Ousted Top Vaccine Scientist Rick Bright Says Trump HHS Operated On ‘Cronyism’

Dr. Rick Bright, former federal government’s top coronavirus vaccine scientist, filed his whistleblower complaint on Tuesday against the Trump Administration.

Bright was removed last month as director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), a federal office under the Health and Human Services Department (HHS).

Bright claimed in the complaint that his refusal to endorse the drug chloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19, which President Donald Trump promoted, was the cause of his removal.

“I was pressured to let politics and cronyism drive decisions over the opinions of the best scientists we have in government,” he told reporters after filing his whistleblower complaints.

“His efforts to prioritize science and safety over political expediency and to expose practices that posed a substantial risk to public health and safety, especially as it applied to chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, rankled those in the Administration who wished to continue to push this false narrative,” Bright’s complaint states.

Bright was the chief of BARDA from 2016 until last month when he was sent to the National Institutes of Health.

Following the complaint, Trump strongly denied the whistleblower’s claim, referring Bright as a “disgruntled employee” and asserted that the former federal vaccine scientist is just trying to help Democrats win.

“I never met him, I know nothing about him,” Trump said.

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Article by Dongyoon Shin