Did Suge Knight accuse Diddy of blackmailing Barack Obama?! Take a look at the viral claim, and find out what the facts really are!
Claim : Suge Knight accuses Diddy of blackmailing Barack Obama!
People are sharing an article (archive) by The People’s Voice (formerly NewsPunch), which claimed that Suge Knight just said that Diddy has been working with the FBI and has blackmail material on Barack Obama!
Here is an excerpt of the (intentionally?) rambling and confusing article. Feel free to skip to the next section for the facts!
Suge Knight Claims Diddy Holds ‘Blackmail Material’ on Barack Obama
Sean “Diddy” Combs has been working with the FBI his whole career and has blackmail material on some of the most powerful people in America – including former President Barack Obama.
This allegation comes from Suge Knight, the incarcerated former CEO of Death Row Records and a long-time associate and rival of Combs.
Knight appeared on Chris Cuomo’s News Nation show on Wednesday and dropped a series of bombshells regarding Diddy’s influence over powerful figures including Barack Obama.
Knight pointed out Diddy’s leverage over Obama was so powerful that he once had the former president get his friend out of prison after he was jailed on drug charges.
Knight claims that the rapper has been intricately linked to pedophilia and elite power dynamics since the outset of his career.
He continued to note that despite his reputation as Diddy’s rival, he was friends with the mogul for many years and declared that his recent arrest came as a surprise because he had been “involved with the FBI for most of his career.”
Suge also admitted the rapper will not be safe in jail and is unlikely to make it to trial.
Truth : Suge Knight did not accuse Diddy of blackmailing Barack Obama!
This appears to be yet another example of fake news created / promoted by The People’s Voice, and here are the reasons why…
Suge Knight never mentioned Barack Obama
Let me start by pointing out that Suge Knight never mentioned Barack Obama in his NewsNation interview with Chris Cuomo.
If Suge Knight actually accused Diddy of blackmailing Barack Obama, such a shocking news would have been reported by news outlets and celebrity websites all across the world. Barack Obama might even be forced to make a public statement.
Yet, there was not even a hint of such a scandal involving Barack Obama on social media, never mind any legitimate news report, because it was all made up!
Unsurprisingly, The People’s Voice article did not provide any evidence to back up its claims.
Barack Obama did not release any Diddy friend over drug charge
Suge Knight also did not claim that Barack Obama ordered the release of a friend of Sean “Diddy” Combs who was jailed on drug charges.
There is also no evidence that Barack Obama ever ordered the release of any of Diddy’s friends who were imprisoned on drug charges.
Yet again, The People’s Voice article did not provide any evidence to back up that claim.
In his NewsNation interview with Chris Cuomo, Suge Knight only accused music executives of being responsible for the misconduct of musicians like Sean “Diddy” Combs.
In a call from prison, the former CEO of Death Row Records, who is currently serving 28 years for running over and killing a man, told Chris Cuomo that his artists used to smoke only weed, but allegedly got into heavier drugs after signing on with other record labels.
Those guys … they introduced cocaine to my artists. So once they got on cocaine, once they got on drugs, once they got on alcohol, then that’s when the weird stuff happened. I think that’s what took Puffy [Combs] down that lane.
Suge Knight then went on to accuse Clive Davis, Russell Simmons, and Andre Harrell of using “alcohol, drugs” to compromise Diddy’s “manhood”.
[Combs] was taught that. He got Usher as a kid … alcohol, drugs, sex. Justin Bieber — and see they do these things to take control. … You choose to be gay that’s your preference, but they’re doing this to people for control.
To be clear – none of those music moguls were ever charged for those allegations made by Suge Knight, or charged with any drug or sex crimes.
The People’s Voice is the current name for NewsPunch, which possibly changed its name because its brand has been so thoroughly discredited after posting numerous shocking but fake stories.
Founded as Your News Wire in 2014, it was rebranded as NewsPunch in November 2018, before becoming The People’s Voice. A 2017 BuzzFeed report identified NewsPunch as the second-largest source of popular fake news on Facebook that year.
Its articles have been regularly debunked as fake news, so you should think twice about sharing anything from NewsPunch / The People’s Voice. Here are some of its fake stories that I fact checked earlier:
Please help us FIGHT FAKE NEWS by sharing this fact check article out, and please SUPPORT our work!
Don’t forget to protect yourself, and your family, by vaccinating against COVID-19!
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.
He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.
Did Chris Cuomo contract VAIDS from the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine?! Take a look at the viral claim, and find out what the facts really are!
