Should Scripps Research Institute's Kristian Andersen Be Indicted or Debarred for Misleading Congress?

A newly disclosed email by former NIH Director Francis Collins underscores that Andersen failed to tell the truth while testifying under oath.

10 minute read

Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, released an email earlier this month that provides evidence that Scripps Research Institute’s virologist Kristian Andersen misled Congress when testifying under oath, a crime that is punishable by up to 5 years in prison. Even if the Justice Department declines to prosecute Andersen for this offense, the Department of Health and Humans Services (HHS) could debar Andersen from federal programs that provide grants.

In March 2020, Andersen published the infamous “Proximal Origin” paper in Nature Medicine. The paper’s authors concluded “we do not believe any type of laboratory scenario is plausible” absolving Fauci of helping to start the COVID pandemic. Within two years, Le Monde reported, Andersen’s paper was downloaded more than 5.7 million times and cited in 2,650 scientific papers. However, emails showed Tony Fauci was provided drafts of the paper for comment while it was being put together.

When questions about this arose during a 2023 congressional hearing, Andersen stated multiple times that Tony Fauci and NIH Director Francis Collins “played no role” in the paper.

But in the newly released email, Collins contradicts Andersen’s sworn 2023 testimony.

When Andersen sent NIH leaders a press release for the paper in 2020, Collins forwarded Andersen’s email to NIH officials, including Larry Tabak, who was the NIH Deputy Director.

“FYI, this is the work that Tony [Fauci], Jeremy [Farrar], Larry [Tabak], and I helped with…” Collins wrote.

Kristian Andersen did not respond to repeated requests to explain his sworn statements to Congress. Before examining the specifics of Andersen’s misleading behavior, let’s take a look at recent developments in virology.

Follow the documents

The last few months have been pretty rough for the “follow the science” virologists and their allied scicomm writers who violated public trust and misled the country about the COVID pandemic. The Department of Justice indicted former NIH official David Morens in late April for conspiring to destroy and conceal federal records concerning investigations into the start of the pandemic. Morens served for almost two decades as a senior advisor to Tony Fauci, whom Biden gave a preemptive pardon, backdated to 2014, for any COVID-related charges.

The day Morens was indicted, I published an investigation into University of North Carolina (UNC) virologist Ralph Baric, reporting that the NIH had cut off his grants and UNC had placed him on leave. A senior official inside the Department of Health and Human Services told me that UNC was terrified of the public learning that they were complicit in creating the COVID virus.

“Baric designed the gun,” I was told. “But the Chinese built it, and then they pulled the trigger.”

Several weeks after my report, the federal government sent Baric notice that he was going to be debarred from receiving grants, and he retired from UNC this month.

And in early May, I exposed NIH virologist Vincent Munster, who was caught smuggling viruses in from Africa while on a trip back to his NIH lab in Montana, where he studies monkeypox and Ebola. The Justice Department announced their indictment of Munster on June 2, charging him and his lab researcher with two felonies that included conspiracy to smuggle monkeypox into the United States and giving false statements to federal law enforcement.

Kristian Andersen’s dishonesty has long been reported in the media. In July 2023, The Intercept accused Andersen of misleading Congress while testifying under oath about an $8.9 million grant he received from Tony Fauci after he published the “Proximal Origin” paper in Nature Medicine.

Published in March 2020, Andersen’s paper concluded that “we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible” for having started the COVID pandemic. But while Andersen was working on the paper, he had a pending $8.9 million grant before Fauci.

During the 2023 congressional hearing, Andersen dismissed any connection between the pending Fauci grant and the conclusion of the “Proximal Origin” paper, claiming that the grant was already funded before he published “Proximal Origin.” However, The Intercept reported that, despite Andersen’s testimony to the contrary, grant documents showed that Fauci gave final sign-off on Andersen’s $8.9 million grant in May, two months after Andersen published the “Proximal Origin” paper in March.

During that same 2023 congressional hearing, Andersen claimed multiple times that Fauci and Collins “played no role” in the “Proximal Origin” paper.

“So, it is true to say that, yes, they played no role in this paper,” Andersen testified during the July 2023 hearing.

