Pfizer Board Member Accused of Getting Journalist Banned From Twitter

Scott Gottlieb testifies during a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on April 5, 2017. Zach Gibson/Getty Images

Former New York Times reporter Alex Berenson said Thursday that Pfizer board member Scott Gottlieb, the former head of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), got him banned from Twitter.

Following a temporary ban in 2021, “When I came back on the platform last year, in August, I was asking even harder questions about the vaccines, at a time when the Biden administration knew they were going to be pushing for mandates and boosters, they still wouldn’t ban me,” Berenson said on Fox News’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”

“And then,” he added, “Scott Gottlieb, director of Pfizer on the executive committee of Pfizer, which has made tens of billions of dollars from selling these vaccines, went to Twitter and said ’this guy is a problem' and then they banned me.”

On Friday, Gottlieb appeared on CNBC, where he works as a contributor, and did not deny those claims. Gottlieb said he won’t comment on Berenson’s allegation and said it’s due to possible litigation.

“My primary concerns with Twitter relate to the physical safety of people. Threats have been made on that platform by multiple provocateurs that I believe need to be carefully monitored, specifically threats by instigators who target people for harassment and even violence,” he also wrote on Twitter.

“Respectful debate and dialogue is one thing, and should be encouraged and protected. But there’s no place for targeted harassment, and misleading dialogue which can instigate a small but persuadable group of people to make targeted and dangerous threats,” Gottlieb continued.

In response, Berenson wrote on his Substack page that he “never made any threats against” him, White House COVID-19 adviser Anthony Fauci or anyone else involved in the federal COVID-19 response.

“Nor have I used the kind of over-the-top language that some vaccine skeptics use, such as calling Fauci a profiteer or criminal who should be tried for crimes against humanity,” he wrote. “I regard those accusations as inflammatory and the stakes of this debate too high for that kind of language.”

On Thursday, Berenson published a long Substack article that shows a chain of events, including emails that he obtained via discovery in his suit against Twitter, that pointed to Gottlieb essentially getting him banned.

In August 2021, he alleged, Gottlieb wrote an email to Twitter questioning Berenson’s posts regarding Fauci’s statements around COVID-19 vaccines. Gottlieb had allegedly written that Berenson’s statement “is what’s promoted on Twitter” and “this is why Tony (Fauci) needs a security detail.”

That was, according to Berenson, the “final act in a secret months-long conspiracy to suppress my basic American right to free speech.”

“I was discouraging people from getting the vaccines, which the White House wanted and [he was] asking them why they hadn’t banned me,” Berenson claimed later in his interview with Carlson.

The Epoch Times has contacted Pfizer for comment.