SIMI VALLEY, Calif. — For the second time in this election cycle, many of the top challengers in the race for the Republican nomination for president debated each other. They hoped to gain support as they try to chase down the candidate in the front of the polls, Donald Trump, who chose again to not attend.
They took on ideas related to inflation, immigration, fentanyl, crime, and more.
QUESTION
Did the national debt increase by more than $7 trillion during Donald Trump's presidency?
SOURCE
ANSWER
Yes, the national debt rose by more than $7 trillion while Donald Trump was in office, as Ron DeSantis and Chris Christie mentioned during attacks against the former president.
WHAT WE FOUND
Both Ron DeSantis and Chris Christie mentioned the national and inflation while discussing the strike by autoworkers against the big three car manufacturers. They each blamed the former president for his role in increasing the national debt, thereby inducing inflation.
“During the Trump administration, they added $7 trillion, $7 trillion, in national debt,” Christie said. He said Trump should have been on the debate stage with the other candidates, and DeSantis agreed. “He owes it to you to defend his record - where they added $7.8 trillion to the debt,” he added.
The U.S Treasury Department tracks yearly changes in the national debt. It measures per fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1 and ends Sept. 30. On Sept. 30, 2016, a couple months before Trump took office, the national debt was $19,573,444,713,936. Four years later, just before his term ended, the debt had risen to $26,945,391,194,615. That is a difference of approximately $7.4 trillion.
QUESTION
Did more Americans die because of fentanyl in 2022 than the combined number of service members who died in the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq?
SOURCES
ANSWER
Fentanyl took more American lives last year than all three of those conflicts.
WHAT WE FOUND
Fentanyl was mentioned frequently as one of the reasons the candidates wanted to increase security at the U.S.-Mexico border.
“It is unsafe, wide open and insecure," Tim Scott said of the border, "leading to the deaths of 70,000 Americans in the last 12 months because of fentanyl.”
“We’ve had more fentanyl that have killed Americans than the Iraq, Vietnam, or Afghanistan wars combined,” Nikki Haley stated.
A CDC report from June showed that, of the 107,081 reported drug overdose deaths in the U.S. in 2022, approximately 68% were connected to fentanyl. That would come to 72,819 deaths. That followed data from the NIH showing 70,601 overdose deaths in 2021 connected to synthetic opioids other than methadone, which it said were primarily fentanyl.
Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs reports that 7,057 U.S. service members were killed in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. According to statistics from the National Archives, 58,220 military casualties of the Vietnam War were recorded. Combined, that adds up to 65,277 deaths, fewer than were reported as being caused by fentanyl in 2022.