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No, Marjorie Taylor Greene didn’t say ‘people are dying who have never died before’
If Your Time is short
- We found no evidence that Marjorie Taylor Greene said this.
- It has previously been falsely attributed to former President Donald Trump, and a similar quote was wrongly attributed to President Joe Biden.
- It was Ernest Hemingway who once wrote something similar.
First it was then-President Donald Trump who supposedly said, "People are dying who have never died before."
Then it was President Joe Biden who said, "People will die, who have never died before."
Now, it’s U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
"People are dying who have never died before," a recent Facebook post claims the Georgia Republican said.
Except she didn’t, and neither did Trump or Biden.
This post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)
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We reached out to the congresswoman but did not immediately hear back.
We didn’t find the statement on either of her Twitter accounts. We didn’t find it searching Politwoops, the ProPublica database that tracks deleted tweets by public officials. Searching more broadly online, we didn’t find any credible evidence that she said this.
But the quote, or something close to it, has been circulating on social media for more than a decade.
"I believe it was Ernest Hemingway who said: ‘People are dying who have never died before,’" someone tweeted in 2009.
According to a book of selected letters by Hemingway, he once wrote that someone had "advised us all to be careful as men are dying this year who have never died before."
Sandra Spanier, general editor of the Hemingway Letters Project, told AFP that the author used the phrase two other times and attributed it to a friend, Edward "Bra" Saunders.
We rate claims that Greene said it False.
Our Sources
Facebook post, June 4, 2021
PolitiFact, No, Trump didn’t say, ‘People are dying who have never died before,’ March 19, 2020
Reuters, False claim: Joe Biden said, "People will die, who have never died before," AOC said, "There are homeless people out there who can’t pay their mortgage," May 8, 2020
Marjorie Taylor Greene Twitter accounts, visited June 9, 2021
Politwoops search, visited June 9, 2021
Tweet, June 25, 2009
"Selected letters 1917-1961," Ernest Hemingway, June 3, 2003
AFP, Hemingway phrase misrepresented as Trump and Biden statement on COVID-19 death toll, April 1, 2020
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No, Marjorie Taylor Greene didn’t say ‘people are dying who have never died before’
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