Claim : Chris Cuomo Contracted VAIDS From COVID-19 Vaccine!
People are sharing an article (archive) by The People’s Voice (formerly NewsPunch), which claimed or suggested that Chris Cuomo contracted VAIDS from the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine!
Here is an excerpt of the long and (intentionally?) confusing article. Feel free to skip to the next section for the facts!
Chris Cuomo Says He Now Has Full-Blown VAIDS Following COVID Shot
Former CNN host Chris Cuomo has revealed that he contracted Vaccine Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (VAIDS) as a direct result of taking the mRNA Covid jab.
Cuomo was once a high-profile advocate of the Big Pharma shots during the pandemic, and berated guests on his show for encouraging “vaccine hesitancy.”
Cuomo admitted that his immune system had been destroyed during in an interview with nurse-practitioner Sean Barcavage, on Cuomo’s show for NewsNation.
The sharp decrease in immunity following vaccination is caused by “altered cytokine responses”. Cytokines are small proteins that are produced by our immune system in response to infection. The more jabs a person receives, the more depleted the immune system becomes, resulting in VAIDS.
“We know that vaccines can have unintended consequences, a.k.a. side effects,” said Cuomo. “But nobody’s really talking about it because they’re too afraid of blame, and they just want it to go away.”
“But the problem is people like Sean and me and millions of others who still have weird stuff with their bloodwork and their lives and their feelings physically are not going away.”
Later in the interview, Cuomo told Barcavage, “I’m sick myself.”.
Barcavage was featured in a recent New York Times article on people who have been harmed by the COVID-19 vaccines. In the interview with Cuomo, he described how the negative effects of the COVID vaccine were almost immediately apparent to him.
“As soon as I was injured—15, 20 minutes into my first dose—I experienced numbness and tingling up and down my injected arm, which spread over the day to my face and my eyes,” he explained.
“I consulted a neurologist who ran some tests and remarked, ‘Well, this is all new. We don’t know much about it, but the hospital is going to mandate it. You should get a second dose.’ Everything in my medical mind and in my bones was telling me, ‘No, if you have a reaction to something, don’t do it again.’” Despite knowing that the first dose had caused him harm, Barcavage felt he had to take a second.
“However, the pressure was immense. Then, three weeks later, I received a second dose, and after that, everything blew up. I went from being a healthy, 100% healthy, fully functioning nurse to a complete downward spiral of health. I developed a myriad of symptoms,” he added.
Truth : Chris Cuomo Did Not Contract VAIDS From COVID-19 Vaccine!
This is yet another example of fake news created / promoted by The People’s Voice, and here are the reasons why…
Fact #1 : Vaccine AIDS Does Not Exist!
Let me start by pointing out that there is no medical disease called Vaccine AIDS or VAIDS – Vaccine-Induced Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome. It appears to be a nonsense term made-up by anti-vaccination activists to scare people.
AIDS is caused by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). Nothing else causes AIDS. Certainly no vaccine, not even the COVID-19 vaccine, causes AIDS.
Robert Charles Gallo – one of the two scientists who independently discovered that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) was responsible for AIDS, said in response to the 2021 claim by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro that COVID-19 vaccines cause AIDS:
[I]t’s hard to believe anyone would claim that the covid-19 vaccine causes AIDS. We know what causes AIDS.
I don’t know what your president said. So I don’t want to be too critical. But it is obvious that neither the covid-19 vaccine nor any other vaccine causes AIDS.
Fact #2 : No One Mentioned VAIDS In The Video!
According to The People’s Voice article, Chris Cuomo revealed that “he contracted Vaccine Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (VAIDS) as a direct result of taking the mRNA Covid jab“???
That’s utter nonsense. Chris Cuomo and Sean Barcavage never mentioned vaccine AIDS or VAIDS in the video!
To be clear – Chris Cuomo never said that he contracted VAIDS from the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine. In the video, he only said that he has long COVID, which he blamed on the COVID-19 vaccine.
While Chris Cuomo suggested that his long COVID could be due to the COVID-19 vaccines he received as he was never infected, that is not the case. After all, long COVID is broadly defined as signs, symptoms, and conditions that continue or develop after someone is infected with COVID-19.
Even though Chris Cuomo claimed that he was never infected with COVID-19, that’s impossible to know, as vaccinated people who get infected with COVID-19 are often asymptomatic or have mild symptoms, and may not be aware they were even infected.
More importantly, COVID-19 vaccines have been shown to be protective against long COVID. A large study of almost 1.2 million people in Hong Kong, that was published in February 2024, has shown that the more vaccine doses people receive, the less likely they are to experience long COVID.