Andersen made similar claims when congressional investigators deposed him on June 16, 2023, to prepare for the coming public hearing in July. During that deposition, Andersen stated multiple times that Fauci and Collins played no role in the paper. For example, when asked during the deposition why Fauci and Collins were not acknowledged in the “Proximal Origin” paper, Andersen said this is because they played no role.

“[T]here would be no grounds for even acknowledging Drs. Collins or Fauci because they had played no role in the paper itself,” Andersen claimed in the deposition.

But new documents released by Senator Paul shows Collins emailed senior NIH officials a press release Andersen sent him for the coming “Proximal Origin” paper to be published on March 17.

On March 6, 2020, Andersen emailed Fauci and Collins the press release for the coming “Proximal Origin” paper. “[L]et me know if you have any comments, suggestions, or questions about the paper of the press release,” Andersen wrote.

Forwarding Andersen’s email, Collins wrote, “FYI, this is the work that Tony [Fauci], Jeremy [Farrar], Larry [Tabak], and I helped with, but are appropriately not mentioned explicitly in the paper.” Collins added, “I hope Senator Cotton notices this.”

The month prior to Collins’ email, Senator Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas, complained in February 2020 that the COVID virus could have come from a lab in Wuhan, China.

“We don’t know where it originated, and we have to get to the bottom of that,” Cotton said, during a February 2020 interview. “We also know that just a few miles away from that food market is China’s only biosafety level 4 super laboratory that researches human infectious diseases.”

The Washington Post later labeled Sen. Cotton a “conspiracy theorist” for making this statement.

Roll camera!

Years after Collins stated in a March 2020 email that he and Fauci had helped on Andersen’s work on the “Proximal Origin” paper, Andersen denied this several times to Congress. During his June 16, 2023, congressional deposition, Andersen claimed Fauci and Collins “played no role.”

Here’s some screenshots from that deposition, with Andersen providing answers to the questions.

Here’s Andersen at another point in his June 16, 2023, deposition

And during the later July 11, 2023, public hearing Andersen also claimed that Collins and Fauci played no role in the “Proximal Origin” paper. Andersen’s misleading statements were often backed up by his co-author on the “Proximal Origin” paper, Robert Garry of Tulane University.

House Democrats on the Committee sought to use the testimony of Andersen and Garry as proof that Republicans were on a wild goose chase to smear Collins and Fauci with claims the two helped direct the paper. To bolster their defense of Collins and Fauci, Democrats released a report and supporting documents that found Wellcome Trust’s Jeremy Farrar helped “organize and facilitate” and “led the drafting process of the paper.”

“Jeremy Farrar!” screamed Democrats. “Not Fauci! Not Collins!” Yet, in his email, Collins wrote that the people who helped with Andersen’s work were Jeremy Farrar, Tony Fauci, Larry Tabak, and himself.

The Committee’s Ranking Member, Democrat Raul Ruiz of California, made the point that Fauci and Collins played no role in the Andersen’s paper in his opening statement.

CONGRESSMAN RAUL RUIZ: What’s more, my colleagues claim that Drs. Fauci and Collins orchestrated the Proximal Origin paper. Again, their own investigations has thus far revealed the opposite. In fact, the records and testimony of those involved in the paper reveal that Drs. Fauci and Collins, quote, played no role in the drafting of the paper, unquote.

Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland also sought to distance Fauci and Collins from Andersen’s “Proximal Origin” paper.

CONGRESSMAN JAMIE RASKIN: But I have your paper, The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV–2, in which you write: Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV–2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus. Did Dr. Fauci or Dr. Collins pressure you to come to this conclusion or to suppress the lab leak theory?

KRISTIAN ANDERSEN: They did not. That is fully a conclusion of the authors on the paper.

Democratic Congresswoman Deborah Ross of North Carolina highlighted that, in his prior congressional deposition, Andersen stated that Fauci and Collins played no role in the “Proximal Origin” paper. Ross’s statement prompted agreement from Andersen. Garry then backed up Andersen.

