“The Lie of the Year — the only time PolitiFact uses the word ‘lie’ — speaks to a falsehood that proves to be of real consequence and gets repeated in a virtual campaign to undermine an accurate narrative,” PolitiFact wrote in a post announcing the decision. Managing editor Katie Sanders wrote that the anonymous whistleblower’s account of the July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky proved to be substantively correct, based on records of the call released by the White House and accounts from other administration officials.

President Trump’s repeated claims that the whistleblower who came forward with concerns about Trump’s Ukraine call and ignited the impeachment inquiry was “completely wrong” and “defrauded our country” has been named the “lie of the year” by the fact-checking website PolitiFact .


“The whistleblower, who to Trump’s consternation remains unidentified, raised the concern that the president’s actions leading up to and on that phone call amount to interference in the coming presidential election. Agree or disagree with the conclusion, or whether the president’s conduct warrants impeachment, the actions described in the complaint stand up to factual scrutiny," Sanders wrote.

Trump has tweeted about the whistleblower dozens of times since September, according to the Trump Twitter Archive, with many tweets and retweets calling the person’s claims false. But as the House announced it would investigate the matter as part of an impeachment inquiry, Trump released a summary of the call that showed he pressured Zelensky to conduct investigations into the Bidens and the 2016 election. Other administration witnesses testified that they understood that Trump had withheld a White House meeting and millions in military aid to the country as he applied pressure for an announcement of the investigations.

The House is set to vote on two articles of impeachment that grew out of the inquiry on Wednesday: One dealing with abuse of power and the second alleging obstruction of Congress.


This is the third time in 10 years Trump has been the winner of PolitiFact’s “lie of the year.” In 2017, his insistence that Russian meddling in the 2016 election was a hoax won the distinction, and in 2015, PolitiFact pointed to his presidential campaign generally as it declared his many misstatements exhibited “a disregard for the truth.”





Christina Prignano can be reached at christina.prignano@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @cprignano.