Fact #4 : No Evidence mRNA Vaccines Cause Altered Cytokine Response
The People’s Voice article referred to another study which supposedly showed that a “sharp decrease in immunity following vaccination is caused by altered cytokine response“. That is not true either.
Here’s the gist – the study also did not mention anything about VAIDS, and was only conducted on blood samples. The children participating in that study did not report any side effect or disease from their COVID-19 vaccinations.
Fact #5 : Vaccine Side Effects Were Acknowledged
Although Barcavage appears to suggest that the government did not acknowledge that there will be side effects or reactions to the COVID-19 vaccines, that’s not true.
The COVID-19 vaccines underwent large clinical trials, where the most common side effects were identified and announced. After mass deployment, rarer side effects like anaphylaxis, and myocarditis, were identified and publicly announced.
On top of that, both health authorities and vaccine manufacturers continued their surveillance of vaccine side effects through vaccine surveillance systems like VAERS and the British Yellow Card system.
Fact #7 : The People’s Voice Is Known For Fake News
The People’s Voice is the current name for NewsPunch, which possibly changed its name because its brand has been so thoroughly discredited after posting numerous shocking but fake stories.
Founded as Your News Wire in 2014, it was rebranded as NewsPunch in November 2018, before becoming The People’s Voice. A 2017 BuzzFeed report identified NewsPunch as the second-largest source of popular fake news on Facebook that year.
Its articles have been regularly debunked as fake news, so you should never share anything from NewsPunch / The People’s Voice. Here are some of its fake stories that I fact checked earlier:
Please help us FIGHT FAKE NEWS by sharing this fact check article out, and please SUPPORT our work!
Please Support My Work!
Support my work through a bank transfer / PayPal / credit card!
Name : Adrian Wong Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
Credit Card / Paypal : https://paypal.me/techarp
Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.
He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.
Did 5 conspiracy theories promoted by RFK Jr turn out to be true?! Take a look at the viral claims, and find out what the facts really are!
Claim : RFK Jr Conspiracy Theories Turned Out To Be True!
People are sharing a post by The Vigilant Fox (archive), which claims / suggests that five conspiracy theorists promoted by Robert F. Kennedy (RFK Jr.) turned out to be true! The Vigilant Fox also posted this on X (formerly known as Twitter):
RFK Jr. Hits Back at Chris Cuomo After Being Labeled a ‘Conspiracy Theorist’
“Tell me a theory that you think I got wrong. Show me facts.”
Kennedy then listed a series of “conspiracy theories” that ended up being true:
1.) Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, causes non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a claim that has been validated through three jury trials and a $13 billion settlement with Monsanto.
2.) COVID-19 vaccines would not prevent transmission, which is now generally accepted.
3.) “I said that COVID lockdowns were going to be very, very harmful to children, particularly. They would damage our economy, and they would not prevent the spread of a respiratory virus.
4.) “I said the masks were not going to work to prevent the spread of the disease and that they would probably do more harm than good. And now everybody agrees with that.”
5.) Social distancing wasn’t science-based, a claim that Fauci has acknowledged is true.
“I’ve been around long enough that I question everything that the government tells me,” remarked Kennedy. “And I think people who don’t question what the government tells them are not paying attention.”
Glyphosate, a widely-used herbicide, has been the subject of many studies and lawsuits, over claims that it can potentially cause cancer, particularly non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
As the City of Hope cancer centre pointed out, it has still not be scientifically proven that glyphosate causes non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, even though the courts have seen fit to dole out billions of dollars in damages.
In 2019, researchers at University of Washington concluded that using glyphosate increases the risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma by 41 percent. However, the preponderance of research worldwide has found no connection to glyphosate and cancer risk. And most of the world’s health agencies agree. For instance:
Health Canada says the product does not cause damage to human DNA. Objections to Health Canada’s position “could not be scientifically supported when considering the entire body of relevant data,” the agency said.
The European Food Safety Authority “did not identify any critical areas of concern in its peer review of the risk assessment” of glyphosate.
Notably, Bayer settled the majority of current and future lawsuits over Roundup – Monsanto’s glyphosate product, for $10 billion, without admitting that glyphosate causes cancer. In fact, Roundup and other glyphosate herbicides are still sold all over the world today!
The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), however, stated in 2015 that glyphosate is “probably carcinogenic to humans.” CNN reported that hundreds of patients with non-Hodgkin lymphoma started suing the manufacturers of glyphosate herbicides after IARC made its announcement.
