Republican senators on Friday accused U.S. spy chiefs of working “in the shadows” to cover up bombshell evidence that COVID-19 leaked from a Chinese lab, citing political appointees. They renewed calls for a thorough independent investigation into allegations of meddling into the origins of the pandemic.
“For years, we have exposed the role of the federal government, especially the intelligence community, in covering up the origins of COVID-19, but the Biden administration “We're complicit every step of the way.” post.
“For this reason, I recently sent a letter to the Intelligence Community's Office of Inspector General requesting documentation and additional critical assistance in initiating an investigation into potential integrity violations in the Intelligence Community's COVID-19 origins assessment process. We have provided it to the authorities,” he said.
“While the U.S. intelligence community operates in the shadows, I will continue to fight for the sunshine, for transparency and accountability, and for answers for all Americans lost to this devastating pandemic.” Continue,” Marshall added.
During the first year of the pandemic, Pentagon and FBI scientists discovered that the virus that causes COVID-19 was created artificially and then exploded after a laboratory accident in Wuhan, China. We found evidence that this is likely.
But Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines never presented those findings to President Biden, a source familiar with compiling the agency's report said. August 2021 Report he told the Post on Thursday.
Evidence includes that Chinese researchers like the infamous “Bat Lady” Dr. Shi Zhengli have optimized the virus to make it easier to infect humans and trained the techniques while working with virus research institutes. Includes a 2008 scientific study from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) showing. A few years before the pandemic, a US laboratory in Texas.
This includes highly detailed genomic analysis of SARS-CoV-2 and how WIV scientists can seamlessly piece together new viruses to determine whether the resulting virus is manufactured. It also included evidence of learning.
But three scientists at the Defense Intelligence Agency's National Medical Information Center who exposed dozens of data points supporting the so-called “lab leak” were “silenced” by their superiors and told to stop cooperating with the FBI on similar matters. was told. According to officials, the origin of the new coronavirus will be investigated.
Months before the intelligence report was released, Sen. Chuck Grassley had asked Haines to hand over information that would include much of the scientist's lab leak findings, but senior officials at the agency The department crushed the effort, the source added.
“Secretary Haines' failure to fully comply with long-standing requests for congressional oversight meant that critical information within the intelligence community was not shared with Congress, the American people, or even the President himself,” Haines, an Iowa Republican, wrote in the Post. told the paper.
“Those who have politicized the current administration's investigation into the origins of the coronavirus have committed a disgraceful act against the American people,” he added.
Other sources close to the intelligence community's efforts also accused “political appointees” of pushing the theory of natural spillover from animals to humans as the origin of the pandemic — one said there was no “evidence” supporting the agency's work. Despite pointing out that there is a lack of
The spy leaders also countered three scientists who, at the direction of then-Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, had tried to discredit them since their errors were exposed in March 2020. prohibited. Laboratory leakage theory.
Additionally, FBI scientist Jason Bannan's team had submitted evidence supporting the lab leak theory, but he was excluded from the White House meeting with the 82-year-old Biden and ultimately became the commander-in-chief. It was reported that SARS-CoV-2 was “probably present.” Not genetically modified. ”
“We believe the FBI will be asked to attend the briefing because it is the only agency that has assessed a likely laboratory origin and is the only agency that has expressed the highest level of confidence in the analysis of the origins of the pandemic. I expected it,” Bannan said. The Wall Street Journal first reported that the scientists were removed from their seats.
“I think it's surprising that the White House didn't ask.”
Marshall previously obtained whistleblower documents in November that were excluded from Haines' report that was used to brief Biden on August 24, 2021, and was included in the intelligence community investigation. He said it had become clear that there were major “deficiencies” and urged the intelligence community's inspector general, Thomas, to make a request. Monheim begins an investigation.
” [Office of the Director of National Intelligence] “Some inconsistent individuals may have censored relevant information originating from the lab,” the Kansas Republican wrote in a Nov. 14 letter to Monheim.
“[I]”If true, this represents an alarming breach of integrity in the investigative process,” he added. “Today, I am urgently writing to your office to request an investigation into the federal government’s COVID-19 origin analysis process and its results.”
The whistleblower is a Marine. Lt. Col. Joseph Murphy, who works for the Army Division's Combat Research Laboratory based in Quantico, Virginia, said in July 2021 that an unclassified grant proposal known as Project DEFUSE had been improperly uploaded to a classified portal. discovered. , was excluded from the ODNI report one month later.
The proposal, which scientists say contains a “blueprint” for creating SARS-CoV-2, was submitted by the Manhattan-based nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance and Over $1.4 million from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal grants for research conducted at WIV from 2014 to 2021.
According to a 2023 Government Accountability Office report, the grant will fund “genetic experiments that combine naturally occurring bat coronaviruses with the SARS and MERS viruses to create hybrid (also called chimeric) coronavirus strains.” It is said that he was
DEFUSE's proposal was never funded, but NIH officials later acknowledged that WIV had been conducting so-called “gain-of-function” research during that period to increase the virus's transmissibility. -And the Wuhan lab was barred from receiving U.S. taxpayer funding last year. Next 10 years.
EcoHealth Alliance has also been suspended from receiving federal grants, and a U.S. House of Representatives committee ordered its president, Dr. Peter Daszak, to allow his organization to authorize experiments under potentially unsafe laboratory conditions. , recommended prosecution after failing to submit progress reports on WIV grants for nearly a year. 2 years.
Daszak has previously sought to “downplay” the involvement of Chinese researchers in the 2018 DEFUSE grant proposal and the involvement of former federal officials such as former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield. It was. proposed The Biosecurity Committee in October allowed unfunded projects to be tested under other research grants.
Dr. Ralph Barrick, a researcher at the University of North Carolina who is at least one of the U.S.-based collaborators on one of the WIV grants funded by EcoHealth, was also consulted by ODNI as part of the coronavirus origins investigation. This creates a direct conflict of interest. According to Marshall.
NIH officials and EcoHealth officials have repeatedly denied that any of the experiments could have caused the coronavirus pandemic. The coronavirus pandemic began in Wuhan, more than 1,300 miles from the nearest bats that can infect humans.
The virus has also killed more than 1.2 million Americans.
Biden ordered ODNI to begin an investigation in May 2021 into whether the COVID-19 pandemic started in a laboratory accident or occurred naturally. was.
The agency released another unclassified report in June 2023, which still states: [intelligence community] Authorities have assessed that SARS-CoV-2 is not genetically modified. ”
Representatives from the Intelligence Community Inspector General's Office did not respond to requests for comment.
