying “ADPH cannot verify that a party or parties actually occurred, that persons were present at parties who had COVID 19, or that persons were violating home quarantine. At this time, no cases of COVID 19 have been epidemiologically linked to a party or parties.” In their own investigation, the University of Alabama was unable to identify any students involved in a “coronavirus party.”

There is no federal law that bans carrying a concealed weapon while wearing a mask. Concealed carry laws are almost always made at the state level.

An Illinois law, for example, makes it a felony to carry “any pistol, revolver, stun gun or taser or firearm or ballistic knife, when he or she is hooded, robed or masked in such manner as to conceal his or her identity.” Gov. J.B. Pritzker issued an executive order on May 1 that residents must wear masks in public in order to curb the spread of COVID-19. The intent of the executive order was for public health, not to negatively impact permit holders. Shortly after, the Illinois State Police clarified that:

“The Executive Order does not require or suggest that law enforcement should arrest or criminally charge conceal carry license permit holders for wearing protective masks while in public as long as they are complying with the other provisions of the Illinois Concealed Carry Act and are not committing any other violations of Illinois law.”

Some states, like North Carolina, Georgia and Virginia, have laws that prohibit adults from concealing their identities in public, often referred to as anti-KKK laws. Those laws were both suspended for mask-wearing related to COVID-19.

President Donald Trump retweeted this video of his remarks at the White House on June 20. “You hear about certain places like Chicago and you hear about what’s going on in Detroit and other cities — all Democrat run. Every single one of them is Democrat-run.”

It’s unclear where Trump is pulling his list of the 20 most “dangerous” cities in America or whether by “Democrat-run” he means led by Democratic mayors.

CBS News ranked the cities with the highest rate of violent crime from 2017 FBI data. It is true that the top 20 cities on that list all currently have Democratic mayors:

Chicago: Lori Lightfoot (D)
Minneapolis: Jacob Frey (D)
New Orleans: LaToya Cantrell (D)
Lansing: Andy Schor (D)
Nashville: John Cooper (D)
Anchorage: Ethan Berkowitz (D)
San Bernardino: John Valdivia (D)
Oakland: Libby Schaaf (D)
Indianapolis: Joe Hogsett (D)
Springfield, MO: Ken McClure (D)
Albuquerque: Tim Keller (D)
Stockton: Michael Tubbs (D)
Cleveland: Frank G. Jackson (D)
Rockford, IL: Tom McNamara (D)
Milwaukee: Tom Barrett (D)
Little Rock: Frank Scott Jr. (D)
Memphis: Jim Strickland (D)
Baltimore: Bernard Young (D)
Detroit: Mike Duggan (D)
St. Louis: Lyda Krewson (D)

Whenever the FBI releases crime statistics, however, the agency explicitly advises against making simplified lists like these: “Each year when Crime in the United States is published, some entities use the figures to compile rankings of cities and counties. These rough rankings provide no insight into the numerous variables that mold crime in a particular town, city, county, state, tribal area, or region. Consequently, they lead to simplistic and/or incomplete analyses that often create misleading perceptions adversely affecting communities and their residents. Valid assessments are possible only with careful study and analysis of the range of unique conditions affecting each local law enforcement jurisdiction.”

Even though these cities have higher rates of violent crime, labeling them as “dangerous” can be problematic.

Additionally, urban areas tend to vote more Democratic, so elected leadership in any city is more likely to be Democratic, no matter the crime rate. 64 of the 100 largest cities in the country currently have Democrat mayors.

Finally, connecting violence and partisanship is not reasonable. While voting is widespread, crime is the product of a small number of people in small areas. It is not representative of the behavior of a city or of its leadership. A 2015 study examined crime networks in Chicago and concluded that 70% of the city’s non-fatal gun injuries involves networks that include just 6% of the city’s population.