The Biden administration is funding the distribution of “safe smoking kits” — colloquially known as “crack pipes” — to help reduce substance abuse. Perhaps this is a helpful program, though maybe not. I couldn’t say. What I do know is that increasingly people are having a difficult time distinguishing between “things that are untrue” and “things conservatives say that annoy me.”
Example: “Did Biden Admin ‘Fund Crack Pipes’ To ‘Advance Racial Equity’?” asks a fact-checker at Snopes. The verdict? “Mostly False.” Dan MacGuill goes on:
What’s True
In 2022, a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services substance abuse harm reduction grant did require recipients to provide safer smoking kits to existing drug users. In distributing grants, priority would be given to applicants serving historically underserved communities. However . . .
There really is no “however.” Snopes points out that the federal grant has numerous other, more-important components. Probably true. It points out that “racial equity” is merely a secondary consideration. Maybe. Those are solid contextual points for a columnist or journalist to offer, but not a fact-checker. Because it is indisputably true, even according to Snopes, that the Biden administration is funding crack pipes to advance racial equity.