Fauci adviser Dr. David Morens indicted in political witch-hunt

Last week, a federal grand jury indictment was unsealed against Dr. David M. Morens, the former senior adviser to National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Anthony Fauci. The Department of Justice (DOJ) alleges that Morens conspired to conceal and falsify federal records related to the COVID pandemic.

Specifically, the charges center on his communications with the EcoHealth Alliance and its scientific collaborators during a period of intense political scrutiny over the origins of the virus. Dr. Peter Daszak, the former head of EcoHealth Alliance, and Dr. Gerald Keusch, associate director of the National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratory at Boston University, are identified as co-conspirators, although their names do not actually appear in the indictment.

Morens operated at the center of the early pandemic response and origins discussions at the NIAID. Now, his indictment is being paraded by the DOJ and key Republican figures as a breakthrough in exposing a supposed cover-up of the Wuhan lab leak, a conspiracy theory promoted by fascists and advocates of imperialist war against China. This legal action is not a simple matter of record-keeping violations. It is a politically motivated witch-hunt designed to scapegoat the very scientists who worked to understand the virus and prevent future outbreaks.