On Friday night, President Donald Trump was lapping up the love from MAGA supporters from the deep-red shelter of an Alabama venue. But even Trump’s University of Alabama refuge in Mobile could not protect him from a punishing volley of corrections from the local newspaper.
AL.com hit the press on Saturday morning with a grueling takedown of Trump’s ballyhoo.
“Like many of his freewheeling rally speeches, Trump’s remarks in Mobile included embellished claims, contradictions, and several assertions that conflict with available evidence,” reported AL.com.
The paper immediately pounced on Trump’s claim to have provided $3 million for Alabama’s I-10 bridge project. But not so much, said AL.com, dubbing the claim “mostly false” because the Trump administration did not provide “a single $3 billion grant or federal appropriation for the Interstate 10 Mobile River Bridge and Bayway project.”
The largest federal grant for the project was a $550 million award through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law — and that was actually signed by former President Joe Biden. All Trump did was help push the project forward and allow construction to begin on the first phase. And there is no indication that Biden was incapable of ding the same thing. Plus, the second phase of the project remains unfunded and without a construction timetable.
“Trump tied the project’s groundbreaking on Friday to ‘$3 billion’ in administration funding,” reports AL.com. “Much of the project’s financing, however, is tied to a federal Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) loan that must be repaid through toll revenue.”
Trump flew other nonsense fast and furious, claiming Wesley Britt, husband of U.S. Sen. Katie Britt and Executive Vice President of 68 Ventures, played 11 years as a tackle in the National Football League from 2006-2008, with the New England Patriots. But in fact, he played three. But those little snafus were nothing compared to Trump’s bigger lies, said AL.com.
The president’s repeated claim on Friday night that if Republicans retain the House and Senate, every adult U.S. citizen would receive $5,000 through what he calls the “Trump Dividend” was also nonsense, according to AL.com. Such a deal requires congressional approval, and even some Republicans are expressed reservations, citing concerns about the national debt, inflation, and the legality of tying government payments to election outcomes.
Other Trump claims that he “achieved the largest drop in violent crime ever” and “the murder rate is at the lowest level in 125 years, since the year 1900,” AL.com determined to be partly true in that crime did drop — but the decline began during the Biden administration.
“He also cited declines in murders of 44 percent in Birmingham, 91 percent in Washington, D.C., and 83 percent in New Orleans,” said AL.com. However “nationally, homicides have fallen to their lowest levels in decades,” and “violent crime has generally been declining since 2022 following a pandemic-era spike.”
Trump’s other lies that The Biden administration “gave 25 million illegal aliens amnesty,” and that “they wanted to give amnesty to everyone who came into the country illegally,” was also deemed “False” by AL.com factcheckers, backed up by Politifact. Biden-era undocumented population ranged between 11 million and 12 million, and there is no evidence that the Biden administration granted blanket amnesty to everyone who entered the country illegally.
Additionally, AL.com disemboweled Trump’s claim that he invested $21 trillion in the U.S. with new manufacturers, farmers, American exports and more. According to the paper, that figure includes multiyear commitments, announced projects, and future investments that haven’t even yet happened.
But AL.com critics were especially passionate about Trump’s bogus Friday night claim that “We’ve done nothing but bring prices down.”
“Gasoline prices, for instance, were more than 40 percent higher than in January 2025 amid market disruptions tied to the Iran conflict. Diesel prices reached record highs last month,” reported AL.com, adding that “overall consumer prices have increased about 4.7 percent since Trump returned to office.
Inflation and consumer prices are actually a key Democratic attack lines heading into the midterms, reported AL.com.