President Biden waved and abruptly stopped a herd of press before it started Friday when asked about the origins of COVID-19.
The 80-year-old president approached reporters to speak as he was leaving the White House for a weekend at his Delaware home, but turned and walked away when asked.
“On the origins of COVID, will you hold China accountable?” asked NTD Television reporter Iris Tao, just days after The Wall Street Journal revealed that the Department of Energy now believes the virus that has killed more than 1 million Americans has leaked from a Chinese lab.
Biden surprised reporters by throwing his hands in the air and walking to his waiting for Marine One helicopter. The president previously walked away from the press after appearing willing to answer questions on Feb. 16 when The Post asked, “His ability to deal with China is undermined by his family’s business dealings in China, President Biden ?”
Biden snapped: “Give me a break, man” and refused to answer any more questions, adding: “You can come to my office and ask a question when you have more polite people with you.”
Biden rarely mentions an interest in determining the origins of the pandemic, which the FBI also believes was leaked from a facility in Wuhan, China, where a risky US-funded investigation focused on modifying coronaviruses before the outbreak.
“The FBI has long considered that the origins of the pandemic could be a possible laboratory accident in Wuhan,” FBI Director Christopher Wray told Fox News on Tuesday. “Here you’re talking about a possible leak from a Chinese government-controlled lab.”
Biden’s son Hunter and brother James have extensive business relationships with Chinese state-linked companies, and the president engages with their relatives’ partners in at least two separate deals.
Republicans regularly criticize Biden for not doing more to determine the origins of COVID-19 or lobby Beijing to halt illegal fentanyl exports that have led to a spike in overdose deaths in the United States, data is available.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and National Security Council spokesman John Kirby declined on Monday to confirm reports that the Energy Department recently updated its stance on the origins of the pandemic.
Under political pressure, Biden in May 2021 ordered a US intelligence community assessment of the origins of COVID-19, after previously saying the US would defer to the World Health Organization for answers.
Spy agencies assessed in August 2021 that it was “plausible” that the virus came from a laboratory release in Wuhan or occurs naturally through animal-to-human transmission.
At the time, a written statement attributed to Biden read, “The world deserves answers and I won’t stop until we have them.”
“Responsible nations do not shy away from this kind of responsibility to the rest of the world,” the statement added. “Pandemics do not respect international borders and we all need to better understand how COVID-19 arose to prevent further pandemics.”
But Biden, who campaigned heavily in 2020 to criticize then-President Donald Trump’s handling of the outbreak, has rarely raised the issue publicly since.
In response to a question from The Post in January 2022, Biden said he pushed Chinese President Xi Jinping to be transparent about the origins of the virus during a virtual summit in November 2021, despite then-press secretary, Jen Psaki, having told differently to reporters. impression. Biden said his press team didn’t know he did because they weren’t in the room for that exchange.
After a July 2022 phone call between Biden and Xi, Jean-Pierre dodged questions about whether Biden pressed the Chinese leader about the origins of COVID-19, but said he brought up fentanyl.
The topic was omitted from Biden’s opening public remarks and a White House reading of the private portion of Biden’s first in-person meeting with Xi in November, although Biden aides later said they discussed it behind closed doors.
BREAKING: President Biden @POTUS was going to speak but turned away upon hearing my question on #Covid origin and whether he’ll hold #China accountable. @NTDNews @ChinaInFocusNTD @capitolreport pic.twitter.com/jsbMTNPeYb
— Iris Tao (@IrisTaoTV) March 3, 2023
Documents released in late 2021 by The Intercept revealed that the New York-based EcoHealth Alliance used US grants to fund Wuhan lab experiments that modified three bat coronaviruses other than COVID-19. Research has found that they became much more contagious among “humanized” mice when human-like receptors were added to them.
Biden’s approach to determining the origins of the pandemic stands in stark contrast to Trump’s. The former president, who seeks revenge against Biden in 2024, forced China to pay $50 trillion in “reparations” for the virus, which has caused widespread economic, social, and educational upheaval around the world.
There are two large Biden family-owned businesses in China that are currently the focus of the House Republican investigation.
The first comes from an investment firm called BHR Partners formed by then-second son Hunter Biden in 2013. The other comes from a company called CEFC China Energy, which reportedly paid Hunter and his uncle James Biden millions in 2017 and 2018, as Joe Biden considered a presidential race.
Hunter Biden co-founded BHR Partners in 2013, just weeks after he joined then-Vice President Joe Biden aboard Air Force Two on an official trip to Beijing, according to The Wall Street Journal. Hunter introduced his father to new BHR CEO Jonathan Li in a hotel lobby during that trip, and Joe Biden later wrote college recommendation letters for Li’s children.
Online company records indicate that Hunter Biden still holds a 10% stake in BHR, despite his father’s insistence that there would be no conflicts of interest related to the family business during his presidency. Hunter Biden’s attorney Chris Clark said in late 2021 that BHR’s stake had been sold, but neither he nor the White House provided any further information on the alleged transaction.
Joe Biden would also be involved in dealings with the CEFC.
Hunter and Jim Biden won $4.8 million from CEFC China Energy, an arm of Beijing’s “Belt and Road” foreign influence initiative, in 2017 and 2018, the Washington Post reported after a review of documents from Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Hunter Biden’s former business partner, Tony Bobulinski, says he met with Joe Biden in May 2017 regarding the CEFC deal, and a May 2017 email from another associate, James Gilliar, states that a ” big man” was due a cut of 10%.
Bobulinski and Gilliar identified Joe Biden as the “big guy,” and an October 2017 email identifies Joe Biden as a participant in a call about CEFC’s bid to buy U.S. natural gas.
