On Tuesday, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, called on the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to immediately preserve all records referring or relating to the development, safety, and efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines. During the Biden administration, these agencies have refused to provide complete and unredacted documents to Sen. Johnson’s numerous oversight letters, hindering Congressional oversight and jeopardizing the public’s health.
“In addition to hiding relevant information from Congress, your agencies have applied heavy redactions to public documents released under Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. These redactions have made many of these public documents hard to understand and, in countless instances, impossible to read,” the senator wrote.
In the letter, the senator highlighted several examples of records from May 2021 representing “only a small fraction of communications and documents on myocarditis and pericarditis” that U.S. public health agencies continue to conceal. The heavily redacted documents that the senator identified included a Pfizer report on myocarditis and pericarditis, CDC communications contemplating whether to issue a health alert on myocarditis, and Biden White House talking points sent to then-CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, then-National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci, and then-National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins, among others. The senator requested HHS, FDA, and CDC produce these documents without redactions by December 3, 2024.
Sen. Johnson added, “[w]hile your agencies have largely ignored or failed to fully cooperate with my oversight efforts, I can assure you that your obstruction will soon come to an end. In the next Congress, when I become chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, any attempt by your agencies to withhold documents will be met with a subpoena.”
Full text of the letter can be found here.
