By Matt Novak
The White House has changed covid.gov into a website for promoting the so-called lab leak theory for the origins of covid-19. Donald Trump, who was president during the first year of the covid pandemic in 2020, has long sought to claim the virus originated from a laboratory in Wuhan, China, in an effort to suggest it was a weapon intentionally unleashed onto the world. But the best science we have at the moment still suggests covid had natural origins.
The covid.gov website was previously a government-run destination to find information about covid-19 testing, vaccines, and treatment options. The Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine has snapshots saved from what the site looked like as recently as April 10:
But the Trump regime has turned what used to be a dry, informative, fact-based website into a hype page for Trump’s personal grievances against perceived political enemies. At some point in the past week, covid-19, started to redirect to the White House. And incredibly, it looks like this:
The covid.gov URL redirects to the White House website and now features a list of “facts” that aren’t widely agreed upon by scientists who have studied the origins of covid-19.
Trump’s allies have long claimed that covid-19 was designed in a lab and was either intentionally or accidentally leaked. The CIA even changed its assessment of covid’s origins shortly after he took power again, suddenly claiming it may have been from a lab leak, though admitting “low confidence” in that assessment. But the most recent studies on the topic, looking at genomic data, still suggest natural origins from an animal market in Wuhan, China. And a study earlier this year found that most virologists and other scientists with relevant expertise still don’t think the lab leak theory is the best explanation for how covid-19 came into the world.
The new website presents highly contested claims as facts and prominently features several people like Anthony Fauci and Joe Biden, who were supposedly instrumental in covering up some big scandal. Disturbingly, the website also names several other people whom the White House suggests conspired to cover up the real origins of covid, including Dr. David Morens, a senior advisor to Fauci. It’s disturbing because President Trump has promised a campaign of retribution against his enemies and has already started to target individuals like cybersecurity expert Chris Krebs for telling the truth about the 2020 election. Trump has also targeted law firms that he’s extorting to get free services, and institutions like Harvard University to resegregate American life.
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