Websites such as politifact.com and factcheck.org were designed to provide an unbiased fact check on comments, numbers and accusations that are presented by politicians. They present their audience with the analysis of the candidates’ claims, and what the website’s research indicates about them. “The Tampa Bay Times” spawned Politifact in 2007, which provides fact checks for political figures, especially the presidential hopefuls. The site won the Pulitzer Prize in 2008 for its coverage of the election and still remains one of the most popular fact-checking websites. The site uses its “Truth-O-Meter” to organize facts from politicians into categories scaling from “mostly true” to “pants on fire.” Factcheck.org was established in 2003 by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. The layout of the site is similar to that of Politifact; it contains articles and visuals analyzing the validity of what political figures say. Both sites claim to be unbiased and nonpartisan, but many criticize the general concept of facts without bias. Associate Professor of Political Science Carlos Costa, Ph.D., is one of them. “Regardless of anybody’s political agenda, those institutions are still run by people, and people have biases,” Costa said. “That’s what it means to be a human being. You can’t wash those away.” Costa urges college students to become informed about political candidates through personal research and educated decisions. According to Costa, the fact-checking websites don’t cut it. “Being able to digest what is going on behind the offers that are being put on the table, for me, is the most important thing,” Costa said.
