Cuomo COVID Cover-up

[INSIDE JW]

UNDER DR. FAUCI NIAID GAVE WUHAN LAB $826K FOR BAT CORONAVIRUS
RESEARCH

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We’re now learning that U.S officials, using your tax dollars, were
more deeply involved with the notorious Wuhan Lab in China than anyone
knew. The agency headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci is reluctantly revealing
the details only because we sued them. Here is a progress report.

We obtained 280 pages of documents from the Department of Health and
Human Services revealing that from 2014 to 2019, $826,277 was given to
the Wuhan Institute of Virology for bat coronavirus research by the
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which
is headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci.

The documents, some of which were redacted or withheld in their
entirety, were obtained through a Freedom of Information Act
(FOIA) lawsuit
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seeking
records of communications, contracts and agreements with the Wuhan
Institute of Virology in China (_Judicial Watch, Inc. v. U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services _
[[link removed].
1:21-cv-00696)). The agency is only processing 300 pages of records
per month, which means it will take until the end of November for the
records to be fully reviewed and released under FOIA.

The records include a chart
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of
NIAID funding to the Wuhan Institute of Virology sent on April 21,
2020, by NIAID’s Chase Crawford
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to Principal Deputy
Director Hugh Auchincloss
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and other NIAID
officials. The agency funds directed to the Wuhan Institute of
Virology between the years 2014-2019 total $826,277. All of the
projects listed in the chart are titled “Understanding the Risk of
Bat Coronavirus Emergence.”

In an April 15, 2020 email
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marked “high” importance, Principal Deputy Director of
NIH Lawrence Tabak
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emailed
Fauci, NIH Director Francis Collins, and other NIH officials with the
subject line: “HEADS UP: Wuhan lab research:”

Tabak: WH HAS STRONGLY EMBRACED CONCERNS raised by Congressman Gaetz
who is publicly criticizing HHS/NIH for funding the Wuhan
laboratory’s bat research. Here’s this quote from another article:
“I’m disgusted to learn that for years the US government has been
funding dangerous and cruel animal experiments at the Wuhan Institute,
which may have contributed to the global spread of coronavirus, and
research at other labs in China that have virtually no oversight from
US authorities.” [Emphasis in original]

This is a large multi-country study with Wuhan being one site. The
principal investigator, Peter Daszak, is based in NY at EcoHealth
Alliance, Inc. [Emphasis in original]
Tabak provides details of the grant to Peter Daszak
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president of EcoHealth Alliance, for a project titled “Understanding
the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence.” Tabak continues, saying,
“The 3.7M dollar figure is over 6 years to all sites which include
(several in) China, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Malaysia,
Indonesia and Myanmar. We estimate that approximately $826,300 has
been spent at this site since the inception of the grant. Yearly costs
appear to be about 80K/year. The grant is in year 6 of a total of 10
year.”

A January 9, 2020, email exchange
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labeled
“high” importance between NIAID Senior Scientific Advisor
Dr. David Morens
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and Daszak details
the relationship between the Fauci agency and the Wuhan Institute of
Virology:

Morens: Hi guys, do any of you have any inside info on this new
coronavirus that isn’t yet in the public domain? Or any thoughts?

Daszak: Yes – lots of information and I spoke with Erik Stemmy and
Alan Embry yesterday before the news was released. Erik is my program
officer on our coronavirus grant specifically focused on China….

Morens: Thanks, the excitement never ends, right?

Daszak: NIAID has been funding coronavirus work in China for the past
5 years … (1R01Al110964: “Understanding the Risk of Bat
Coronavirus Emergence” ). That’s now been renewed …
Collaborators include Wuhan Institute of Virology (currently working
on the nCoV), and Ralph Baric [of University of North Carolina
[[link removed]]].


***

Also-FYI, prior to the R01, we worked under an R01 with Eun-Chung Park
as program officer on viral discovery in bats, where originally
identified SARS-CoV as having a likely origin in bats (published in
Science)….

Morens: Great info, thanks. Tony doesn’t maintain awareness of these
things and doesn’t know unless program officers tell him, which they
rarely do, since they are across town and may not see him more than
once a year, or less…. Interested in your feeling about where this
is going. The experts are buzzing around us are all over the map,
between doomsday and not that big a deal, with everything in between.
On January 23, 2020, a senior NIH official, Melinda Hoskins
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forwarded
a _Daily Mail_ article to colleagues discussing NIH/NIAID funding of
the bat virus research, and noting
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that
Fauci would be briefing senators the following morning. Hoskins says,
“Would you please confirm the exact nature of our support to the
Wuhan Institute of Virology/Biosafety Lab.”

