Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., told "Cortes & Pellegrino" on Newsmax that “we should put an immediate stop to any flow of money going to China or to the Wuhan lab.”
“I introduced an amendment that did pass, and this amendment says that no more will be forthcoming, he added, however, “there's a question of whether or not there's still some flowing,” into the lab.
“During the President Trump administration, they did cut it all, and then they (the Democrats) apparently came back and have restarted that,’ he said.
“This is a lot of money, you know, Dr. Anthony Fauci says, ‘oh it's only 600 grand,’ or maybe it's 3.7 million. But the group that was funneling this (money) received over $100 million over the last several years.
The project was run by a U.S. nonprofit called EcoHealth Alliance. For more than a decade, the group has been sending teams to China to trap bats, collect samples of their blood, saliva and feces, and then check those samples for new coronaviruses that could spark the next global pandemic, reported NPR.
“On May 25, 2021, the U.S. Senate passed U.S. Senator Rand Paul’s amendment that would permanently ban all funding of gain-of-function research in China. This is following much back-and-forth with Dr. Fauci, and continually defending against the use of American taxpayer dollars in funding gain-of-function research, which aims to enhance the infectiousness or severity of a virus. The amendment is co-sponsored by U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI)., U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), Roger Marshall (R-KS), U.S. Senator Mike Braun (R-IN), and U.S. Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC),” according the Senator’s press release on May 25, 2021.
“We don’t know whether the pandemic started in a lab in Wuhan or evolved naturally,” said Dr. Paul. “While many still deny funding gain-of-function research in Wuhan, experts believe otherwise. The passage of my amendment ensures that this never happens in the future. No taxpayer money should have ever been used to fund gain-of-function research in Wuhan, and now we permanently have put it to a stop,” he wrote.
U.S. intelligence officials are investigating whether the coronavirus escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, located in the city where the outbreak began, reported NPR.
Note: See Newsmax TV now carried in more than 100 million U.S. homes, on DirecTV Ch. 349, Dish Network Ch. 216, Xfinity Ch. 1115, Spectrum, U-verse Ch. 1220, FiOS Ch. 615, Frontier Ch. 115, Optimum Ch. 102, Cox cable, Suddenlink Ch. 102, Mediacom Ch. 277, AT&T TV Ch 349, FUBO and major OTT platforms like Roku, YouTube, Xumo, Pluto and most smart TV’s including Samsung+, Sony, LG, Vizio and more – Find All Systems that Carry Newsmax – Click Here