False and Misleading Claims in October 2025
In October 2025, a barrage of dramatic claims and misinformation emanated from the White House and its allies. These statements often dominated headlines, serving as political noise that captured public attention – even as fact-checkers debunked many of them. Notable examples include:
Insurrection Act Exaggeration: President Trump repeatedly claimed that “50% of the presidents, almost, have used” the Insurrection Act, implying his potential use of it was routinepolitifact.com. In reality, only 17 of 45 presidents (about 37%) ever invoked the Insurrection Act, mostly over a century agopolitifact.com. Legal experts noted Trump’s assertion “omits context” – past invocations addressed rebellions or civil rights crises, not ordinary crime – and his claim of “unquestioned power” was flatly wrongpolitifact.compolitifact.com. PolitiFact rated this statement Mostly Falsepolitifact.com.
“Solved Wars” Boast: On October 17, Trump boasted, “We’ve never had a president that solved one war, not one war” before himpolitifact.com. This sweeping claim ignored history: at least two U.S. presidents (Theodore Roosevelt and Jimmy Carter) personally brokered peace agreements ending foreign wars – efforts that earned Nobel Peace Prizes – and others oversaw peace deals via their envoyspolitifact.compolitifact.com. Trump’s self-aggrandizing statement was rated “Pants on Fire” (extremely false)politifact.compolitifact.com.
Drug Boats and Fentanyl Fear-Mongering: Trump justified lethal strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats from Venezuela by claiming “Every boat that we knock out we save 25,000 American lives”washingtonpost.com. He alleged five boat attacks had already saved over 100,000 lives by preventing fentanyl influx. No evidence was provided for the quantity of drugs on these boats, and experts noted Venezuela is a minor transit route for U.S.-bound fentanylpolitifact.compolitifact.com. Even if each boat carried 25,000 fatal doses, the math didn’t add up – five boats would account for 125,000 deaths, nearly double the total U.S. drug overdose deaths in an entire yearpolitifact.com. Stopping drugs doesn’t translate directly to lives saved, and Trump’s figure was deemed absurd. PolitiFact and CNN both highlighted that the claim was baseless and wildly exaggeratedpolitifact.compolitifact.com, with PolitiFact rating it “Pants on Fire!”politifact.compolitifact.com.
Shutdown Blame Lies: As a government shutdown hit in early October, Trump allies spread dubious claims to pin the crisis on Democrats. For instance, Rep. Mike Johnson (a Trump ally) posted that “Democrats want hospitals paid MORE to treat illegal aliens than American citizens” as a condition to end the “Democrat shutdown”politifact.com. This was completely false – fact-checkers found no such Democratic demand; it was a fabricated talking pointpolitifact.com. Similarly, Sen. J.D. Vance misleadingly insisted Democrats were “threatening to shut down the entire government” unless Congress gave “hundreds of billions of dollars of health care benefits to illegal aliens.” This too was debunked as false – a gross distortion of budget discussionspolitifact.com. These falsehoods grabbed media attention, framing Democrats as villains, even though the shutdown stemmed largely from Republican infighting over spending.
Miscellaneous Misinformation: The October media cycle saw many other spurious claims. A viral X/Twitter post warned voters that “If you vote no on Prop 50…it shows through the envelope, [making] it easy for Democrats to cheat”. This conspiracy-tinged claim about a mail-in ballot was rated Mostly False (envelopes are designed to protect ballot secrecy)politifact.compolitifact.com. In another instance, Sen. Josh Hawley alleged in a hearing that “The FBI tapped my phone” (and other senators’ phones) – a dramatic claim that lacked evidence and was rated Barely True at bestpolitifact.compolitifact.com. In short, October was filled with such dubious assertions, which served to distract, inflame partisan sentiment, and create a chaotic information environment.