Another official, Barbara Mulach, responds that, “We’ve identified
one grant with a sub-grant to Wuhan Institute of Virology (thanks for
the lead) and one primary grant to Wuhan University. We are trying to
get clarification whether or not the two organizations are related so
we know if the second application is relevant to the request or
not.”

She provides data showing a “Sub-award to Wuhan Institute of
Virology,” with Daszak as principal investigator for a project
titled, “Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence,” and
she provides information on another award, grant number
R01AI119064-06, with principal investigator Ke Lan, going to Wuhan
University and titled, “Versatile functions of LANA in KSHV
pathogenesis.”

In an April 13, 2020, email from NIH official Emily Erbelding to NIH
colleagues, Erbelding notes that the “entire amount of the new
Daszak grant (year 6 funded in FY19) is about 3.64 M. The total amount
that will go to Wuhan Institute of Virology under this grant will be
about $750K ($76,301 had already been sent to Wuhan in year 1
according to the NOA).” Additionally, the email notes that bat
sampling work done during years 2011-2015, in addition to receiving
funding from Daszak’s grant, “could also have been supported by
USAID Predict program (which was also funding the Wuhan lab).”

Auchinloss forwards
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Erberlding’s
note to Fauci, saying, “This is higher but not extraordinarily
higher than I originally indicated which was for some earlier work.”
Fauci replies, “Thanks.”

In an April 15, 2020, email exchange
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Tabak asks his colleagues if Daszak’s team had “published anything
seminal related to the current pandemic.” Erbelding responds,
“Peter’s only publication on SARS-CoV-2 since the epidemic began
is thought piece in NEJM [New England Journal of Medicine]” to which
she provides a hyperlink. She adds, “Note that all of the prior work
on zoonotic reservoirs of CoV’s was also supported by USAID funding
through a program called PREDICT, which has since ended.”

On October 1, 2017, after receiving Daszak’s email
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related
to his then-unpublished paper describing detailed research into a
novel bat-born virus tied to Swine Acute Diarrheal Syndrome, Fauci
forwards Daszak’s email and paper on to NIH official Greg Folkers,
saying, “Confidential, but fyi for you.” Daszak says, “You
should know that this work was supported by a NIAID ROl that [NIH’s]
Erik Stemmy is the Program Officer for, and that I’m PI [principal
investigator] on, with Zhengli Shi [the director
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of the Center for
Emerging Infectious Diseases of the Wuhan Institute of Virology] as
co-PI.”

A person whose name is redacted on April 19, 2018, CCs an email
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to
“International Cables (HHS/OS)” with the subject line “China
Virus Institute Welcomes More U.S. Cooperation on Global Health
Security,” includes a U.S. cable:

China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, a global leader in virus
research, is a key partner for the United States in protecting global
health security. Its role as operator of the just-launched Biosafety
Level 4 (or ‘P4’) lab- the first such lab in China – opens up
even more opportunities for expert exchange, especially in light of
the lab’s shortage of trained staff.

***

In the last year, the lab also hosted visits from the National
Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, and experts from
the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. The institute
reports to the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing.

P4 Lab is Open and Transparent, Officials Emphasize

***

Officials described the lab as a “regional node” in the global
biosafety system and said it would play an emergency response role in
an epidemic or pandemic. The lab’s English brochure highlighted a
national security role, saying that it is “an effective measure to
improve China’s availability in safeguarding national bio-safety if
[a] possible biological warfare or terrorist attack happens.”

Institute officials said there would be “limited availability” for
international and domestic scientists who had gone through the
necessary approval process to do research at the lab. They stressed
that the lab aimed to be a “worldwide, open platform” for
virology. They said they welcomed U.S. Centers for Disease Control
(CDC) experts, noting that the Chinese Academy of Sciences was not
strong on human disease expertise, having only focused on it in the
last 15 years, after the SARS outbreak. A Wuhan-based French consulate
official who works on science and technology cooperation with China
also emphasized that the lab, which was initiated in 2004 as a
France-China joint project, was meant to be “open and transparent”
to the global scientific community. “The intent was to set up a lab
to international standards, and open to international research,” he
said. French experts have provided guidance and biosafety training to
the lab, which will continue, the French official said. Institute
officials said that France provided the lab’s design and much of its
technology, but that it is entirely China-funded and has been
completely China-run since a “handover” ceremony in 2016.

