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Bulwark Takes
The Bulwark
The news cycle doesn’t slow down, and neither does The Bulwark. Bulwark Takes brings you bite-sized takes on the news of the day from the entire Bulwark team, including Tim Miller, Sarah Longwell, and Bill Kristol, and more.
108 claims · Clear filters
True90% confidence7 sourcesSep 15, 2026The Lenox Spice Village collection was originally released in 1989.Said by AMultiple independent sources (Vogue, Country & Town House, Chowhound, Good Housekeeping, Tocuro, The Pioneer Woman) state the Lenox Spice Village was first released in 1989, and the Lenox Corporation's own page refers to its 'original 1989 collection.' The claim is a faithful extraction of the passage's 'calling back to the originals from 1989,' and no source contradicts the 1989 date.True75% confidence5 sourcesSep 15, 2026The Supreme Court granted a stay in a legal case regarding mail-in ballot restrictions.Said by BThe Supreme Court granted a stay on August 24, 2026 in Trump v. California (26A124), a case over the executive order on mail-in ballots, on standing and ripeness grounds, which matches the claim and the post's 'on grounds of standing' remark. A later September 14 order in Postal Service v. California (26A305) denied a different stay request, so the court did both within the same litigation, but that does not contradict the August stay.True92% confidence4 sourcesSep 15, 2026Judge Luttig wrote an article in The New Republic stating that January 3 is more important than November 3 regarding the election.Said by BThe New Republic's author page lists Michael Luttig's September 10, 2026 essay "The Final Battle for America's Democracy," which opens "Forget November 3. It's January 3," and several outlets describe it the same way. The passage's "Judge Ludding" is a garbled reference to Luttig, and the claim faithfully reflects the passage.Reported in the post, not stated as its own.True90% confidence6 sourcesSep 15, 2026Mike Pence did not overturn any actual votes on January 6.Said by CMultiple tier-1 and tier-2 sources report that Pence refused to reject or return electoral votes and certified the results on January 6, 2021, so he overturned no votes. The passage's core point is that objecting Republicans failed to overturn votes, and the extracted claim shifts the subject to Pence, though the passage itself implies Pence did not overturn votes either.True95% confidence8 sourcesSep 15, 2026Justices Alito and Thomas wrote that the government has a strong interest in enforcing a rule to enhance the visibility of federal ballot mail to better detect election fraud.Said by BThe Supreme Court's official dissent in No. 26A305 shows Justice Alito, joined by Justice Thomas, writing that the government has a strong interest in enforcing the rule and that implementing it will 'enhance the visibility of Federal Ballot Mail' to better detect election fraud. Multiple independent outlets quote the same passage, so the claim matches the record.Reported in the post, not stated as its own.True85% confidence4 sourcesSep 15, 2026The Supreme Court ruled in favor of states challenging the United States Postal Service's election rulemaking process.Said by COn September 14, 2026, the Supreme Court declined the Trump administration's request to lift a preliminary injunction blocking the USPS mail-ballot rule, saying the government was unlikely to succeed, as reported by AP and Reuters while state and voting-rights challenges proceed. The ruling was an emergency order on a stay request, not a final merits decision, but it still favored the states' side, and the claim matches the passage's wording.True85% confidence5 sourcesSep 15, 2026Justices Alito and Thomas wrote in a dissent that the Postal Service has statutory authority to adopt rules and regulations for the collection, handling, transportation, delivery, forwarding, returning, and holding of mail.Said by BThe primary text of Justice Alito's dissent, joined by Justice Thomas, states that the Postal Service's authority to promulgate the rule is a statutory question and that Congress may authorize the Postal Service to issue such rules; Reuters and other outlets quote him saying the Postal Service has broad authority to regulate the mail. The excerpted sources do not reproduce the exact list of mail-handling powers (collection, handling, transportation, etc.), but that detail is peripheral to the core assertion and is consistent with the statutory language the post attributes to the dissent.Reported in the post, not stated as its own.True70% confidence4 sourcesSep 15, 2026The Supreme Court previously stated that no party had standing to sue over the United States Postal Service's election rules until the agency released its final rule.The Supreme Court's August 24, 2026 per curiam order in Trump v. California lifted the injunction because the states' challenge was premature: the Court found the states lacked standing and the case unripe before USPS had issued a final rule, and it said federal courts review final rules, not proposals. The sources say the states lacked standing, not literally 'no party', and the final rule was published August 21, three days before the order, so the chronology is looser than the post's 'until' implies, but the core assertion holds.True90% confidence6 sourcesSep 15, 2026Countries that use mail-in voting include Canada, Germany, Iceland, South Korea, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Poland, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.Said by BThe ten countries named match the International IDEA list of countries that allow all voters to vote by postal ballot, as reported by FactCheck.org, Snopes, Statista, and IDEA's own page, all before the 2026-09-15 posting date. The claim's wording departs only trivially from the passage ("include" versus "The other countries include"), which does not change the substance; sources differ on whether Denmark belongs on the all-voter list, but that does not affect the ten named countries.True85% confidence6 sourcesSep 15, 2026In August 2025, Donald Trump revealed a world leader who suggested the idea of mail-in ballot restrictions to him.Reuters and other tier1 outlets confirm that in August 2025 Trump told Hannity that Vladimir Putin had said mail-in voting cannot produce a fair election, and Trump then moved to end mail-in ballots. Fact-checkers dispute Trump's account of Putin saying the 2020 election was rigged, but that dispute concerns the content of Putin's remark, not whether Trump revealed that Putin raised the idea.True95% confidence8 sourcesSep 5, 2026Fox News announced that Maria Bartiromo is no longer hosting her show.Said by AFox News Media announced on September 3, 2026 that it was parting ways with Maria Bartiromo, and her shows were renamed or handed to rotating hosts, so the claim holds as of the September 5 posting date. The post says the announcement came 'yesterday' (September 4), but the sources date it to Thursday, September 3; that timing detail is peripheral and does not change the verdict. Her attorney disputed reports that she was fired or no longer working at Fox, but that dispute does not contradict Fox's announcement.True90% confidence8 sourcesSep 5, 2026Fox News paid almost a billion dollars in legal settlements.Said by BMultiple tier1 and tier2 sources (AP, Reuters, BBC, NPR, NBC, CNN) confirm Fox agreed in April 2023 to pay $787.5 million to settle Dominion's defamation suit, which is 'almost a billion' in the loose sense the post used. The claim's 'legal settlements' plural is a minor imprecision; the sources document one settlement, not several, but the core assertion of nearly a billion dollars in settlement payments holds.