Social media users share online quotes attributed to House President Nancy Pelosi about ‘illegal aliens’. Looks like the quotes were fabricated.
Examples can be seen here, here, here and here.
One report here reads: “We should only deport illegal aliens if they are doing something illegal.”
Another post here contains a variation of the quote: ‘Just because someone is here illegally does not mean they have violated any of our laws. ‘
Both quotes are aimed at portraying Pelosi as unsuitable for her role, as seen in the accompanying text in some posts here, here and here.
Reuters could not find any record of Pelosi saying these quotes. A statement of this kind by the Speaker of the House would probably be widely reported by news organizations.
The quotes do not exist on Pelosi’s Twitter page twitter.com/SpeakerPelosi or in ProPublica’s “Politwoops” archive, which follows deleted tweets by public officials (here).
At a press conference in June 2018, Pelosi told a reporter that the use of terminology such as ‘illegal alien’ is not constructive. The video is available on C-SPAN. Her exact words can be heard around 15:30 (here). It is therefore unlikely that Pelosi would have used the words attributed to her in these quotations.
Other fact checkers could not prove the authenticity of the quote “Just because someone here is illegal” that they violated our laws, here and here.
Reuters Fact Check earlier dismissed another fabricated quote from Pelosi here: “You must vote for the Democrats, otherwise the illegal aliens will lose their rights.”
VERDICT
Untrue. There is no evidence to show that Speaker Nancy Pelosi made these quotes about ‘illegal aliens’.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checking work here.