The FBI was tipped off in April 2020 to gain-of-function virus research in China, funded by the agency formerly headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci, that “would leave no signature of purposeful human manipulation,” emails from agents at the bureau show.
At least one FBI agent at the bureau’s Newark Field Office referred to the revelation as “alarming.”
Another agent called the tip “interesting,” and vowed to follow-up with others at the FBI.
The five-pages of emails were obtained by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch via a Freedom of Information Act request and released Friday.
“These smoking gun documents showed the FBI quickly understood that Fauci’s agency funded the gain-of-function research that could disguise the resulting coronavirus as ‘natural,’” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement.
“These new documents further demonstrate the need for a comprehensive criminal investigation into Fauci’s gain-of-function scandal,” he added.
In an email exchange from April 23, 2020, with the subject line “Follow up call,” a person whose name is redacted passes along details and analysis to several FBI Newark Field Office officials related to the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases $661,000 grant to EcoHealth Alliance for bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
“The reason I am writing is that the experimental strategy proposed in Aim 3 (‘infectious clone technology’), if performed using commercial or in-house gene synthesis to prepare the infectious clones, *** would leave no signatures of purposeful human manipulation***,” the unnamed individual informed the FBI.
The individual sending the email – who appears to have been previously interviewed by agents at the Newark Field Office – scrutinized the project details related to EcoHealth Alliance’s grant from NIAD (details which are publicly available), and translated the jargon into “lay language” for the FBI agents to better understand, it appears.
“Hey are you going to be in office tomorrow?” an agent wrote as they forwarded the missive to another person at the bureau. “We just interviewed our person from [redacted] and he provided us with some alarming new info. Give me call if you can.”
“This interesting, I’m following up with the squad tomorrow morning,” an unnamed assistant special agent in charge of national security then writes to Newark Field Office Special Agent in Charge Gregory Ehrie.
Ehrie replies: “[Redacted] Details when you can.”
Emails previously obtained by Judicial Watch indicate that the FBI opened an “inquiry” into the National Institutes of Health’s bat coronavirus grant tied to the Wuhan Institute of Virology around May of 2020.
The FBI determined last year that an accidental lab leak was the most likely explanation for the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said in March 2023.
The Post has reached out to EcoHealth Alliance for comment.