White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki is praising Dr. Anthony Fauci, calling him an “undeniable asset” following a question about the thousands of emails made public from the health expert’s work emails.
During a White House press briefing on Thursday, a reporter mentioned the email exchanges between Fauci and National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins, reportedly discussing the COVID-19 lab-leak theory. She noted Collins denied jumping to conclusions about the theory and his references to conspiracies were meant to describe claims that the virus was engineered as a “bioweapon.”
The reporter asked Psaki, “Is that the position of the administration and their top health experts that this was not engineered or is that still an open question as part of this review?”
Psaki replied, “On Dr. Fauci and his emails … He’s been an undeniable asset in our country’s pandemic response but it’s obviously not that advantageous for me to re-litigate the substance of emails from 17 months ago.”
Watch part of the press briefing below:
.@PressSec is asked about Dr. Fauci's emails:
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) June 3, 2021
"He's been an undeniable asset in our country's pandemic response but it's obviously not that advantageous for me to re-litigate the substance of emails from 17 months ago." pic.twitter.com/XGOe2s1qgs
She continued, “We’ve launched, based on the president’s direction, an entire internal review process to use all of the resources across government to get to the bottom of the origins.”
During an interview with Fox News on Wednesday, Collins told the outlet the theory that the virus was engineered as a bioweapon “doesn’t fit with what we know about this particular viral genome. Another was that NIH had somehow been complicit in the generation of this dangerous virus. And I can tell you categorically that did not happen.”
He added, “I don’t think we know what happened in Wuhan. It is possible there was a lab leak. But again, that’s an extraordinary claim. What we need then is to have an evidence-based, expert-driven investigation.”