The GOP debate this week produced lots of fireworks, so here’s a look at follow-up stories and websites that try to sort out the facts behind the charges.

At PolitiFact.com, the Truth-O-Meter and the Attack File concludes:
Rudy Giuliani’s claim that Mitt Romney failed to take action against sanctuary cities: Mostly true.
Mitt Romney’s claim that Giuliani welcomed illegal immigrants: True.
Mike Huckabee’s explanation about school benefits for children of illegal immigants: Barely true.
Mitt Romney (aka Bill Buckner) muffed an easy grounder: He got a key Red Sox stat wrong.
Mitt Romney’s stat on out-of-wedlock African-American births: True.
Ron Paul’s claim on receiving campaign donations from military members: True.
John McCain’s claim on saving taxpayers $2 billion: True.

Here’s an AP story that examines whether New York was a sanctuary city under Guiliani. It makes a compelling case that NYC followed the same policies toward illegal immigrants as do cities that proudly proclaim themselves as sanctuary cities. In NYC, the policy was put in place long before Giuliani became mayor, but he vigorously protected the policy.

Giuliani took a swipe at Romney, saying he had a “sanctuary mansion” because illegal immigrants worked at the former governor’s home in Massachusetts. Here’s the original Boston Globe story, which was published nearly a year ago.

This first AP story and this second AP story explore whether Rudy Giuliani hid the costs of police protection for him while he had extramarital trysts with his now-wife, Judity Nathan.

Here’s the original Politico.com report, and here’s Politico’s next-day follow-up.

Here’s Guiliani explaining away the charge, on CBS news. (Be warned: 30-second ad precedes the report.)

Who do you think was “more truthful” and who was “less truthful” in the debate?

In a posting earlier this morning I included a link to a Boston Globe story about younger voters and Ron Paul. Here it is again.

Ron Paul campaigning in New Hampshire on Saturday

Now Open Secrets is pointing out that Paul, the Texas congressman and presidential candidate, is displaying surprising fundraising strength — pulling in $1 million a month, largely through small donations and the Internet. With the reports the candidates will soon be filing, Paul apparently will show that he has more money in the bank than John McCain.

And Open Secrets reports this intriguing item: “…we can tell you that more visitors come to OpenSecrets.org looking for information about Ron Paul than anyone else in the field.”

Here is the Open Secrets page on Paul’s fundraising, before this most recent period.

Here’s Politically Connected’s page on Paul, which shows his fundraising from Minnesota residents, his biography and votes and quotes on some key issues. (We’re working on adding more issues.) The page also has blog posts, news from other sources about him and news directly from his campaign.

For what it’s worth, when I was driving to work one morning this week on I-394, I noticed a bunch of “Ron Paul Revolution” banners on the overpasses — the first ones of any presidential candidate that I’ve seen like that.

Our new Star Tribune Minnesota poll, which we published Tuesday on Politically Connected, picked up negligible support for Paul in Minnesota — just 2 percent. Here’s the poll story and the here’s a graphic showing results for all Republican candidates.

But Paul appears to be one of those candidates who — at least at this stage — has a relatively small but very fervent base of supporters. The question is how broad will it become, and in what way, if any, will Paul affect the Republican primaries and caucuses?

In our main Star Tribune Minnesota Poll story about whether the U.S. and Minnesota are moving in the right direction and president Bush’s job approval, Patricia Lopez explored the key reasons behind the numbers.

Here’s another interesting finding in the poll: younger adults in Minnesota are the most optimistic.

When asked whether things in the U.S. are “generally going in the right direction or do you think things have gotten pretty seriously off on the wrong track,” here are the age-group breakdowns for those who answered “right direction:”

18-39 year olds: 29%
40-59 year olds: 22%
60 and over: 20%

Asked the same question about Minnesota, the gap between the youngest and oldest age groups was even more striking. Here are the “right direction” results for how things are going in the state:

18-39 year olds: 58%
40-59 year olds: 51%
60 and over: 38%

Barack Obama

Younger voters historically have a lower turnout on Election Day, but their participation has been on the rise. For example, turnout rates among 18-29 year olds fell from 55 percent in 1972 to about 40 percent in 1996 and 2000 — but it shot up to 49 percent in the last presidential election, according to CIRCLE, a group at the University of Maryland that studies younger voter engagement. (Turnout also spiked in 1992, when Bill Clinton was elected.) And younger voter turnout in the 2006 mid-term elections was up slightly from the 2002 mid-terms.

Our latest poll shows that Rudy Giuliani does best among 18-39 year old Republicans and Republican leaners in Minnesota. Among Democrats and leaners, Hillary Rodham Clinton leads among that age group, but she draws a higher percentage of support among older voters. And the 18-39 year olds are critical to second-place Barack Obama; they account for most of his support.

Ron Paul

Here’s a Newsweek story about Barack Obama’s efforts to win over younger voters.

And here’s a Boston Globe story about how Republican Ron Paul is energizing younger voters and has lots of friends on MySpace.

How do you think younger voters will affect the 2008 election? It’d be great to hear from some first-time voters on this question.