{"id":39663,"date":"2020-05-06T10:37:53","date_gmt":"2020-05-06T17:37:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=39663"},"modified":"2020-05-06T10:37:53","modified_gmt":"2020-05-06T17:37:53","slug":"a-bright-spot-makes-the-fuhrer-squirm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2020\/05\/06\/a-bright-spot-makes-the-fuhrer-squirm\/","title":{"rendered":"A Bright Spot Makes the Fuhrer Squirm"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you remember the \u201canonymous whistleblower that helped expose the high crimes and misdemeanors for which criminal Fuhrer Trump* escaped responsibility?  Bought Bitch Midnight Moscow Mitch and the Senate Republicans violated their oath.  Well, it\u2019s whistleblower time again.  This one is not anonymous, and the high crimes and misdemeanors are even worse.<\/font><\/p>\n

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\"0506Bright\"<\/p>\n

[H]e was pressured to invest in drugs and vaccines that lacked scientific merit, because the people selling them had friends in the Trump administration, up to and including the president\u2019s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. He was forced to transfer funds to acquire drugs for the Strategic National Stockpile, America\u2019s most important reserve of lifesaving medications, based not on health needs but on \u201cpolitical connections and cronyism.\u201d He was instructed to use his department\u2019s budget to purchase flu medications of questionable efficacy. And when the COVID-19 crisis erupted, he was pressured to approve a plan that would \u201cflood\u201d cities with unproven and untested doses of chloroquine drugs, from uninspected manufacturing plants in Asia. When his efforts to work through the system failed, he decided he had a \u201cmoral obligation to the American public\u201d to ring the alarm about the plan, \u201cwhich he believed constituted a substantial and specific danger to public health and safety.\u201d In retaliation, he was \u201csmeared,\u201d with officials unfairly accusing him of dropping the ball on vaccine development and PPE preparation.<\/p>\n

These are just some of the allegations contained in a blistering, 63-page complaint<\/a> that Dr. Rick Bright, former head of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), filed today with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel. According to his lawyers, Bright will testify before Congress next week.<\/p>\n

Vanity Fair has submitted requests for comment to the White House and the Food and Drug Administration, and will update this article with any responses. In a statement, Department of Health and Human Services spokesperson Caitlin Oakley said: \u201cDr. Bright was transferred to NIH to work on diagnostics testing\u2014critical to combatting COVID-19\u2014where he has been entrusted to spend upwards of $1 billion to advance that effort. We are deeply disappointed that he has not shown up to work on behalf of the American people and lead on this critical endeavor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bright has become the first high-level federal whistleblower to publicly allege that the Trump administration has responded to the COVID-19 crisis by unduly pressuring health officials, and putting politics and profit ahead of science<\/strong>. Bright, the government\u2019s top coronavirus vaccine developer, had spent a decade at BARDA, a small but powerful agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), whose mandate is to partner with private companies to help accelerate the development of vaccines, drugs, and diagnostics. According to Bright\u2019s complaint, BARDA manages almost $50 billion worth of contracts and acquisitions, on an annual budget of just over $1.5 billion. He was named director in 2016\u2026  [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <Vanity Fair<\/a>><\/font><\/p>\n

I strongly encourage you to click the link in the second paragraph and read the shocking complaint in it\u2019s entirety.<\/font><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s some coverage from CNN.<\/font><\/p>\n

Ousted vaccine director says pandemic warnings were ignored<\/a><\/p>\n