CONGRESSWOMAN DEBORAH ROSS: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Just this morning, the Select Subcommittee Democrats released a report to correct on the record the allegations that Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins had involvement in the Proximal Origin paper. And I’d like to revisit some of the questions that Mr. Raskin asked about who organized and facilitated that paper. And I want to be clear that I’m not suggesting that there’s anything untoward or nefarious about the paper or the events leading to its publications. But my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have made allegations today, unsupported allegations, that I believe misrepresent who did what for the paper and why.

Dr. Andersen, is it accurate to say that because this was not their area of expertise, Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins attended the call with a goal of hearing what you and other experts, including your eventual co-authors thought of the virus’ genomic features?

KRISTIAN ANDERSEN: That is correct.

CONGRESSWOMAN ROSS: And in the period following the call, you and your co-authors began to work on what would become the Proximal Origin paper. Is that correct?

KRISTIAN ANDERSEN: That is correct.

CONGRESSWOMAN ROSS: The Select Subcommittee has reviewed thousands of pages of documents and communications between you and your co-authors. In our review, it became abundantly clear that Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins had little to no involvement in the paper. For example, Dr. Andersen, when asked about Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins’ role in the paper, you told the Select Subcommittee staff, ‘‘They played no role in the paper.’’ Is that correct?

KRISTIAN ANDERSEN: That is correct. I think it’s important to understand that we are talking about an international group of known experts drafting a paper. The whole idea that NIH directors would have a role in that paper is obviously false. So, it is true to say that, yes, they played no role in this paper. Of course, they appeared to have been interested in the paper because they were interested as known experts in the conclusions and the research itself.

CONGRESSWOMAN ROSS: Thank you. In my remaining time, let me turn to you, Dr. Garry. In the final stages of drafting the paper, you sent an email to your co-authors stating, quote—Jeremy Farrar, you were referencing him, had been an amazing leader. You also told Select Subcommittee staff that Dr. Farrar played a substantial advisory role throughout the drafting of the paper. Is that correct?

ROBERT GARRY: That is correct.

CONGRESSWOMAN ROSS: And did Dr. Fauci or Dr. Collins ever influence the conclusions drawn in your paper?

ROBERT GARRY: Not in any way.

CONGRESSWOMAN ROSS: So it seems to me, when we don’t have the cameras rolling, even my Republican colleagues might concede that Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins did not organize or facilitate the Proximal Origin. And that Dr. Farrar did instead.

As the hearing drew to a close, Committee staffers were allowed to further question the witnesses. Democratic Party Committee staffer, Giancarlo Pellegrini, got both Andersen and Garry to agree that neither Collins nor Fauci played any role in their “Proximal Origin” paper.

Both Andersen and Garry confirmed this statement.

DEMOCRATIC PARTY STAFFER GIANCARLO PELLEGRINI: I just wanted to ask a brief question. When we talk about the role of Dr. Farrar in the paper, I understand that as it relates to the direct drafting of the paper, his role was essentially limited to one particular ask for an edit, but when we talk about his role in the broader process of the paper, for example, Dr. Garry, there is an email from yourself, saying, Jeremy has been an amazing leader, should be an author. I think you both, when we talked in our transcribed interview, confirmed that that general premise, the phrase father figure when we talk about navigating the paper process, talking about different publications that might make sense for the paper to go, that sort of role in the process is an accurate description of Dr. Farrar’s role, I think. Either one of you can confirm that that’s——

KRISTIAN ANDERSEN: Yes, that is correct, and I think importantly too is that Dr. Farrar is on later papers. We have a paper in, I believe, in 2021 in the journal Cell, which is a review on the available evidence, and Dr. Farrar is an author on that particular paper.

STAFFER PELLEGRINI: And when it comes to that sort of a role in the process of the Proximal Origin paper, you both confirmed in our interviews, but I just want to confirm one more time, neither Dr. Fauci, nor Dr. Collins played that type of role or really any role at all?

KRISTIAN ANDERSEN: That is correct.

STAFFER PELLEGRINI: Dr. Garry?

ROBERT GARRY: That is correct.

STAFFER PELLEGRINI: I have no more questions.

If you have thoughts on whether the Justice Department will indict Andersen, or if HHS will debar Andersen as they did UNC’s Ralph Baric, please leave those comments below.