President Trump repeatedly trampled on many well-trampled falsehoods in his complaint-handling fuel speech at the Justice Department on Friday, ousting lawyers and prosecutors to singles from prepared remarks, attacking criminal investigations against him.
His comments, which were billed as a policy speech, were broad, touching on immigration, crime and egg prices.
This is fact check.
His legal issues
What I was told
“They have used the vast power of our intelligence reporting agency and law enforcement as weapons to thwart the will of the American people.”
“They spyed on my campaigns, started surgeries on hoaxes and disformation one after another, broke the law on a huge scale, persecuting my family, staff and supporters, storming my home's Marlago, and did everything in their power to prevent me from becoming President of the United States.”
There is no evidence for this. Trump's claims refer to a wide range of investigations and criminal cases that occurred before, during and after his first term as president.
The FBI investigated contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian officials. Trump's deputy attorney general has appointed a special adviser to continue his investigation during his first term. After Trump resigned, he was charged in four state and federal criminal cases — two about his efforts to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election and his efforts related to retaining his classification documents after he resigned. Trump's employees, families and allies were intertwined at various points in these cases.
However, the president and his supporters have not provided evidence of a vast and long-standing conspiracy to coordinate these investigations that have been undertaken over nearly a decade in the three presidential administrations as a political weapon against him.
The FBI personally investigated Trump's campaign of ties with Russia in 2016, but then director James Comey publicly released an investigation into then-Trump's presidential rival, Hillary Clinton.
Trump administration officials later expressed concern about Trump's desire to shut down investigations on his campaign after he took office, and Trump's deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, appointed a special adviser to protect the investigation from political pressure and avoid the emergence of conflicts of interest within the government.
After Trump's defeat in the 2020 election, Trump was charged in four criminal felony cases. Of the four cases, two were brought by state or local prosecutors. This means that the Department of Justice has no control over them. His other two criminal cases were overseen by special advisers appointed in the 2024 campaign to avoid the emergence of conflicts of interest by Trump's rival President Joseph R. Biden Jr.
2020 election
What I was told
“Fully equipped elections are a big factor.”
error. Trump appears to have mentioned multiple elections, but it is likely he has revived the lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. A mountain of evidence – speeches by election officials, court rulings and audits all confirmed Biden's election victory in 2020.
Documents classified as Biden
What I was told
“We also finished the Biden crime family and Joe Biden's own clearance. He didn't deserve it. In fact, he was essentially found guilty. But they said he was incompetent.
error. Trump was referring to a special advisor's investigation into whether Biden retained and disclosed classified material after leaving the vice president in 2017.
Robert K. Full, the special advisor to the case, said in the final report that Biden held and shared sensitive material but concluded that “criminal charges are not justified” because the evidence “did not establish Biden's guilt beyond reasonable doubt.” In his role as a prosecutor, Hart was unable to determine that Biden was guilty before trial and that the president was not charged with the crime.
However, based on the interview, Hart raised questions about Biden's memory and his older age, suggesting that it played a role in his decision not to recommend the accusation. He writes: “Biden will present himself to the ju umpire as a sympathetic, well-meaning older man during his interview with him, as an older man with poor memory,” he wrote.
On January 6th, 2021, attack on the Capitol
What I was told
“I have forgiven hundreds of political prisoners who have been badly abused. I have removed senior FBI staff who misdirected resources to send SWAT teams after my grandmother and the J6 hostage.”
This requires context. In one of his first official acts of his second term, Trump has forgiven hundreds of people charged in connection with an attack on Congress on January 6, 2021. Many of them included people convicted of violent crimes and arms charges. Others were threatening law enforcement officials who investigated the attack.
But Trump has long tried to rewrite the history of the attack. He also picked out the case of Rebecca Raventz, who promoted herself online as “J6 prayer grandma” for her conviction for misdemeanor charges related to the riot. There is no evidence that Loverentz is the target of a police SWAT attack.
Parents, anti-abortion activists, Catholics
What I was told
The Biden administration “slacks violent criminals while targeting patriotic parents at school board meetings.
This requires context. Trump's claims about the persecution of parents and Catholics stem from leaked memos prepared by the FBI's efforts to track threats made to school boards, teachers and other officials, as well as the potential extremists of supporters of the “radical traditionalist catholic” ideology.
