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Nicolle Wallace, MS NOW
Drawing on years of experience as communications chief for President George W. Bush and senior advisor for the McCain-Palin campaign, Nicolle Wallace provides political insight and clarity on where the decision-makers stand on complex issues. Join her for analysis and discussion with the key newsmakers every weekday.
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Mixed70% confidence6 sourcesOct 20, 2026CISA was established by George W. Bush and Donald Trump.Said by DTrump is supported as the establishing figure: CISA was created by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Act of 2018, which he signed on November 16, 2018. Bush's role is overstated, since the sources show only that its predecessor, NPPD, was formed within DHS in 2007 under his administration, not that he established CISA. The claim matches the passage's wording, so no extraction departure applies.Mixed60% confidence4 sourcesOct 20, 2026The Trump administration terminated a contract with a research contractor in Puerto Rico after the contractor failed to find evidence of 2020 election rigging.Said by DMultiple reports (ProPublica, CNN, Reuters, GovExec) say the administration stopped renewing or shut down the Puerto Rico contract with Mojave Research after the firm found no evidence supporting 2020 fraud claims. However, an ODNI spokesperson told reporters the work ceased because Mojave had completed its contract, so the causal link is disputed by an official source. The claim's core sequence is supported, but its stated reason is contested.Reported in the post, not stated as its own.Mixed60% confidence6 sourcesOct 20, 2026John Solomon stated that no votes were flipped in the 2020, 2024, or 2022 elections.Solomon did tell MS NOW's Vaughn Hillyard that the intelligence community has "zero evidence" that a foreign power flipped a vote in 2020, '22 or '24, so that part is supported. But the claim drops the qualifiers he used: he said "foreign power," that he was "still researching," and that "we're not through all the documents," so he did not flatly state that no votes were flipped.Mixed70% confidence7 sourcesOct 20, 202670% of Americans are not at all confident that Donald Trump will accept Republican losses in the 2026 election.Said by 2BThe 70% figure is accurate for Americans who are not confident (any degree) that Trump would accept Republican midterm losses, per the Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll. The claim's specific wording, 'not at all confident,' does not match the record, which puts that group at about half of Americans, not 70%.Mixed50% confidence1 sourceOct 20, 2026The speaker's organization is currently litigating 90 cases in 41 states.Said by 2CThe only relevant source, a Washington Examiner report published November 2, 2026, has Marc Elias saying his Elias Law Group is litigating 92 election-related cases across 42 states, close to but not matching the claimed 90 cases in 41 states. The report is dated after the October 20 claim date and relays the claimant's own statement, and no source names the speaker's organization as the Elias Law Group, so the identification is inferred.Minor detail. The sources confirm the claim; only a minor detail differs, such as a name's spelling, a title's wording or a rounding.Mixed50% confidence4 sourcesOct 20, 2026The largest 100 law firms in the country employ 130,000 lawyers.Said by 2CThe claim's figure of 130,000 lawyers for the largest 100 firms is not what the sources report for that scope. The only headcount total for the Am Law 100 in the sources is 115,043 attorneys (2023 data, published 2024-06-04), about 13% lower, so the figure is overstated for that cohort. The claimed 130,000 matches a different measure: adding up firms with 250+ lawyers in the Law360 400 gives 129,922, which is not the top 100. The sources contain no 2026 headcount data, and the extraction matches the post's wording, so the claim is graded as stated.Mixed40% confidence3 sourcesOct 20, 2026Aaron Wrights is a U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas appointed by Donald Trump.Said by 2BSources conflict on who holds the post. A September 2026 USAO SDTX video transcript has Aaron Wrights calling himself the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas, but the DOJ profile and the Wikipedia list of Trump appointees name Aaron Reitz (2026–present) for that post, and Wrights does not appear on the Trump list. The claim also departs slightly from the passage, which says only that Wrights is Trump's U.S. Attorney, but the verdict turns on the identity conflict.Reported in the post, not stated as its own.Mixed60% confidence6 sourcesOct 20, 2026Elon Musk spent between $100 million and $150 million in the Texas midterm race.Said by AThe claim's range of $100M to $150M is only partly supported. Musk's disclosed contributions tied to the Texas Senate race were about $158M (via the Senate Leadership Fund, passed to Texas PAC), plus $10M to Lone Star Liberty PAC, which exceeds the $150M ceiling. Texas PAC's own spending, reported at more than $148M by October 19, falls inside the range, so the result depends on whether contributions or spending is counted. The speaker's 'probably 100-150 million' was an estimate, and by October 20 filings already showed more than $150M.True60% confidence6 sourcesOct 20, 2026Political appointees at the Department of Homeland Security requested that CISA secretly acquire and hack a voting machine at the beginning of President Trump's second term.ProPublica's October 19, 2026 investigation reports that DHS political appointees asked CISA to secretly acquire and hack a voting machine a few months into Trump's second term, citing two former administration officials. No source contradicts this, but the other outlets largely repeat ProPublica's reporting, and the DHS and CISA did not respond to questions, so the claim rests on a single investigation with anonymous sources.True95% confidence4 sourcesOct 20, 2026The 2026 midterm elections are scheduled for November 3, 2026.Multiple tier1 sources (AP calendar, Reuters, BBC) and several others state that the 2026 midterm general election is on Tuesday, November 3, 2026, matching the claim. The post's own passage says midterms are two weeks away from October 20, consistent with a November 3 date, so the claim does not depart from the passage.True95% confidence6 sourcesOct 20, 2026Donald Trump fired Chris Krebs from his position as director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.Multiple tier1 and tier2 sources (AP, Reuters, BBC, NPR, CNN, ABC) report that President Trump fired Chris Krebs as director of CISA on November 17, 2020, via a tweet. The claim's core assertion is directly corroborated; the post's phrasing about firing 'for making sure the election was secure' matches sources describing the firing as tied to Krebs's election-security statement.True70% confidence8 sourcesOct 20, 2026A group of about ten current and former U.S. national security officials has been advising state governments and congressional lawmakers on how to prepare for potential interference by the Trump administration.Multiple outlets, including the Washington Post original report from 2026-10-20 and later syndications and follow-ups, report that about ten current and former U.S. national security officials have been discreetly advising state governments and congressional lawmakers on preparing for possible Trump administration interference in the midterms. The coverage traces back to one Post report based on anonymous participants, and the White House disputed the concerns without denying the group's existence.