Herbicide manufacturers have stood by their products, even while still agreeing to settlements of current and future lawsuits. In June 2020, Bayer, which acquired Monsanto in 2018, settled the majority of current and possible future lawsuits for more than $10 billion, CNN reported.
In an announcement about the settlement, the chief executive officer of Bayer said that “the extensive body of science indicates that [glyphosate-based herbicide] Roundup® does not cause cancer, and therefore, is not responsible for the illnesses alleged in this litigation. We stand strongly behind our glyphosate-based herbicides, which are among the most rigorously studied products of their kind, and four decades of science support their safety and that they are not carcinogenic.”
Claim #2 : COVID-19 Vaccines Would Not Prevent Transmission Verdict : False
Let me start by pointing out that COVID-19 vaccines were never required to prevent transmission. The main purpose of the COVID-19 vaccines was to prevent death and severe disease (and hospitalisation) from COVID-19, not to block transmission.
Hence, the end points for COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials did not include blocking transmission, although scientists and healthcare professionals were hoping that the vaccines would significantly block transmission.
After vaccinations started in 2021, researchers found that the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, for example, was significantly reducing the transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
UK study : New data from Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge suggests that a single dose of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine can reduce by 75% the number of asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infections. This implies that the vaccine could significantly reduce the risk of transmission of the virus from people who are asymptomatic, as well as protecting others from getting ill.
Israeli study : These results suggest that BNT162b2 is moderately to highly effective in reducing infectivity, via preventing infection and through reducing viral shedding.
While the vaccines’ effectiveness against infection and transmission waned with each new variant (research), they still continue to provide protection, not only against death and hospitalisation from COVID-19, but also infection and transmission.
In fact, a September 2023 systematic review of existing research show that COVID-19 vaccines reduce transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, regardless of variant:
Overall, study results showed the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 transmission (range 16–95%), regardless of vaccine type or number of doses.
The effect was apparent, but less pronounced against omicron (range 24–95% for pre-omicron variants versus 16–31% for omicron).
Results from viral load studies were supportive, showing SARS-CoV-2 infections in vaccinated individuals had higher Ct values, suggesting lower viral load, compared to infections among the unvaccinated.
In short – the RFK Jr. conspiracy theory that COVID-19 vaccines do not block transmission at all has been disproven time and time again.
Claim #3A : COVID Lockdowns Were Very Harmful To Children Verdict : Partially True
This isn’t a conspiracy theory, but more of an opinion by RFK Jr., as no one actually disputed even back then that COVID-19 lockdowns would be detrimental to everyone, not just children. After all, human beings evolved to be social animals, and are biologically-driven to seek out the company of others.
The lockdowns were only implemented because the authorities wanted to stop the spread of COVID-19, and determined that the benefits far outweighed the risks. While children were judged to be least affected by COVID-19, they cannot be left out of a lockdown, because they can transmit the virus to vulnerable members of their own family.
While it is indisputable that the lockdowns can have a negative impact on children, the claim that the lockdowns were “very dangerous” to children isn’t borne out in actual studies.
2021 Spanish study : Children, in general, showed high resilience and capability to adapt to new situations. Sleeping problems were reported in more than half of the children (54%) and adolescents (59%), and these were strongly associated with less time doing sports and spending more than 5 h per day using electronic devices. Parents perceived their children to gain weight (41%), be more irritable and anxious (63%) and sadder (46%).
2022 Chart Review : Many children developed educational, social, emotional, and behavioral gaps during LD, and they lost skills to deal with everyday problems due to social isolation. It is important to follow the long-term impact of the lockdowns and social isolation.
In short, while more children experience mental health issues during the lockdown, other children were able to cope with the changes.
Also important to note – the lockdowns helped to prevent vulnerable people – both adults and children, from dying from COVID-19. While mental health issues can be detrimental, it can be treated or mitigated, whereas death cannot.
Well, thank you, Captain Obvious. No one ever said that COVID-19 lockdowns would not damage the economy. RFK Jr. might as well have said that it gets wet when it rains.
To be clear – everyone knows that lockdowns will damage the economy. That’s indisputable when businesses are forced to close, and people are required to stay at home. The lockdowns were only implemented to save lives, by blocking the transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, until vaccines and treatments could be developed.
Claim #3C : COVID Lockdowns Would Not Block Transmission Verdict : False
The claim by RFK Jr. and other people that lockdowns would not block the transmission of viral infections is false. The concept of a quarantine and the wider lockdown is centuries-old, and have proven to be effective in curbing the spread of disease.
