Cory Booker's campaign hit back after the Washington Post gave him four "Pinocchios" for claiming that Republican and Russian suppression of black voters led to President Trump winning Michigan in 2016.
“We lost the state of Michigan because everybody from Republicans to Russians were targeting the suppression of African American voters,” the New Jersey senator said during the Democratic presidential primary debate on Thursday. Trump won Michigan by less than 1%, receiving only around 10,700 more votes than Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
The Washington Post fact-checker found that while black voter turnout was down in 2016 compared to when Barack Obama was on the ballot, there was not evidence that Russian propaganda or other suppression efforts caused the lower turnout. On the fact-check rating scale, the maximum of four Pinocchios indicates that the falsehood was a "whopper."
