The claim is part of a conspiracy theory being spread by social media users. US Officials have denied reports of child rescue.
On February 7, "Beforeitsnews.com" posted an article claiming that "US Special Op forces recovered bodies, body parts and at least a hundred surviving children from a tunnel system beneath the White House and Capitol Building in Washington DC on Fri. 29 Jan". It further claimed that in light of this incident, President Joe Biden and other members of US Congress were arrested. However, this claim is false and is part of a larger conspiracy theory known as QAnon, which says that former "President Donald Trump is waging a secret war against elite Satan-worshipping paedophiles in government, business and the media". Media Fact Check Bias describes "beforeitsnew.com" as "Questionable based on the promotion of pseudoscience and right-wing conspiracy theories as well as poor sourcing, a lack of transparency, and the routine publication of fake news". Politifact reported that a spokesperson from the Defence Department said that the news is false. Government officials from New York city confirmed to Reuters that the claim circulating on social media is not true. Further, there are no reliable news reports or photographs published in the media to corroborate the incident. Fake claims with different captions with the same content are also being circulated on social media since 2020. One of the fake claim circulated is "35,000 “malnourished” and “caged” children were rescued from tunnels by U.S. military." QAnon supporters are known to spread unfounded conspiracy theories. There is no clear and convincing evidence to back up the allegations about child trafficking, and hence we mark the claim as False.
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