Obama family flown to private island to escape coronavirus pandemic.
The claim originated in an article published by ObamaWatcher.com on March 19, 2020 titled "Obama Family Flown to Private \Safe Island\" (archived here) which opened:, , Users on social media only saw this title, description and thumbnail:, Must be nice to just bury your heads in the sand- literally., The site is part of the "America\s Last Line of Defense" network of satire websites run by self-professed liberal troll Christopher Blair from Maine along with a loose confederation of friends and allies. Blair has been in a feud with fact-checking website Snopes for some time now and has also criticized other fact-checkers in the past who labeled his work "fake news" instead of satire. In reaction to this, he has recently rebranded all his active websites and Facebook pages so they carry visible disclaimers everywhere., Every site in the network has an about page that reads (in part):, About SatireBefore you complain and decide satire is synonymous with "comedy":, "sat·ireˈsaˌtī(ə)rnounThe use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize peoples stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.", "Everything on this website is fiction. It is not a lie and it is not fake news because it is not real. If you believe that it is real, you should have your head examined. Any similarities between this sites pure fantasy and actual people, places, and events are purely coincidental and all images should be considered altered and satirical. See above if youre still having an issue with that satire thing.", Articles from Blair\s sites frequently get copied by "real" fake news sites that often omit the satire disclaimer and any other hints the stories are fake. Blair has tried to get these sites shut down in the past, but new ones keep cropping up., Here is a video of Blair explaining how his process works:, , If you are interested in learning more about Blair and the history of his sites, here is something to get you started:, STORY UPDATED: check for updates below. Yesterday Eli Saslow at the Washington Post wrote a fantastic article about Christopher Blair, a man from Maine who has been trolling conservatives and Trump supporters online for years and occasionally even made a living out of it., If you see one of his stories on a site that does not contain a satire disclaimer, assume it is fake news. If you do see the satire disclaimer, it is, of course, also fake news., NewsGuard, a company that uses trained journalists to rank the reliability of websites, describes obamawatcher.com as:, According to NewsGuard, the site does not maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability. Read their full assessment here., We wrote about obamawatcher.com before. Here are our most recent articles that mention the site:, See who is sharing it (it might even be your friends...) and leave the link in the comments.:, Editor-in-Chief Alan Duke co-founded Lead Stories after ending a 26-year career with CNN, where he mainly covered entertainment, current affairs and politics. Duke closely covered domestic terrorism cases for CNN, including the Oklahoma City federal building bombing, the UNABOMBER and search for Southeast bomber Eric Robert Rudolph. CNN moved Duke to Los Angeles in 2009 to cover the entertainment beat. Duke also co-hosted a daily podcast with former HLN host Nancy Grace, "Crime Stories with Nancy Grace" and hosted the podcast series "Stan Lee\s World: His Real Life Battle with Heroes & Villains." You\ll also see Duke in many news documentaries, including on the Reelz channel, CNN and HLN., Note: if reading this fact check makes you want to contact us to complain about bias, please check out our Red feed first., Lead Stories is a fact checking website that is always looking for the latest false, deceptive or\n      inaccurate stories (or media) making the rounds on the internet.\n      \n      Spotted something? Let us know!., Lead Stories is a fact checking website that is always looking for the latest false, deceptive or\n        inaccurate stories (or media) making the rounds on the internet.\n        \n        Spotted something? Let us know!.
Fact Check: Obama Family NOT Flown to Private 'Safe Island' | Lead Stories