More recently, the SARS outbreak in 2002, which killed over 800 people, was contained by blocking all human-to-human transmission through syndromic surveillance, strict isolation of patients and quarantine of their contacts, and lockdowns (community quarantine).
Even though the far more extensive COVID-19 lockdowns did not stop its global spread, they helped to reduce transmission and reduce the impact on healthcare services, until effective vaccines become available:
Even if our public health measures are not able to fully contain the spread of COVID-19 because of the virus characteristics, they will still be effective in delaying the onset of widespread community transmission, reducing peak incidence and its impact on public services, and decreasing the overall attack rate.
In addition, minimising the size of the outbreak or suppressing its peak can reduce global deaths by providing health systems with the opportunity to scale up and respond, and to slow down the global spread until effective vaccines become available.
People like RFK Jr. who claim the face masks don’t work often refer to the 2023 Cochrane report which stated that, “wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of influenza‐like illness“.
However, they fail to point out that the same report urged caution, and pointed out that there was “a high risk of bias in the trials, variation in outcome measurement, and relatively low adherence with the interventions during the studies hampers drawing firm conclusions“.
Cochrane officially said that the report was inconclusive, and the editor-in-chief of the Cochrane Library, Karla Soares-Weiser, called reports saying that “masks don’t work” as an “inaccurate and misleading interpretation“.
It would be accurate to say that the review examined whether interventions to promote mask-wearing help to slow the spread of respiratory viruses, and that the results were inconclusive.
In addition, Michael D. Brown, who serves on the Cochrane editorial board pointed out that the review could not arrive at a firm conclusion because “there were not enough high-quality randomised trials where participants adhered to mask-wearing rules.
Other studies, like this 2020 Japanese study, show that wearing a properly-fitted face mask will greatly reduce the amount of inhaled virus droplets / aerosols, compared to not wearing a face mask at all.
Cotton face mask : 20% to 40% reduction
Surgical mask : 47% to 50% reduction
N95 mask : 80% to 90% reduction
They also show that infected people wearing face masks can block transmission, by reducing the amount of virus droplets / aerosols being expelled into the environment.
Our airborne simulation experiments showed that cotton masks, surgical masks, and N95 masks had a protective effect with respect to the transmission of infective droplets/aerosols and that the protective efficiency was higher when masks were worn by the virus spreader.
Claim #4B : Face Masks Do More Harm Than Good Verdict : False
There is no evidence that face masks do more harm than good, as RFK Jr. claimed or suggested. In fact, healthcare professionals have been wearing face masks to protect their patients and themselves since they were invented in the late nineteenth century.
Their effectiveness was greatly improved by Malaysian Chinese epidemiologist Dr. Wu Lien-teh, who developed a face mask with layers of gauze and cotton that would protect both the wearer, and other people.
The modern surgical mask as we know it was developed in the 1960s, and has been in use since then. In the 1990s, Taiwanese-American scientist Peter Tsai would invent the electrocharged fibre that would make the N95 mask possible.
To be clear – face masks do not do more harm than good, no matter how many times people like RFK Jr. repeat such claims.
Claim #5 : Social Distancing Not Based On Science Verdict : Partially True
The claim that Dr. Anthony Fauci admitted that social distancing is not based on science isn’t actually accurate.
In his closed-door congressional testimony, Dr. Fauci said that the US federal social distancing guidance that people keep six feet of social distance “sort of just appeared”. He didn’t actually say that social distancing did not work. He only said that the six feet guidance was not backed up by an actual study.
When the US government first issued its guidance on social distancing, there were no studies on how far the COVID-19 virus can disperse from an infected person and remain infective. The six feet recommendation was based on early assessments that COVID-19 spread by droplets. Later, this was found not to be accurate, as COVID-19 could also spread by aerosols, therefore extending beyond the six feet guidance.
In short – social distancing can help reduce transmission. The further away you are from an infected person, the less likely you will inhale significant amounts of viral particles. What was not based on science back in 2020 was the six-feet recommendation. If we know what we know today – people would have to socially-distance way beyond six feet.
Now, isn’t it fortunate that we now have effective COVID-19 vaccines, and can do away with social distancing?
Please help us FIGHT FAKE NEWS by sharing this fact check article out, and please SUPPORT our work!
Please Support My Work!
Support my work through a bank transfer / PayPal / credit card!
Name : Adrian Wong Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
Credit Card / Paypal : https://paypal.me/techarp
Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.
He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.