These latest chain e-mails are part of a continuing pattern of indignant, anonymous authors spreading false and misleading claims about the travels of the president and the first lady.
In
November 2010, we wrote about the "highly doubtful" claim that Obama's trip to India would cost $200 million each day. That figure was based on only one report from an Indian news organization that cited an unnamed official, with no additional evidence to support the claim. The White House called the claim "wildly exaggerated."
In July 2009, we wrote about another chain e-mail that complained that the first lady used taxpayer money to take her daughters and her mother on a European vacation. While taxpayers were on the hook for some of the cost of transporting the first family, and for providing security for them, no taxpayer money was used for their personal expenses.
In October 2008, we wrote about the false claim that Michelle Obama spent nearly $450 on room service at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York City that year. Not only did Obama not stay at that hotel when she was in the city, according to her husband's then-presidential campaign, she hadn't yet arrived in New York by the time the bogus receipt claimed she had ordered room service.
