Republicans escalate investigation into COVID origins by slamming Dr. Fauci’s top aide subpoenaed for ‘intentionally’ hiding pandemic discussions by using personal email
Republicans have escalated their investigation into the origins of COVID-19 by subpoenaing a former top aide to Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Last week, the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic revealed that Dr. David Morens—Fauci’s top aide at the National Institutes of Health (NIH)—allegedly used his personal Gmail account to discuss the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic to circumvent federal transparency laws.
At the time, Morens’ official government work email would have been subject to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests that could have published his daily communications.
Subcommittee chairman Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio, said Morens used Gmail to ‘intentionally (subvert) federal transparency laws to protect discussions related to the origins of COVID-19.’
Now Wenstrup has sent a subpoena to Morens demanding that he hand over documents from his personal email account about COVID-19, funding for the coronavirus and his communications with Fauci and former NIH Director Francis Collins, among other top health officials.
A whistleblower presented evidence to Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio, alleging that Dr. David Morens used his personal Gmail account to communicate about the COVID-19 pandemic. Morens’ official work email is subject to Freedom of Information Act requests
Morens was a senior advisor to former NIAID director Dr. Anthony Fauci during the pandemic, and according to his LinkedIn account, he still works there in the same capacity
Committee subpoenas documents regarding Morens’ communications with former NIH director Francis Collins (left) and former NIAID director Anthony Fauci (right)
Wenstrup requests the material sent by 30 April at the latest.
The Ohio Republican previously said a whistleblower gave him the material indicating Morens’ use of his personal email.
These emails from whistleblowers show that Morens uses an ‘@gmail.com’ account to correspond with Dr. Peter Daszak, head of the EcoHealth Alliance, a research nonprofit organization, regarding a government research grant.
In a batch of documents released last week by EcoHealth, Daszak emailed Morens saying ‘we’ll be communicating with you via Gmail from now on’, before later mentioning having ‘15,000 samples in freezers in Wuhan’ which could help them ‘do the full genome of 700+ (coronavirus).’
Another email shows Morens appearing to expose Fauci’s attempt to provide ‘damage control’ to EcoHealth.
“Tony is now all set, I think, and I’ve been told involved in some sort of damage control,” Morens told Daszak.
Republicans previously revealed that EcoHealth and the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in collaboration with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), submitted a proposal to federal officials seeking funding to create a new coronavirus in 2018.
And Wenstrup has accused EcoHealth of using taxpayer money ‘to fund research into dangerous gain-of-function at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.’
“These emails raise serious concerns that federal health officials are potentially covering up the origins of the pandemic,” Wenstrup said earlier.
In the email above, Daszak can be seen telling Morens about 15,000 samples in a Wuhan lab that could help them map the genomes of over 700 coronaviruses.
The subject line of one of the messages between Morens’ personal email and EcoHealth’s Daszak includes a reference to a National Institute of Health (NIH) grant proposal that provided $661,980 for a 2019 project titled ‘Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence’.
Another subject line from his personal email reads ‘COVID-19 update (312): China, SARS-CoV2 origin, animal reservoir, WHO mission’, indicating the two discussed the origins of the disease.
A third email from Morens had a subject line that referred to “our suspended R01,” possibly indicating that funding for the bat coronavirus research project was stopped at some point.
However, during his transcribed interview with the select subcommittee in January, Morens refused to delete any federal COVID-19 records of origin, according to the lawmaker.
Morens also previously admitted to the committee in a closed interview that ‘I will delete anything I don’t want to see in the New York Times.’
“I always try to communicate over gmail because my NIH email is constantly FOIA’d,” Morens told the committee at the time.
The mother’s admission that he intentionally hides his messages prompted Wenstrup to send one letter to Boston University Professor Dr. Gerald Keusch, who was mentioned in the emails.
Wenstrup requests the presentation of all documents and communications in connection with Keusch’s correspondence with doctor Morens, the committee stated.
That includes all emails with “other individuals and entities with knowledge of and access to COVID-19 material.”
“This letter continues our investigation into the potential cover-up of information about the origin of COVID-19 by US public health authorities,” Wenstrup writes.
The Republican requested that Keusch turn over his communications with a number of federal officials by April 25.
Daszak (left) and Fauci (right) likely had knowledge of the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s desire to create a new coronavirus as early as 2018, Republicans claim
EcoHealth, run by Daszak, partnered with the Wuhan Institute to seek federal funding to achieve functional research
Earlier this week, Senator Rand Paul announced that at least 15 government agencies, including NIAID and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), had information about the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s proposal.
And despite the fact that these officials knew that EcoHealth, the Wuhan Institute, and NIAID wanted to create a disease similar to COVID-19, they did not reveal the lab’s intentions to the public.
Further muddying the waters are claims by Paul that Fauci may have been involved in influencing decisions about the origin of COVID-19, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention still says probably came from bats and not a Chinese lab.
“We also have stories, rumors and innuendo that Fauci was a frequent off-the-books visitor to the CIA.”
Paul says Fauci’s secretive trips are important because ‘officially the CIA still says (COVID-19 is) probably from animals.’
Paul pointed to how the CIA disagrees with findings from the Department of Energy and the FBI, which have said the pandemic likely originated from a leak at a Wuhan, China, laboratory.
And although an initial CIA assessment found the lab leak theory plausible, senior agency officials dismissed its findings.
Late. Rand Paul, R-Ky., announced that his investigation into the origins of COVID-19 has revealed that at least 15 government agencies were aware of the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s efforts to create a new strain of the coronavirus
This means, according to Paul, that Fauci almost certainly knew about the Chinese laboratories’ desire to create a new coronavirus, since NIAID was a partner in the proposal.
“So in January and February of 2020, instead of Anthony Fauci coming up and saying, ‘Oh, wow, they briefed us on this. It looks like they ended up doing what they briefed us on,’ instead of saying that, he ordered people to say the opposite,’ Paul told DailyMail.com.
‘It makes me think there really is something they’re hiding.’
Dr. Meanwhile, Peter Daszak is due to testify publicly before Parliament on 1 May.
EcoHealth and Dr. Morens did not return a request for comment.