The “Signal”: Laws Broken and Extreme Actions in October 2025
Behind the noise of October’s headlines, the administration was aggressively pushing the envelope – and often breaking laws or norms – in ways that have far-reaching consequences. This is the real signal that the flurry of false claims often obscured. Key examples of rule-breaking and legal violations in October include:
Hatch Act Violations During Shutdown: Federal agencies under Trump took the unprecedented step of posting overtly partisan messages blaming “the Radical Left” Democrats for the October government shutdown on official websites and even in furloughed employees’ email auto-repliestheguardian.comtheguardian.com. This politicization of government communications appears to violate the 1939 Hatch Act, which bans federal employees from partisan activity on the jobtheguardian.com. Career ethics officials and watchdog groups were alarmed – Public Citizen filed multiple complaints noting the Trump administration was “violating the Hatch Act with reckless abandon, using taxpayer dollars to plaster partisan screeds on every government homepage”marylandmatters.org. Even out-of-office notices were changed to say Democrats “caused” the shutdown. A top House Democrat, Jamie Raskin, called this messaging a “naked violation” of federal lawtheguardian.com. (It also potentially violated the Antideficiency Act, since government funds were used for propaganda outside the scope of any appropriationmarylandmatters.orgmarylandmatters.org.) In short, the administration leveraged federal agencies to spread a one-sided political narrative – an illegal abuse of government resources.
Illegal Firing of Federal Workers: In a move that shocked federal workforce experts, the Trump administration attempted mass purges of civil servants during the shutdown – actions widely described as unlawful. On Sept. 30, just before the shutdown, Trump’s team issued reduction-in-force (RIF) notices to thousands of federal employees, effectively threatening to fire them while they were furloughed without paynteu.org. They even ordered some “essential” staff to work unpaid solely to process these terminationsnteu.org. Multiple federal unions (AFGE, AFSCME, etc.) sued immediately, arguing these actions violated the law and exceeded presidential authoritynteu.org. Indeed, a federal judge in California agreed there was a strong likelihood of illegality – on Oct. 15 Judge Susan Illston issued a temporary restraining order halting any further RIF firingsnteu.org. The unions expanded their lawsuit as more agencies were targeted, calling the purge “patently illegal” and “blatantly unconstitutional” retaliation against perceived political enemiesnteu.orgnteu.org. Union leaders emphasized that firing career civil servants during a funding lapse is unlawful and purely punitive: “The administration’s planned mass firings clearly broke the law…a blatant abuse of power” said AFSCME President Lee Saunders in an Oct. 17 statementnteu.org. In short, Trump tried to tear down civil service protections in a swift stroke – an extraordinary breach of federal law that was only stopped by rapid court intervention.
Abuse of Emergency Powers (Deploying Troops Domestically): Trump spent October pushing the limits of his authority by attempting to deploy the National Guard into U.S. cities over the objections of state and local officials. He painted cities like Portland and Chicago as if they were war zones to justify invoking extraordinary powers. Federal judges, however, found these claims “simply untethered to the facts”theguardian.com. In Oregon, Judge Karin Immergut (herself a Trump appointee) rejected Trump’s portrayal of Portland as “war-ravaged” by Antifa, noting the city was not in chaos and Trump’s emergency determination was baselesstheguardian.comtheguardian.com. In Illinois, Judge April Perry likewise found no credible factual basis for sending troops to Chicago, warning that unleashing the military could itself “fuel civil unrest”theguardian.comtheguardian.com. Both judges issued temporary restraining orders in early October to block Trump’s troop deployments as likely unlawful. One judge flatly concluded the president’s claims were “simply unreliable” with a “lack of credibility” in courttheguardian.com. As one retired Republican-appointed judge observed, there is now a clear pattern of Trump and his deputies engaging in “unlawful conduct” and showing open contempt for constitutional limits – to the point that even Trump-appointed jurists are rebuking himtheguardian.comtheguardian.com. (Indeed, retired Judge J. Michael Luttig noted that Trump and his Attorney General are “openly contemptuous of the Constitution and laws,” and that federal courts have noticed this and “are going to have none of it”theguardian.com.) In sum, October saw judges push back on Trump’s attempts to use fabricated emergencies to expand his power, calling him out as a “rogue president” undermining the rule of lawtheguardian.com.