In addition to French assistance, experts from the NIH-supported P4
lab at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston have
trained Wuhan lab technicians in lab management and maintenance,
institute officials said.… One Wuhan Institute of Virology
researcher trained for two years at the Galveston lab, and the
institute also sent one scientist to U.S. CDC headquarters in Atlanta
for six months’ work on influenza.

NIH-Supported Research Revises SARS Origin Story

NIH was a major funder, along with the National Science Foundation of
China (NSFC), of SARS research by the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s
[redacted.]

***

Ready to Help with the Global Virome Project

Institute officials expressed strong interest in the Global Virome
Project (GVP), and said Chinese funding for the project would likely
come from Chinese Academy of Sciences funding already earmarked for
One Belt, One Road-related initiatives…. GVP aims to launch this
year as an international collaborative effort to identify within ten
years virtually all of the planet’s viruses that have pandemic or
epidemic potential and the ability to jump to humans. “We hope China
will be one of the leading countries to initiate the Global Virome
Project,” one Wuhan Institute of Virology official said. China
attended a GVP unveiling meeting in January in Thailand and is waiting
for more details of the initiative. The officials said that the
Chinese government funds projects similar to GVP to investigate the
background of viruses and bacteria. This essentially constituted
China’s own Virome Project …

***

U.S.-China Workshop Explores Research Partnerships

***

Some workshop participants also expressed skepticism about the Global
Virome Project’s (GVP) approach, saying that gaining a predictive
understanding of viruses with pandemic potential would require going
beyond the GVPs strategy of sample collection, to take an
“ecological” approach that considers the virome beyond vertebrate
systems to identify mechanisms driving pathogen evolution. A follow-on
workshop will be held in June at the University of Berkeley.

NSF and NSFC hope to jointly announce a funding call for collaborative
projects later this year.
On April 14, 2020, NIH official Marshall Bloom forwarded
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a _Washington
Post_ article by Josh Rogin titled “State Department Cables Warned
of Safety Issues at Wuhan Lab Studying Bat Coronaviruses,” and asked
a colleague to “Please send to the HCTF [High Containment Task
Force]. Thanks!”

After receiving an article
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via
an email on November 1, 2013, from NIH official Greg Folkers with a
cartoon depicting a bat depositing coronavirus particles attacking
human ACE2 receptor cells, his colleague, Fauci’s Special Assistant
Patricia Conrad writes, “I think we need more slides like this…its
too cute!”

A January 19, 2018, State Department cable
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from
the US Embassy in Beijing about the Wuhan Institute of Virology with
the subject “China Opens First Bio Safety Level 4 Laboratory”
includes a section titled “Unclear Guidelines on Virus Access and a
Lack of Trained Talent Impede Research,” which notes in its
introduction that “its current productivity is limited by a shortage
of highly trained technicians and investigators required to safely
operate a BSL-4 laboratory and a lack of clarity in related Chinese
government policies and guidelines.”

The memo continues: “To date, WIV [Wuhan Institute of Virology] has
obtained permission for research on three viruses: Ebola virus, Nipah
virus, and Xinjiang hemorrhagic fever virus (a strain of Crimean Congo
hemorrhagic fever found in China’s Xinjiang Province.)”

These new documents show that funding for the Wuhan Institute was
greater than the public has been told. That it has taken a year and a
federal lawsuit to get this first disclosure on COVID and Wuhan is
evidence of a cover-up by Fauci’s agency.

JUDICIAL WATCH SUES INTELLIGENCE DIRECTOR AND STATE DEPARTMENT OVER
WUHAN LAB

Many U.S. government agencies have had a hand in the pandemic, as we
are only now learning. The latest: the director of national
intelligence and the State Department. Judicial Watch is doing a
comprehensive investigation into the origin of the coronavirus.

We filed FOIA suits against the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence (ODNI) and the State Department for information on the
Wuhan Institute of Virology and the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus
(_Judicial Watch, Inc. v. Office of the Director of National
Intelligence
[[link removed]
(No. 1:21-cv-01515)), (Judicial Watch, Inc. v. U.S. Department of
State
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(No. 1:21-cv-01516)).

