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There’s no doubt that the media played an inordinate role in allowing COVID-19 mandates and restrictions to start, expand, and continue well beyond any reasonable justification.
Whatever their motivation, ideological, personal panic, or a desire to capitalize on widespread fear, major media outlets almost immediately abandoned any pretense of journalism. Instead of holding powerful figures to account, asking tough questions, and treating experts with skepticism, they treated most authorities with reverence and deference.
Nobody exemplified that special treatment more than Anthony Fauci. Fauci, likely as a result of being viewed as the voice of Science, with a capital s, and opposition to President Donald Trump, was almost immediately given the blanket of media protection.
Whatever he said was viewed as absolute truth, even when what he said was contradictory, hypocritical, or obviously false. Largely because most major media figures viewed their job during the early stages of the pandemic as promoting the “experts” and mindlessly repeating their mantras. “Wear a mask.” “Stay home, save lives.” “Six feet of social distancing.” “I’ve tested positive for COVID-19, and I’m grateful to be vaccinated.” “It’s proven that the virus came from the wet market, yet skeptics continue to spread racist conspiracy theories about the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”
But a massive trove of newly declassified documents from outgoing Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard reveals that Fauci’s public statements were often directly opposed to private information. So why isn’t the media outraged about it?
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci testifies before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee about the COVID-19 response in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 4, 2021. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
The documents contain a complete and thorough collection of documents on Fauci, and the scientific community’s, involvement in the original discussions around the origins of COVID. There’s a tremendous amount of detail over hundreds of pages of declassified emails, internal discussions, testimony, reports, and investigations.
Some of the highlights include the circular reporting system Fauci helped create. As one example, the former head of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases served as a behind-the-scenes advisor to the Intelligence Community (IC) during their investigation into the origins of the pandemic, while also working to guide policy decisions from politicians.
Gabbard’s documents include testimony from a whistleblower that the IC had assessed multiple times that a lab leak was the most likely origin for the pandemic. But Fauci’s work essentially guaranteed that those assessments did not define the public conversation. How? By providing hand-picked lists of experts and virologists that he knew would back up the natural origin hypothesis. So while internal assessments came to one conclusion, Fauci’s advocacy ensured that the public-facing message had a different conclusion.
When the IC gave a closed door briefing to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) in September 2021, they refused to give representatives the names of experts who were consulted during the Biden administration’s 90-day assessment on the viruses origins. Republicans on the committee were furious, with open questions as to why they were refusing to name sources that weren’t “clandestine” or “spies.” The answer? Because they knew it would lead back to Anthony Fauci.
Fauci, meanwhile, downplayed his involvement with the IC regarding COVID. In 2024 testimony, he said he was “briefed” about the virus by certain agencies, but denied having spoken to them about viral research, adding, his contributions had been, “not to my knowledge about COVID.”
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The declassified communications reportedly contradict this directly, showing he maintained regular contact with intelligence officials, led private teleconferences with the FBI and ODNI as early as February 2020, and provided specific guidance for the IC’s 90-day review into the virus’s origins in June 2021.
Allegedly, then, Fauci misled Congress and the American people by denying that he put his political weight into influencing the IC’s assessments in favor of a natural origin. Seems important.
Dr. Anthony Fauci is sworn in before testifying at a House Oversight and Accountability Committee Select Subcommittee hearing on the coronavirus pandemic at the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C., on June 3, 2024. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
Fauci is also accused in the documents of promoting “disinformation and censorship,” hiding his and NIH’s involvement in funding gain-of-function research. Gabbard released documents from as early as May 2020 showing that subject matter experts did, in fact, believe that a lab leak was possibly responsible, if not likely responsible. But that those scientists then faced career consequences as a result.
Her press release describes several examples:
- “A contractor was terminated just days after coming forward to ODNI as a whistleblower.
- Managers reminded analysts who advocated for the lab-leak hypothesis that leadership would determine which analysts would be promoted. The message was clear: disagreement with the manipulated finding would derail careers.
- Senior leaders allegedly set up roadblocks for whistleblowers, removing anonymity from the complaint process by insisting managers or attorneys be present at ODNI meetings, creating an atmosphere of intimidation.”
To sum up then, the accusations in these documents amount to claims that Fauci personally hand selected scientists to steer the IC away from a lab leak and toward a natural origin. Those IC assessments were then used as evidence by the media to diminish the possibility of a lab leak. And then misled Congress about it, in order to avoid scrutiny and concern over NIH’s funding. That’s the cycle of self-dealing.
So why isn’t the media furious? Virtually every major legacy media outlet has ignored this new release, ignored the findings in it, and ignored what it says about Fauci’s other policy recommendations and public statements. Well, there’s an obvious answer: because it makes them look bad.
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These organizations claim to be bastions of journalism, Defenders of Democracy, and heroes in the fight for truth in government. Yet there’s no investigation, no follow up, no acknowledgement that they were used to spread this “disinformation and censorship.”
Fauci was essentially handed unlimited power by the media, and politicians and organizations who listened were heavily influenced as a result. Had the truth been more openly discussed, that a lab leak was the most likely source of the virus, treatment of China’s supposed lockdown “success” may have been entirely different. For example, other countries may not have followed their example in 2020, correctly assessing that the Chinese government may have been more interested in suppressing their country’s role in creating the virus and allowing it to spread.
Dr. Anthony Fauci testifies before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic at the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C., on June 3, 2024. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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Had his alleged dishonesty been more widely discussed, his other policy proposals would have been open to criticism and skepticism. The damage he caused with mask mandates, vaccine passports, school closures, and business restrictions may have been avoided or lessened. Instead, he was treated as an infallible saint. Quite literally worshipped by some extreme members of society.
Still, today, there are those who wear masks or force their children to, because of what Fauci said. This release should end the public perception of him as some unbiased source of truth. But it won’t, because the media won’t cover it. That’s the real legacy of COVID; those most responsible for the immeasurable harm refusing to take accountability for it. And the self-dealing cycle continues, just like it did with Fauci.