Defying Spending Laws (Impoundment of Funds): Another less-publicized saga is Trump’s effort to withhold or redirect congressionally appropriated funds, testing the 1974 Impoundment Control Act (ICA). In September–October 2025, the administration froze billions in federal money (for example, foreign aid funds) that Congress had approved – essentially impounding funds to advance Trump’s agenda (e.g. an “America First” foreign aid review). In one case, a federal judge ruled that Trump’s freeze of nearly $4 billion in foreign aid “likely violated both federal law and the Constitution” and ordered the funds spent before they expiredscotusblog.com. Rather than comply, Trump’s team raced to the Supreme Court, arguing they had unilateral power to withhold money as long as they notified Congress (an argument that effectively guts the ICA)scotusblog.comscotusblog.com. The challengers pointed out that Trump had not followed the law’s procedures – in fact, the White House never properly notified Congress in time, meaning the 45-day impoundment window never legally startedscotusblog.com. They warned that accepting Trump’s theory would flip the ICA on its head, giving the President “vast new powers to impound funds” and making it “virtually impossible” to challenge such moves – clearly not what Congress intendedscotusblog.com. (Simply put, Trump was asserting a power to ignore Congress’s power of the purse.) While the Supreme Court’s conservative majority temporarily allowed the funding freeze to continue (over a three-justice dissent) as an emergency matterscotusblog.comscotusblog.com, even Justice Kagan noted the stakes were “uncharted territory” – the case is fundamentally about forcing the Executive to comply with appropriations lawsscotusblog.comscotusblog.com. Meanwhile, outside the courts, House watchdogs reported that the Trump OMB “repeatedly violated the law” by illegally impounding funds appropriated for various programsmarylandmatters.org. The Government Accountability Office issued multiple decisions in 2025 flagging the administration’s failures to spend money as directedmarylandmatters.org. In short, in October the administration was not only shutting down government over spending fights, but also ignoring spending laws on the books – essentially stealing promised funds from communities (as House Democrats put it) by executive fiat.
Other Legal Breaches: October brought other troubling actions. For example, in the immigration realm, a federal judge in Boston issued a 161-page opinion finding the administration’s tactics unlawful – specifically, Trump’s policy of deporting certain foreign college activists was an illegal retaliation violating those individuals’ First Amendment rightstheguardian.com. Judges across the country – appointed by both parties – have repeatedly struck down Trump’s policies as exceeding authority or violating statutes (over 40 adverse rulings by mid-October on issues from immigration to policing)theguardian.com. There were also continued reports of the White House firing or forcing out independent officials who objected to dubious demands – for instance, the director of the Eisenhower Presidential Library was ousted after refusing Trump’s order to hand over a historical sword (a national artifact) as a personal gift to a foreign leadertheguardian.comtheguardian.com. This raised alarms about abuse of public treasures for private diplomacy. All these incidents underscore a pattern: breaking rules, bending laws, and undermining institutional safeguards at a dizzying pace.
Finding the Pattern:
When we “look at the scope of everything” in October 2025, a clear pattern emerges. The White House generated constant noise – outrageous claims, culture-war distractions, and blame-shifting falsehoods – which dominated news cycles. But beneath that cacophony, the administration was systematically advancing a bold, norm-shattering agenda: concentrating power, dismantling checks, and flouting legal constraints. In just one month, Trump and his allies lied about their authority and achievements while simultaneously violating laws (from the Hatch Act to budget statutes) and skirting constitutional limits on executive power.
This one-month snapshot shows a government playing a high-stakes shell game with the public – Three-card Monte with democracy itself. The lies are the attention-grabbing cups shuffled on the table; the real pea (the substantive actions) often hides under the noise. By tracking both the “noise” and the “signal” – the misinformation and the concrete rule-breaking – we can begin to anticipate the next moves. The pattern is one of distraction paired with rapid policy aggression: while people are busy debunking the latest false claim, the administration is already two steps ahead, changing rules and eroding safeguards at a rapid clip. Recognizing this pattern is the first step in countering it. Equipped with truth-checking tools and legal oversight, citizens and institutions can better see through the smokescreen of October’s lies and focus on the substantive breaches that truly mattertheguardian.comtheguardian.com. The goal, moving forward, is to continue tracking the noise while not losing sight of the signals – so that accountability doesn’t slip away in the din of the spectacle.
CreatorHuman ™ TJ Baden