Which specific claims on the new White House plaques have been fact-checked and what are the findings?

1. What the plaques say and which outlets reviewed them

The plaques — photographed and widely published — pair portraits with editorial captions that describe Biden as “Sleepy Joe” and “the worst President in American history,” accuse him of taking office “as a result of the most corrupt election ever seen,” and portray Obama as “one of the most divisive political figures,” among many other assertions; major news organizations and fact‑checkers treated the plaques as genuine and examined their claims (AP, People, CBC, Snopes) ^{[6] [7] [8] [5]}. Outlets that conducted specific verifications include the BBC’s Verify unit, Reuters, PBS NewsHour, Politifact and Snopes, which focused on factual claims embedded in the plaques rather than the plaques’ tone or intent ^{[1] [9] [2] [3] [5]}.

2. The “most corrupt election” / stolen‑2020 claims — fact‑checked and found false

Multiple outlets fact‑checked the plaque language accusing Biden of winning the presidency through corruption or stolen votes and concluded those assertions are false or unsupported by evidence; Reuters summarized that the plaque “falsely accuses him of winning the ‘most corrupt election ever’” and other outlets noted there is no evidence of the widespread fraud alleged ^{[2] [1]}. PBS and Politifact characterized the plaques’ descriptions of recent Democratic presidents as misleading or false, reflecting standard fact‑checking conclusions that the broad “stolen election” text is unproven rhetoric rather than factual record ^{[3] [4]}.

3. Specific voting fraud claims — machine flips, unexplained surges, “dead” voters — investigated and debunked

The BBC Verify team examined several concrete allegations echoed on the plaques and related messaging — including claims of voting machines flipping votes, unexplained surges in Democratic ballots, and thousands of deceased people voting in Michigan — and reported those specific assertions were not true based on available evidence and previous investigative work ^[1]. That reporting aligns with broader fact‑checking work after the 2020 election that found no systemic machine‑flipping or mass votes cast by the dead ^[1].

4. The autopen allegation and claims about autopen use — framed as false or misleading

The plaques’ visual choice to show an autopen under Biden’s space and text accusing him of “unprecedented use of the autopen” have been flagged as misleading; PBS noted Trump’s prior false claims that autopen use invalidated pardons, and Reuters characterized the autopen claim as false in context ^{[3] [2]}. Fact‑checkers point out that routine administrative uses of delegated signatures do not equate to the sweeping charge implied on the plaque, and outlets treated that accusation as editorialized misinformation rather than a substantiated legal claim ^{[3] [2]}.

5. Other policy and historical claims about Obama, wars and the economy — mixed verification and context

The plaques make sweeping claims about Obama “spying on the 2016 campaign,” presiding over the spread of ISIS, collapsing Libya, crippling small businesses, and passing an “Unaffordable” Care Act; outlets including People, PBS and Politifact describe these as rooted in falsehoods, exaggeration or partisan framing and treated many as misleading summaries of complex events rather than straight facts ^{[7] [3] [4]}. Reporting shows fact‑checkers did not accept the plaques’ causal or absolute statements — for example, complex foreign‑policy outcomes and legislative impacts cannot be reduced to single causal lines the plaques assert — and labeled several claims misleading or false ^{[3] [4]}.

6. What has not been fully fact‑checked or is outside available reporting

Some plaque language — such as hyperbolic character judgments (“worst President”) or partisan interpretations of policy outcomes — are subjective and therefore not amenable to traditional fact‑checking; outlets repeatedly noted the plaques’ tone and political purpose but did not treat every adjective as a verifiable factual claim ^{[6] [10]}. Where reporting did not find direct empirical support for a plaque’s numbered assertion, fact‑checkers either labeled it false/misleading (when concrete claims existed) or described it as partisan opinion (when it was evaluative), and journalists explicitly limited themselves to what evidence allowed ^{[1] [5] [4]}.

Conclusion: Which plaque claims were fact‑checked and the findings

Fact‑checkers focused on concrete allegations — the stolen‑2020 election charge, claims of machine flips and dead voters in Michigan, and the autopen accusation — and found those central factual claims to be false or unsupported; broader policy and historical assertions about Obama and others were judged misleading, exaggerated or framed as partisan opinion rather than empirically supported history ^{[1] [2] [3] [5] [4]}. Journalistic coverage therefore separates verifiable falsehoods from rhetorical insults: when the plaques make a testable factual claim, multiple outlets flagged it as false; when they issue evaluative judgments, outlets treated them as partisan messaging outside strict factual proof ^{[1] [6] [10]}.