James Fishback is a minor candidate for governor of Florida on the Republican side – Rep. Byron Donalds has nearly 50 percent of the vote in recent polls, and Fishback has barely 10 percent. But Florida-based PolitiFact has performed three fact checks on Fishback in 2026.
The latest Fishback claim is obviously wrong – that the U.S. voted to merge its military with Israel's -- but PolitiFact’s own article displays that it could have checked Democrats as well. It’s right there in Samantha Putterman’s review:
Did Congress just approve a merger of the U.S. and Israeli militaries?
That’s what U.S. politicians from both political parties are saying.
“Yesterday, the United States Congress voted to merge our military with Israel’s military,” Florida Republican gubernatorial candidate James Fishback said in a July 23 X video. “This may be the last straw for American sovereignty.”
On July 21, a day before the House was scheduled to vote on the National Defense Authorization Act, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said the bill “includes a provision to merge parts of our military with the (Israel Defense Force). This amendment is an existential threat to American sovereignty and democracy.”
U.S. Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., also criticized Section 219 of the bill, which outlines U.S. and Israeli military cooperation, and co-introduced an amendment to strip it from the legislation. House leadership didn’t allow a vote on the amendment, and the House passed the legislation July 22. The Senate has yet to take it up.
But Fishback’s and other politicians’ comments mischaracterize the legislation.
So why not throw the “False” flag at AOC, or Khanna or Massie? They’re all actually elected officials. Massie has only one fact-check on PolitiFact since he was elected to Congress in 2012. Khanna has only six fact checks (and only two in the 2020s).
The facts are wrong – and the people are clearing building a conspiracy theory where those shady Jews are taking over our military – but the choice of target here is curious. The facts didn't have a liberal bias, but the targeting did.
