Terrorism not suspected in Texas hotel explosion

An explosion at the Sandman Signature hotel in Fort Worth, Texas, last week, injured 21 people, including one critically, as doors were blown out and parts of the wall were thrown into the street.

Some social media users appear to know what caused the blast.

“BREAKING: The suspect of the #explosion at the Sandman Signature Fort Worth Hotel in Texas, USA, has been identified as 44-year-old migrant Sahil Omar. Authorities have yet to find a motive,” reads a post on X, which had received nearly 5,000 likes and shares a day after the Jan. 8 blast.

But that post is false, according to the Associated Press. Authorities are investigating the incident at the 20-story, historic hotel as a natural gas explosion.

“No suspect is being sought as of this email,” Fort Worth Police Department spokesperson Jimmy Pollozani told the AP in an email.

The Fort Worth Fire Department took to social media to keep citizens informed.

“Explosion likely caused by gas leak, but still waiting to confirm,” the department wrote on X on Monday.

In an update on Facebook on Tuesday, the fire department said, “We are seeing several comments and posts insinuating that the explosion yesterday was criminal activity or terrorism. There have been NO comments or statements made by the Fort Worth Fire Department or the Fort Worth Police Department suggesting this was the cause. There is NO THREAT to the public safety in the wake of yesterday’s incident.”

Following a Dec. 6, 2023, shooting at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, social media users then blamed the incident on a 44-year-old migrant named Sahil Omar. Authorities later identified that actual shooter as 67-year-old business professor Anthony Polito.

That’s not Epstein with Taylor Swift

A list of associates of Jeffrey Epstein, who was accused of running a sex-trafficking ring before he killed himself in a New York jail in 2019, was recently released as part of a civil case brought against his longtime partner Ghislaine Maxwell.

Social media users have posted a photo on Spanish platforms claiming it shows singer Taylor Swift hanging out with Epstein.

“Here is a photo of when Taylor visited Epstein in 2004,” reads the translated text on an X post showing Swift sitting on a brick wall, holding a drink, with her arm around a man with short white hair.

That actually is a photo of Swift, according to USA Today. But it’s not from 2004 and she isn’t with Epstein.

The man in the photo with Swift is music executive Monte Lipman, co-founder and CEO of Republic Records. Swift signed a deal with Republic Records in 2018. The image was first posted on Instagram on Dec. 16, 2021, two years after Epstein died. Several photos of Swift and Lipman have been posted to social media.

Swift’s name doesn’t appear in any of the released documents listing Epstein’s associates.

Haley can serve as president

Recent social media posts claim Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley is not eligible to be president of the U.S.

“Nikki Haley is Constitutionally ineligible to be President….or Vice President,” reads the text on an X post that includes a link to an article saying she can’t serve because her parents were not U.S. citizens when she was born.

This is false, according to the Associated Press. Haley was born in the U.S., which is one of the three constitutional requirements to become president. The other two require candidates to be at least 35 years old and have been a U.S. resident for at least 14 years.

Haley was born on Jan. 20, 1972, in Bamberg, S.C. Her parents were born in the Punjab region of India, she wrote in her autobiography. Her father became a U.S. citizen in 1978 and her mother followed in 2003.

Geoffrey Stone, a professor of Law at the University of Chicago, told the AP the false claim is “bonkers.”

“Having been born in South Carolina, she is clearly a ‘natural born citizen,’ without regard to the fact that her parents were immigrants,” he said.

Avalanche disaster is movie clip

Social media users have posted a video of an avalanche that includes a warning.

“Never underestimate the power of nature,” reads the text on a Dec. 26 Instagram post with a clip showing a family of four dining next to a mountain. As they eat, an avalanche begins to rumble near them, but the man tells his family there is nothing to worry about, according to captions with the clip.

Other diners are taking pictures with their phones when they realize the avalanche is coming very close. They begin screaming and running away. The man with the family turns to run, knocks over another patron and appears to leave his wife and children behind.

But this is not a real scenario, according to PolitiFact. It’s a scene from a movie.

The video is taken from the 2014 Swedish film “Force Majeure,” a movie about the aftermath of the father’s actions and how the family perceives him.

This clip has been falsely posted on social media as an actual situation since at least 2019, PolitiFact said.

• Bob Oswald is a veteran Chicago-area journalist and former news editor of the Elgin Courier-News. Contact him at boboswald33@gmail.com.