Fact check: how many of Biden’s debate claims stack up?

Most presidential debates tend to be underwhelming but last night certainly was not one of them. Much of the subsequent coverage focused on Joe Biden’s hesitant, stumbling performance, prompting Donald Trump at one stage to remark that ‘I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either.’ But Mr S was more struck by the sheer number of times that Joe Biden seemed to make statements that were either misleading – or simply downright untrue. Below are eight of the worst instances…

Trump ‘bleach’ comments on Covid

Biden began the debate by accusing Trump of not taking the coronavirus pandemic seriously, saying Trump told Americans, ‘It’s not that serious. Just inject a little bleach in your arm.’ Trump, however, did not say people should inject bleach in their arm. Instead, in a 2020 pandemic briefing he spoke about an ‘injection inside’ the lungs with a disinfectant, after an aide presented a study showing how bleach could kill the virus when it remained on surfaces.