Despite Congress unanimous approval, Biden undecided about COVID bill

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
11 Mar 2023 13:18

The US President says he hasn't decided if he will sign a bill that requires the DNI to declassify materials related to the origin of COVID-19.

US President Joe Biden delivers remarks after touring the General Motors Factory ZERO electric vehicle assembly plant in Detroit, Michigan, Nov. 17, 2021 (Reuters)

US President Joe Biden pointed out that he has not made a decision on whether to sign the bill that requires the US government to declassify all the information regarding the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which is responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic.

"I haven't made that decision yet," Biden told reporters on Friday.

Earlier in the day, the US House of Representatives passed legislation requiring the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to declassify materials related to the origin of the novel coronavirus.

The bill requires DNI to declassify information on potential links between the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China and the origin of COVID-19 no later than 90 days after the enactment of the legislation.

Ohio Republican Rep. Mike Turner, chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said during a floor debate that American citizens deserve "answers to every aspect of the COVID-19 pandemic, including how this virus was created."

"The COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc across the country with almost every household feeling its effects," Turner expressed, highlighting that "the United States death toll from this virus has surpassed 1 million people."

In a fast-track process, the Senate passed the bill earlier this month, and the House’s passage now sends the bill to Biden’s desk for final approval.

Health officials and the US intelligence community remain divided over whether it was spread to humans from an infected animal or escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The US Energy Department concluded with "low confidence" that the virus probably escaped via a lab accident, agreeing with the assessment of the FBI but contradicting the conclusions of several other agencies.

Robert Redfield, a former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Protection, argued for the lab leak theory before senators on Wednesday, while the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the National Institutes of Health identified an infected animal as the likely culprit.

"Basically there's a broad consensus in the intelligence community that the outbreak is not the result of a bioweapon or genetic engineering. What there isn't a consensus on is whether or not it's a lab leak," Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines indicated.

When the Senate version of the bill was introduced in February, its co-author Josh Hawley said anyone asking whether COVID-19 had originated in a lab was "silenced and branded as a conspiracy theorist."

In the same context, House Republicans reintroduced legislation Friday allowing US citizens the right to sue China -- which rejects the lab leak theory -- over its "large-scale misrepresentation campaign" during the outbreak.

In March 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) published a report of the first fact-finding mission of its experts to China's Wuhan, where the world's first COVID-19 outbreak occurred. Experts concluded that the leakage of the virus from a state-run laboratory in Wuhan was "extremely unlikely". They also said that there was a high possibility that the virus was transmitted to humans from bats through another animal.

Last week, the WHO indicated that the US did not give the organization access to reports or data that accuse a Chinese laboratory of causing Covid-19.