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Today, Senate Republicans voted to hold Dr. Fauci in contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with oversight efforts.  This is an important step toward accountability, but it cannot be the last.  The Chinese Communist Party must answer for its role in unleashing a global pandemic that killed over 1.2 million Americans and ravaged the world.  If the CCP is able to fuel a global health crisis, cover up its role, and walk away without paying a price, this communist regime will be more emboldened to flout global norms and exploit U.S. vulnerabilities–and those of likeminded nations–for its benefit.

Fauci’s Accountability Is Long Overdue

  • For years, we were promised transparency about COVID-19 origins and the decisions shaping the government’s response.  But instead of giving clarity, Biden dismissed Americans’ questions and told them to accept its narrative.
  • Fauci was the most powerful public health official in America during COVID-19.  His recommendations shaped policy at the highest level.  Officials had to make tough decisions with limited information, but that influence carried a responsibility to be honest with the American people and Congress.
  • There is clear evidence that Dr. Fauci misled Americans about key issues surrounding the pandemic, including COVID-19’s origins, gain-of-function research, and taxpayer-funded coronavirus research in China.
  • As early as January 2020, Fauci privately admitted the data did not support a Wuhan wet market origin for the virus.  Yet publicly, he pointed to it as the virus’ likely source and worked to discredit the lab-leak theory.
  • While Fauci dismissed the lab-leak theory and the media attacked conservatives as conspiracy theorists for raising it as a possibility, Fauci privately knew many scientists favored a Chinese lab explanation.
  • Fauci also misled Congress on research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.  After denying the U.S. funded its gain-of-function research, he admitted coronavirus research there used the dangerous techniques.
  • Congress has a responsibility to help America prepare for the next pandemic by investigating these revelations, why information was withheld from the American people, and how taxpayer dollars were being abused by federal agencies.

China Never Answered for COVID-19

  • Accountability for American officials is necessary, but that should not distract us from another central issue: The CCP’s role in the origins and spread of COVID-19.
  • Beijing is still stonewalling investigations–but we already know the CCP’s actions hampered the world’s response,including in America.  The CCP withheld information on the outbreak, arrested doctors and scientists raising alarms, burned documents, restricted data access, and downplayed the virus’ severity.
  • Biden did almost nothing to hold China accountable for its role in COVID-19.  Instead, he rejoined the WHO without reform and continued to elevate a public health establishment that was largely uninterested in getting to the bottom of the CCP’s role.
  • Despite media claims, significant evidence points to COVID-19 originating from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a coronavirus research facility near where the first known cases emerged.  Its research on bat viruses raised biosafety concerns.
  • Multiple U.S. agencies and intelligence assessments conclude a lab incident is the most likely explanation for the pandemic’s origin.  Yet Beijing is still refusing to cooperate with an investigation to provide the world with answers.
  • The world must hold this communist regime accountable for refusing to come clean.  That means building a coalition demanding an investigation into China’s role in COVID-19–with severe consequences for refusing to comply–as well as continuing to push WHO reforms, and expanding sanctions on relevant Chinese officials.
  • The CCP stopped the international community from understanding and responding effectively to the threat.  If China can hide information, block investigations, and escape accountability for COVID-19, why would it act differently in the next pandemic?

COVID Was Only the Beginning 

  • COVID-19 should have been a wake-up call for the West.  Instead, the global elite treated it as an isolated incident rather than a warning about the CCP’s true nature.
  • The CCP’s handling of COVID-19 is a warning about how Beijing operates and its ability to subvert America’s national security.  The CCP has shown it will lie, cheat, and steal to advance its interests at America’s expense.
  • Holding Dr. Fauci accountable is a necessary step, but accountability for COVID must include Beijing too.  The same communist regime that hid information on the pandemic is even more dangerous today–and its attacks are accelerating.
  • This is not a distant geopolitical threat–it is the single greatest danger to America’s security and prosperity in the 21st century.  The CCP is using every tool in its arsenal to weaken America, overtake us militarily and economically, and exploit our vulnerabilities.

China Is Exploiting America’s Vulnerabilities on Every Front

  • America remains dangerously dependent on China’s pharmaceutical supply.  China holds monopolies on essential medicines, supplies 97 percent of U.S. antibiotics, and controls 90 percent of the global supply of key starting materials for generic medicines—which account for 91 percent of U.S. prescriptions.  In the next global crisis, Beijing could weaponize that dependence overnight.
  • China is racing to overtake America in technology, pouring enormous resources into AI, quantum computing, and advanced manufacturing while stealing IP and circumventing export controls.  Every week, the gap narrows and America’s edge shrinks.
  • The CCP is already embedded inside America’s critical infrastructure.  China’s cyber actors have infiltrated telecom networks, power grids, water systems, pipelines, and transport, giving Beijing power to disrupt essential services in a crisis.
  • China holds major leverage over America’s economy.  It dominates the processing of critical minerals vital for advanced weapons systems, batteries, and electronics.  Beijing has shown it will economically coerce countries for resisting its aims.
  • These are just a handful of America’s vulnerabilities.  The CCP has flooded our communities with fentanyl, harvested data on millions of Americans, interfered in our elections, pushed propaganda with influence operations, spied on our bases, businesses, and schools, harassed allies like Taiwan and the Philippines with provocative military moves, and armed adversaries trying to kill Americans like Iran.

America Must Close These Gaps Before It’s Too Late

  • Beijing is exploiting vulnerabilities across every dimension of American life.  COVID-19 exposed one weakness, but China is probing for more.  The United States cannot afford another crisis that allows Beijing to wreck our security.
  • President Trump has taken historic action to close these gaps by strengthening critical supply chains, expanding protections against Chinese surveillance, restoring American energy production, and unleashing American innovation.
  • America can build on that progress by strengthening resilience against future biological threats and foreign coercion—ending dangerous research, strengthening oversight of pathogen research, rebuilding biodefense capabilities, and securing critical pharmaceutical and medical supply chains.
  • Winning America’s technology competition with China will require accelerating AI infrastructure—including data center construction—alongside energy production and semiconductor manufacturing.  It will also mean strengthening export controls to stop Beijing from acquiring advanced technologies to threaten us.
  • Most importantly, America must restore deterrence by rebuilding our military strength, accelerating support for allies in the Indo-Pacific, and making clear that aggression against the United States or its allies will fail.  That requires that Congress pass the NDAA, the defense supplemental, and a third budget reconciliation bill.

The Bottom Line: Accountability for COVID-19 begins with Dr. Fauci, but it must end with Communist China.  America cannot afford another era of complacency toward the Chinese Communist Party.  The pandemic was not just a public health crisis—it was a warning about how Beijing can harm America’s security and prosperity.  The U.S. must act now to ensure China cannot subvert our security and put the American people at risk.