CIA whistleblower James Erdman III testified that the Biden administration buried analysis concluding a lab leak was the most likely origin of the COVID-19 pandemic in an explosive hearing on Wednesday.
Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Rand Paul, R-Ky., said Erdman, a two-decade CIA veteran, chose to testify on the alleged cover-up at "great personal risk" because "government secrecy cannot become government impunity."
Paul’s oversight panel had subpoenaed Erdman’s testimony and previously interviewed him in a classified setting. Erdman worked in a joint role with the Director of National Intelligence’s Director’s Initiatives Group (DIG) to investigate COVID origins over the past year.
"According to his testimony, CIA scientific analysts concluded multiple times between 2021 and 2023 that a lab leak was the most likely origin of COVID-19," Paul said in his opening statement. "Yet those conclusions never shaped the official narrative, never made the intelligence report. Congress was never told."
"It was not until after the 2024 election that the outgoing Biden administration directed the CIA to issue an assessment, not because of new intelligence, but so officials could walk out of the door claiming there was nothing left to find," the Kentucky Republican added. "That is not analysis. That is a cleanup operation."
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