Trump and other Republicans seized both efforts as evidence that the Biden administration tried to target the right-handed education efforts, including comprehensive policies on transgender students and diversity initiatives, and parents who are concerned about education efforts to suppress Christian groups.
In 2021, the FBI created “threat tags” and applied to reporting threats, harassment, and violence against school officials. Such tags are used by the bureau to track trends and share information between offices, and are commonly used for crimes such as drug crimes and human trafficking. House Republicans investigated and criticised these efforts.
The warning of potential extremism among traditional Catholic groups distinguished between radicalized and non-radicalized, saying “radical traditionalist Catholics” that could pose a threat. The memo also suggested gathering information and developing sources within the church to identify suspicious activities.
The memo was retracted after it was later published, and the country's top law enforcement officers repeatedly condemned it. An Internal Justice Department investigation concluded that the memo violated expert standards but stated that “there is no evidence of malicious intent.”
Experts said they were unaware of data at the time that support the idea that Catholics were being widely persecuted by the government for their faith. Biden is a Catholic and often cited his faith for guidance on his appointment decision.
What I was told
“They came to our country, bringing elderly Christians and life activists to trial to import illegal foreign murderers, drug dealers and child predators from around the world, sing hymns and say prayers.”
error. Trump appeared to be referring to the case of an anti-abortion activist who was convicted of a civil rights crime and relented shortly after Trump took office.
Protesters were unable to entrust their prayers as Trump claimed, but were unable to go to trial for conspiring civil rights and violating freedom of access to clinic entrances. The defendant in the case blocked an abortion clinic in Washington, D.C. in October 2020.
Immigration and crime
What I was told
“Our first inauguration month achieved the lowest level of illegal border crossing ever recorded. It turned out we really didn't need new laws. All we needed was a new president.”
This requires context. Trump is right that since he took office, illegal border crossings have dropped dramatically. That's because of the series of restrictions he imposed on the border, and in part because Mexico has stepped up its migration enforcement in response to tariff threats. In February, illegal intersections reached a record low of around 8,300.
That said, after the Biden administration reached a similar agreement to Mexico over the summer, illegal crossings began to fade, and the US imposed new restrictions that sharply cut exile applications.
What I was told
“Under the Biden administration, average monthly homicides have increased by 14%, property crimes have risen significantly, violent crimes have risen at least 37%, rape has risen 42%, car theft has risen 48%, and robbery has risen 63% to 100%.”
There is no evidence for this. It is unclear what statistics refer to when Trump makes his comparisons, but the general intention is to paint a picture of America experiencing soaring crimes. However, in 2024, when Biden was still in office, murder and crime generally waned. Robbery and rape were lower than before the pandemic. The worsening attacks have still been lifted from pre-Covid days, but have fallen in 2024.
What I was told
“They didn't even know why. They imported illegal foreign murderers, drug dealers, and child predators to come to our country from all over the world.”
error. The Biden administration intentionally did not allow criminals to enter the country, but it has experienced an illegal intersection at the border at a historic level. Homeland Security Secretaries have long said that most of the intersections are not violent criminals but people fleeing poverty and persecution. During the campaign, Trump effectively highlighted crime, and immigrants pledged to build support for his immigration policy. However, a study of arrest and incarceration rates shows that immigrants are generally less likely to commit crimes than people born in the United States.
Egg prices
What I was told
“By the way, egg prices fell 35%, half last week.”
This requires context. The sign suggests that wholesale prices, which mean retailers will pay to source eggs, have fallen at least 35% since the start of the month. It's probably a relief for consumers, but what exactly means for the price of the grocery aisle remains unknown.
Agricultural sector data shows that wholesale egg prices have fallen sharply since the beginning of March after the rise until February. From a national average of over $8 for a dozen big white eggs at the beginning of the month, it's under $5 this week. The division has cited “critical outbreaks” of avian flu so far this month and “rapidly improve” supply. (The Department of Justice has launched an anti-trust investigation into major egg producers rather than price, but producers point out bird flu as a key perpetrator.)
However, these prices are still well above the long-term average, and we have not yet seen a rise in wholesale prices at retail prices. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, released Wednesday, showed egg prices continued to climb in February, up 10.4% from the previous month.
