As my Legal Insurrection colleague Elizabeth Stauffer reported, Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky) has released a trove of information related to the 2020 COVID pandemic.
This move comes ahead of the July 29th U.S. Senate hearing focused on the origins of the pandemic, U.S. funding of coronavirus research in China, and allegations that Congress was misled. Elizabeth focused on Fauci’s egocentric ramblings and obfuscations of the pathogen’s real origins.
As if this information were not already extremely disturbing, Paul also shared documentation showing that U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) intercepted undeclared biological materials linked to a U.S.–China coronavirus research network as early as 2018.
The documents, which include a Department of Homeland Security intelligence report, primarily focus on a network centered around University of Minnesota virologist Fang Li.In the years leading up to the pandemic, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) intercepted undeclared biological materials tied to this network of American and Chinese coronavirus researchers centered around Li, whose lab has been funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Paul stated in a news release.In April 2018, Zhengli Shi, a scientist at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), asked Li to have a student transport antibodies for SARS research from the United States back to China.Li told Shi that was not a good idea, given the “current tension between the USA and China,” according to the documents. He suggested another scientist ship the antibodies instead.
In the fall of 2018, CBP stopped a shipment of a coronavirus that infects swine (porcine epidemic diarrhea virus) that landed at the Detroit Metropolitan Airport. As an added bonus, these vials were obtained from an official from China’s Academy of Military Medical Sciences.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers found the vials of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus and antibody genetic material on a courier, whose name was redacted, during an inspection at Detroit Metropolitan Airport on Nov. 28, 2018, according to the documents.The courier was not authorized to carry the vials, which had been obscured in carry-on baggage with a combination of paper towels and wax film, officials said. The courier said that he was given the vials by Yusen Zhou, who worked for China’s Academy of Military Medical Sciences, and that the vials were intended for Fang Li, a researcher at the University of Minnesota who has co-written papers with Zhou.Laboratory testing from DHS and the FBI confirmed that porcine epidemic diarrhea virus spike protein was in the vials, as well as partial immunoglobulin heavy chain precursor messenger ribonucleic acid.Porcine epidemic diarrhea virus is a highly dangerous coronavirus that causes illnesses and deaths in swine.
In 2021, this same courier was stopped again, with undeclared vials and a laptop that belonged to someone else.
Perhaps the Detroit Metropolitan Airport is the gateway for Chinese smuggling of biological materials into this country? I have previously reported on several graduate students from China being detained for trying to sneak samples into the country, including one fungus that can be considered an agroterrorism weapon.
Legal Insurrection readers will remember the name Peter Daszak, as the head of EcoHealth Alliance was a key player in the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s coronavirus research.
Meanwhile, Senator Paul also released documents that show the FBI intervened and stopped CBP from searching and questioning Peter Daszak upon his return to the US from China at JFK airport in 2021 during the inept World Health Organization (WHO) investigation into the origins of the COVID pandemic.
The documents show that CBP’s National Targeting Center had flagged Daszak, President of EcoHealth Alliance, as an “extremely high person of interest” ahead of his arrival in the US, citing his more than 15 years of collaboration with the Wuhan Institute of Virology and his role as principal investigator on NIH grants funding bat coronavirus research in China, and that “much of the funding DASZAK receives is put towards gain of function research.”The documents reveal that CBP had a series of questions they planned to ask Daszak when he landed and were going to search his media, until they were told to stand down by the FBI.In an email dated 2/4/2021, a CBP official notifies others within CBP:”Please be advised that FBI New York has requested we do not stop the subject below.”
Looking at the latest batch of documents from Senator Paul, I think that while Fauci’s actions deserve scrutiny and he needs to face serious legal consequences, focusing on him alone misses the bigger picture.
The real long-term concern is the pattern of potentially biohazardous China-linked research activities and repeated breaches that allow biological materials to enter the U.S. unchecked.
If we are serious about national security, biosecurity, and public health, our attention should shift from personalities to the systemic risks emanating from China.
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