Facts Matter: Home Depot doesn’t have a deal with ICE agents
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, agents have reportedly been targeting people outside some larger stores in an increased effort to identify and possibly deport those living illegally in the U.S.
Some social media users appear to have information about the participation by one big box hardware store.
“Soooo …. Home Depot signed a deal that pays them $250 million with DHS, allowing ICE agents to stake out their parking lots and arrest immigrants,” read a July 28 Threads post.
But this claim is wrong, according to PolitiFact. Home Depot is not involved in ICE activities.
“This story is false,” Home Depot spokesperson Beth Marlowe told PolitiFact. “We don’t have contracts with DHS or ICE. We aren’t notified that ICE activities are going to happen, and we aren't involved in them. In many cases, we don't know that arrests have taken place until after they're over.”
The Department of Homeland Security, or DHS, responded to the rumor with a July 29 post on X.
“FALSE. DHS does NOT have a contract with Home Depot, nor do we notify businesses of targeted enforcement operations,” the post read. “This ridiculous claim is just another attempt to smear our brave ICE law enforcement who are already facing an 830% increase in assaults against them.”
Home Depot’s contracts with the federal government mostly involve home improvement.
The Federal Procurement Data System, which provides information on government contracts, listed some recent contracts involving Home Depot, PolitiFact said. Those included a 2017 contract with ICE for paint-related products, a 2023 contract with DHS for plywood and veneer, and a 2017 deal with U.S. Customs and Border Protection for hardware and construction materials.
No evidence for Trump’s claim
Recently President Donald Trump has been repeatedly asked questions about releasing files concerning Jeffrey Epstein, the man convicted on sex offenses in 2019 who later died in prison, reportedly by committing suicide.
During a July 25 news conference at the White House, Trump was asked about Epstein’s private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
“You ought to be speaking about Bill Clinton, who went to the island 28 times. I never went to the island,” the president told a reporter.
Days later, while in Scotland, a reporter asked Trump a similar question about the Epstein case.
“And by the way, I never went to the island, and Bill Clinton went there, supposedly, 28 times,” Trump said.
But there is no evidence Clinton spent any time on Epstein’s island in the Caribbean, according to FactCheck.org. Trump is possibly referring to the number of times Clinton rode on Epstein’s plane.
Based on flight logs, Clinton rode on Epstein’s plane 26 times in 2002 and 2003, FactCheck.org said. Some flights included multiple stops, but Clinton was not listed on any Virgin Islands-bound planes.
Clinton’s office, in a 2019 statement, said the former president was a passenger on Epstein’s planes, but “has never been to Little St. James Island.”
Trump, according to flight logs, took at least seven flights on Epstein’s planes in the 1990s.
Whales not part of recent earthquake
A massive earthquake late last month, off the eastern Kamchatka coast of Russia, left several people injured, buildings damaged and resulted in tsunami warnings for Japan, French Polynesia, Chile and the U.S. west coast.
A social media post appeared to show collateral damage from the event.
A July 29 X post included a video showing people trying to help a beached group of beluga whales.
“Just yesterday, five beluga whales washed ashore in Kamchatka, Russia, the exact epicenter of today’s record-shattering magnitude 8.8 earthquake,” read the post. “Nature always knows first. This was the warning.”
But this video wasn’t from the recent earthquake, according to Reuters. The clip is from 2023 and has been laterally inverted.
A Russian news outlet published the video Aug. 13, 2023, along with an article about people “helping a beluga whale family that washed ashore,” Reuters said.
Bouncing raccoons are AI generated
A recent video posted on TikTok, and later shared to Facebook, X, Instagram and YouTube, includes some amazing footage.
“Just checked the home security cam and … I think we've got guest performers out back! #backyard #ringdoorbell #ring #racoon #trampoline,” read the caption on a video showing several raccoons bouncing and jumping between two backyard trampolines.
As much as it is a delight to see these raccoons having so much fun, it didn’t really happen, according to Snopes. The clip was created using artificial intelligence, or AI.
The video includes flaws that confirm it was AI generated. At one point there appears to be six raccoons but suddenly there are only five. As one raccoon jumps, before landing, it becomes two raccoons. And while one raccoon is bouncing on the trampoline, it appears to lose its head.
• Bob Oswald is a veteran Chicago-area journalist and former news editor of the Elgin Courier-News. Contact him at boboswald33@gmail.com.