The Political Leaning of Fact-Checking: Countering Italian Disinformation on the War in Ukraine

The intense disinformation efforts that accompanied Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine highlight the importance of countering misinformation to mitigate the influence of foreign actors, particularly in vulnerable public spheres such as the Italian one. Despite widespread use, the effectiveness of fact-checking in correcting misinformation remains ambiguous, with limited exploration of the underlying reasons. This article focuses on the role of political leaning and partisanship in shaping individuals’ comprehension of factual information, their inclination to fact-checking exposure, and their capacity to assimilate findings that challenge their preconceived beliefs. We measure the role of these variables for 10 different statements about Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, employing original survey data collected in Italy in spring 2022. We find veracity assessment to be associated with partisan views of the war for both true and false statements, with Russia-leaning views frequently correlating with lower exposure to and reception of fact-checks. Right-leaning political attitudes often work in the same direction, in some cases amplifying the partisan rejection of fact-checks. These findings contribute to literature on fact-checking, selective exposure, motivated reasoning, and misinformation, corroborating previous studies on the limits of debunking efforts and extending their insights to a setting well known for its high level of political parallelism. A crucial implication of these results is that political attitudes should receive greater consideration when addressing misinformation and foreign disinformation efforts, given their potential to amplify partisan barriers that moderate the corrective power of fact-checking. Furthermore, this partisan acceptance of fact-checks complicates the normative assessment of journalistic practices.