Department of Justice Should Investigate EcoHealth Alliance President: House Panel

Peter Daszak, president of the EcoHealth Alliance, testifies before the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic in Washington on May 1, 2024. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

Federal prosecutors should investigate the president of a nonprofit that funneled U.S. taxpayer money to a laboratory in China, a U.S. House of Representatives panel said on May 1.

Peter Daszak, president of the EcoHealth Alliance, should be probed after he and his group violated the terms of a U.S. grant, the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic said.

Mr. Daszak, who holds a doctorate, may have violated federal laws including a statute that prohibits falsifying, concealing, or covering up “any trick, scheme, or device,” the subcommittee said in a report detailing the results of its investigation into Mr. Daszak, EcoHealth, the grant it received, and U.S. officials at the agency that gave the grant.

Mr. Daszak, for instance, claimed that the reason EcoHealth submitted an annual report two years late was because he was “locked out” by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) system. But a forensic audit of the system uncovered no evidence supporting that claim, according to the report.

“The select subcommittee does not find EcoHealth’s explanation for the delayed submission to be credible or consistent with testimony and documents produced during this investigation,” it stated.

Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), a doctor who is the chairman of the panel, said that Mr. Daszak “is not a good steward of U.S. taxpayer dollars and should never again receive funding from the U.S. taxpayer.”

Mr. Daszak should be debarred, or prevented from receiving additional U.S. taxpayer funds, and investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice for possible criminal violations, Dr. Wenstrup said.

An EcoHealth spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email that the group had not yet seen the subcommittee’s report.

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

The year five annual report from the grant showed that experiments were conducted at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the same city where the first COVID-19 cases appeared, that caused an increase in one of the functions of a bat coronavirus, which experts say fits the common definition of gain-of-function research.

Mr. Daszak and EcoHealth “conducted dangerous gain-of-function research at the WIV, willfully violated the terms of a multi-million-dollar NIH grant, and placed U.S. national security at risk,” Dr. Wenstrup said. “This blatant contempt for the American people is reprehensible.”

The NIH and EcoHealth have insisted that the experiments were not gain-of-function because they do not fit the government’s definition.

Mr. Daszak said in prepared remarks delivered to the select subcommittee on Wednesday that the idea work that EcoHealth assisted with was gain-of-function was one of the myths that have circulated about the group.

“We did not—and the NIH itself stipulated that we didn’t,” Mr. Daszak wrote.

U.S. Department of Defense and NIH officials have, since the pandemic started, approved millions in new funding to EcoHealth, even though the NIH found that EcoHealth was not in compliance with grant conditions.

EcoHealth blamed the Wuhan lab for the failures. It received reinstatement of the main grant, while the NIH suspended funding to the lab for 10 years because of its refusal to hand over notebooks with information on experiments.

Mr. Daszak, according to an interview transcript released Wednesday, told the subcommittee that EcoHealth has received new data from the lab on some of the virus tests and that EcoHealth is analyzing the data.

While the lab is not participating in the grant, it has control of the virus samples, Mr. Daszak said.

“My understanding is that the debarment is they are not able to take federal funds, now for 10 years. I think at least that is, what I understand, from what the phrase means. They have other samples. If they are going to do further work on those samples and they are willing to give us that information, that’s a positive win for the U.S. taxpayer,” Mr. Daszak said.

He said he did not know why the lab, or the WIV, wouldn’t hand over notebooks but are now sharing data from tests.

“Well, you would have to ask WIV about that. I’m very delighted that we’ve been able to get that. Information out of WIV and out of China. It’s a good thing,” Mr. Daszak said.

Dr. Emily Erbelding, an NIH official, told the panel that the grant was reinstated in part because EcoHealth represented that it had access to virus samples and needed to conduct analysis of those samples.

Mr. Daszak did not tell the NIH that the samples were still in the custody of the WIV, according to the subcommittee report.

“Witness testimony makes clear that Dr. Daszak omitted the material fact that the sequences and samples the federal government were paying for were, at least in part, under the custody and control of the WIV,” the report stated. “Further, testimony suggests that if NIH had known this, it would have resulted in more questions regarding whether to reinstate the grant or not.”

The NIH did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mr. Daszak said during questioning on Wednesday that he told the NIH the Wuhan lab still had the samples, but that EcoHealth had the sequences. “We were very clear,' he said.