Statements
Florida Democratic Party Fact Checks Ivanka Trump Ahead of Tampa Visit
Today, Ivanka Trump announced she’s returning to Florida to campaign for her father. In her prepared statement announcing her visit to Tampa, she rattled off a litany of lies about her father’s record. To keep Ivanka honest ahead of her visit to the Sunshine State, we’ve fact checked her statement.
“It’s sad that Ivanka Trump can’t talk about the president’s time in the White House without making stuff up,” said Frances Swanson, FDP spokesperson. “Here in reality, Donald Trump hasn’t come close to achieving any of what Ivanka’s claimed — in fact, drug prices have risen, Trump’s tax scam will end up raising taxes for 3.6 million Floridians, and he’s actively undermined protections for trafficking victims. Donald Trump will lose this election because he failed to deliver on his promises and then spent months gaslighting Floridians instead of getting the job done. A smoke and mirrors visit for an aptly named ‘fireside chat’ with the president’s daughter isn’t going to change the fact that Donald Trump’s inability to lead has strapped this state with the worst health and economic crises on record.”
Fact checking Ivanka Trump’s statement announcing her Tampa visit:
IVANKA TRUMP: “‘The President has fought for Florida priorities, including combatting human trafficking, lowering prescription drug costs, increased access to childcare, cutting taxes for hardworking families and prioritizing our great military,’ she added. ‘President Trump will continue to be a champion for the people of Florida in his second term.’”
On “combatting human trafficking”
- REALITY: Martina Vandenberg, founder of the well-respected Human Trafficking Legal Center, recently said, “This administration is undermining protections carefully built for trafficking victims over two decades.”
- REALITY: Like most issues, Trump is all talk when it comes to combatting human trafficking. Trump has actually weakened protections for tracking victims in the U.S.
- REALITY: The nation’s leading anti-trafficking experts are concerned that Trump’s crackdown on T visas, which is an immigration status to provide relief for foreign-born trafficking victims in the U.S., has resulted in a “significant decline in the number of trafficking prosecutions.” Trump’s policy change made it so that anyone denied a T visa risks deportation, discouraging victims from coming forward.
On “lowering prescription drug costs”
- REALITY: Politifact has already rated this claim “mostly false,” because drug prices have either stayed stagnant or gone up during his term
- REALITY: Thanks to Trump’s tax scam, big pharma companies are raking in billions of dollars, but aren’t passing those savings onto the consumer.
- REALITY: Health insurance costs are rising because of Trump’s continued attacks against the ACA
- REALITY: Trump issued a regulation allowing employers to refuse to provide no-cost contraception coverage as previously required under the Affordable Care Act — forcing women to pay out-of-pocket for contraception
- REALITY: If Trump succeeds in repealing the ACA, 3.5 million Floridians who have a pre-existing condition would lose their health insurance or see their premium rise.
On “increased access to child care”
- REALITY: In the midst of a pandemic in which women are disproportionately losing their jobs, Trump scaled back paid leave requirements in the coronavirus relief package, leaving 75% of workers at risk of not receiving paid leave for childcare.
- REALITY: Trump touted an insufficient paid family leave proposal that “does not offer what has generally been considered paid family leave.”
- REALITY: Trump’s tax scam reduced the value of the child care credit for low- and moderate-income families even as it gave huge tax cuts to big corporations and the wealthiest 1%.
On “cutting taxes for hardworking families”
- REALITY: The GOP-Trump Tax bill will raise taxes on 3.6 million Florida residents by 2027, most of whom will have incomes less than $78,500.
- REALITY: Trump cut taxes for the rich, leaving hardworking families behind. 40% of the state’s share of the tax cut went to the richest 1% of Florida taxpayers in 2019.
On “prioritizing our great military”
- REALITY: Trump sides with dictators over our military. Russia paid bounties to have American soldiers killed in Afghanistan, but instead of standing up to Putin, he has repeated Russian propaganda calling the reports and U.S. intelligence a “hoax.”
- REALITY: Trump has empowered his buddies who never served in the U.S. military or government to lead VA policy. VA insiders refer to them as the “Mar-a-Lago crowd.”
- REALITY: Trump’s VA used less than 1% of funding set aside for suicide prevention media outreach in FY 2018
- REALITY: Trump called Americans who died for our country “losers” and “suckers”
- REALITY: In 2017, Trump berated a group of high-ranking military officers, including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, as “losers” and “a bunch of dopes and babies.”
- REALITY: In 2016, Trump claimed: “I know more about ISIS than the generals do.”