WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump accuses Joe Biden of wanting to end all private health insurance, quadruple taxes and quickly impose sweeping lockdowns due to fear of the coronavirus.
The Democratic nominee, in fact, stands for none of that.
Faced with sagging poll numbers less than a week before Election Day, Trump is offering misleading and exaggerated claims about his opponent as he tries to energize his supporters at back-to-back rallies in key battleground states.
At times, Trump's attacks are inconsistent and appear designed to elicit jeers from his supporters rather than make a genuine distinction from his own policies. At some rallies, Trump has called Biden a puppet of socialists, while other times saying he's controlled by Wall Street donors. He has accused Biden, a practicing Catholic, of being "against God."
But Trump has also plainly misrepresented some of Biden's policies. Trump has repeatedly said that Biden plans to eliminate private health insurance. Biden, however, won the Democratic nomination with a pledge to allow Americans to keep private health plans — a central policy difference from his challengers for the nomination — and his public platform explicitly maintains that stance.
The Trump campaign declined to comment for this article.
Biden's campaign said the attacks are evidence that a botched pandemic response and faltering economy have left the president without an argument for re-election.
"He has been forced to divest from making a case for himself, and is instead resorting to even more wild-eyed, projection-based lies about Joe Biden that have failed him for months and that fact checkers have already carved to pieces," Biden's campaign said in a statement.
Here's a sampling of some of Trump's false and misleading claims about Biden:
— Coronavirus
Trump says Biden plans an immediate shutdown to slow the spread of the virus, among a range of other measures.
"They will delay the vaccine, delay the therapies, prolong the pandemic and close your schools, and shut down your country," Trump said Monday in Pennsylvania.
Biden isn't pledging any of that. On vaccines, he said he plans funding for distribution and to administer it free for Americans. Biden has called for a universal mask mandate but also acknowledged that he likely doesn't have the power to enforce it outside federal property so he would urge governors and mayors to adopt it.
"I will shut down the virus, not the country," he said during the Oct. 22 presidential debate.
— Private health insurance
Trump said at an Oct. 24 rally that Biden would "eliminate" private health insurance. Biden's platform specifically says he won't get rid of private insurance but would try to expand the Affordable Care Act that offers coverage to those who don't receive it through an employer.
"Not one single person with private insurance would lose their insurance under my plan," Biden said at the debate.
— Taxes
Trump said Oct. 26 that Biden will "quadruple your taxes" and earlier claimed he'd enact a $4 trillion tax increase.
It's unclear where the "quadruple" figure comes from, and the Trump campaign declined to explain.
Biden has pledged to dismantle Trump's 2017 tax overhaul but said no one making less than $400,000 a year would pay higher taxes. Biden's plan is forecast to raise $4 trillion over a decade, a time frame Trump doesn't mention, largely by increasing the corporate rate and raising the rate on the top personal income bracket.
On Oct. 24, Trump said Biden wants to "take away your child tax credit." Biden, however, said he wants to expand the credit for the duration of the pandemic and economic crisis.
— Domestic energy
Trump tells voters that Biden wants to crush the U.S. energy industry, an exaggerated claim rooted in a comment the former vice president made in the Oct. 22 debate about moving away from fossil fuels.
"Joe Biden confirmed his plan to abolish the entire U.S. oil industry," Trump said on Oct. 26. Trump told supporters that, under Biden, they would be without air conditioning in summer, heat in winter or electricity generally during peak hours.
Biden, however, is not proposing an immediate end to the fossil fuel sector. He plans to achieve carbon-free electrical production by 2035, and to support coal workers affected by the transition, among other measures. Biden says that he'd ban oil and gas drilling on public lands and waters, not ban it entirely.
— Second Amendment
Trump regularly asserts Biden wants to "obliterate your Second Amendment," a claim he repeated on Oct. 24. He also says Biden will "confiscate your guns."
Biden, however, isn't proposing confiscating guns. His platform gives owners of assault weapons or high-capacity magazines two choices: register their weapons, or sell them back to the government.
Biden calls for a ban on the manufacture and sale of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, regulation of existing assault weapons, the imposition of new background checks and a one-gun-per-month buying limit.
— Border protection
Trump, who made border security a signature issue in 2016, tells supporters that Biden would "dissolve our borders," and "flood your state with refugees from terrorist hot spots all around the world."
"If Biden wins, your borders are gone, which means your health care is gone, the middle class is gone, your safety is gone, your country is gone," Trump said Oct. 20.
Biden, however, calls for securing borders while also increasing immigration in certain cases. Biden seeks other changes to immigration rules and has criticized many of Trump's policies, including separating families who illegally enter the U.S.
Biden is pledging to set the refugee cap at 125,000, a level unseen since the 1990s, from 15,000 that Trump announced this week.
— Religious liberty
Trump has sought to gain support from his evangelical Christian base by saying Biden is "against God" and wants to "terminate religious liberty."
Trump, who is not a regular churchgoer, routinely uses faith as a cudgel against Biden, who would be only the second Roman Catholic president, if elected. He goes to Mass every weekend.
Biden has no plan to end religious liberty, but he supports, for instance, strengthening LGBTQ rights, which could lead to legal cases weighing those rights against religious rights.
— Protests, police brutality
Trump has also said that Biden supports violent protests against racism and police brutality. The president has campaigned heavily on maintaining law and order following the protests that have spread across the U.S. since the death of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of Minneapolis police in May.
"If Biden wins, the flag-burning rioters on the street will be running your federal government," he said Oct 24.
Biden, however, has said he supports peaceful protest but has routinely condemned violence. His campaign has said he considers flag-burning an act of free speech.
"Rioting is not protesting," Biden said in an August speech. "Looting is not protesting. Setting fires is not protesting. None of this is protesting. It's lawlessness, plain and simple."