The lawsuit against the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence was filed after it failed to respond to a March 11, 2021,
FOIA request for all reports and records of communication dating back
to June 1, 2017, regarding the Wuhan Institute of Virology and/or the
origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

On April 30, 2020, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence
issued a press release
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stating, “The entire Intelligence Community has been consistently
providing critical support to U.S. policymakers and those responding
to the COVID-19 virus, which originated in China.”

The lawsuit against the State Department was filed after it failed to
respond to a March 10, 2021, FOIA request that asked for:

* All cables/teletypes, emails, or other messages sent or received
by any official or employee of the Department of State assigned to the
U.S. Embassy in Beijing or any Consulate in China related to the Wuhan
Institute of Virology and/or the origins of the SARSCoV-2 virus.
* All records regarding meetings between any official, employee, or
representative of the Department of State and any official, employee,
or representative of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, including
briefing materials, notes, reports, or other records related to any
such meeting.
* All records related to former Secretary Pompeo’s appearance on
ABC’s “This Week” in May 2020 [during which he discussed
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concerns about the Chinese government’s handling of the COVID
pandemic].

We don’t trust either the Biden administration or the Deep State to
voluntarily come clean on COVID and its possible connections to the
Wuhan Institute. Our FOIA lawsuits could be the key to unraveling the
truth about COVID and the Wuhan Institute.

On March 1, we uncovered
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emails and other records of Fauci and Dr. H. Clifford Lane
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from HHS
showing that NIH officials tailored confidentiality forms to China’s
terms and that the World Health Organization (WHO) conducted an
unreleased, “strictly confidential” COVID-19 epidemiological
analysis in January 2020. Additionally, the emails reveal an
independent journalist in China pointing out the inconsistent COVID
numbers in China to Lane.

In October 2020, we uncovered HHS records
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that
included emails Fauci’s approval of a press release supportive of
China’s response to the 2019 novel coronavirus.

On May 4, 2020, we filed a FOIA lawsuit
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against HHS seeking communications between Dr. Anthony Fauci, Lane,
and WHO officials concerning the novel coronavirus.

As the country suffered for more than a year, our government was not
telling us how deeply it is entwined with the Chinese scientists
working on the virus

JUDICIAL WATCH SUES FOR INFORMATION ON NEW YORK COVID-19 DEATHS

As tragic as the pandemic has been for so many, it was turned into a
nightmare in New York and other states by the inexplicably inept and
cruel actions of the likes of Governor Andrew Cuomo. We aim to find
out the truth about this scandal.

We filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) suit against the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for communications
between Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Director Robert Redfield and
New York State and federal government officials regarding COVID-19
deaths reported by New York (_Judicial Watch Inc. v. U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services_
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(No.
1:21-cv-01210)).

We sued in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after
HHS failed to respond adequately to a March 11, 2021, FOIA request
for:

* All emails sent to and from CDC Director Robert Redfield regarding
the numbers of deaths reported by New York State government officials
due to Covid 19 (also known as SARS-Cov-2 or the novel coronavirus);
and
* [A]ll emails between CDC Director Robert Redfield and other
federal and state government officials with accounts ending in
@cdc.gov and/or @exec.ny.gov, regarding the veracity of official
numbers of deaths reported by New York State government officials due
to Covid 19/SARS-Cov-2.

Earlier this year, we also sued
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HHS for
records about New York and Pennsylvania nursing home policies and
procedures during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In January 2020 New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s administration
was reported
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to
have “confirmed thousands more nursing home residents died of
COVID-19 than the state’s official tallies had previously
acknowledged,” and according to New York Attorney General Letitia
James, “the nursing home death count could be off by about 50%.”

On April 28, 2021, _The New York Times_
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reported:


The effort by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s office to obscure the pandemic
death toll in New York nursing homes was far greater than previously
known, with aides repeatedly overruling state health officials over a
span of at least five months, according to interviews and newly
unearthed documents.

***

The Cuomo administration’s handling of nursing home death data now
is the subject of a federal investigation, one of at least four
overlapping inquiries into the governor and his administration. As of
this month, more than 15,500 nursing home residents with Covid-19
have died.
We have little confidence that Gov. Cuomo’s corrupt political allies
in DC and NY will do a competent investigation of his nursing home
scandal. This new lawsuit aims to allow the American people to find
out now, not years from now, what Gov. Cuomo is hiding.

Until next week …





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