Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan is demanding answers and transparency from Dr. Anthony Fauci and others as lingering questions remain surrounding the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Both the Energy Department and the FBI previously suggested the virus likely originated from a lab leak in China, which was a theory largely disregarded by the mainstream media as a conspiracy.
But since both government agencies have aligned on the issue, Congress has taken action to ultimately get answers on how the pandemic first began.
Jordan joined "Sunday Morning Futures" to discuss why Fauci was adamant in countering the lab leak theory as China now faces renewed calls for answers.
"So the fundamental question is, why was Dr. Fauci so consumed with making sure the narrative wasn't about the lab?" Jordan asked host Maria Bartiromo. "I think it's because they were doing gain-of-function research there. He didn't want that out, and that was the narrative that everyone to the left bought into - even though the facts and common sense, maybe most importantly, pointed to the lab leak theory."
The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic will hold its first hearing on the pandemic's origins on March 8.
"At the hearing, we will gather facts about the origination of the virus that has claimed nearly seven million lives globally," the committee said in a tweet last week.
The announcement follows a Wall Street Journal report alleging the Department of Energy amended a 2021 document by Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines’ office, assessing the pandemic was likely caused by an accidental lab leak in China.
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The National Intelligence Council and four other agencies assess at "low confidence" that the COVID-19 pandemic originated due to natural transmission from an infected animal, while the CIA and another unnamed agency are undecided.
The updated report maintains a consensus between all the intelligence agencies that the pandemic was not the result of a Chinese bio-weapons program.
FBI Director Christopher Wray also told Fox News that the pandemic started "most likely" from a "potential lab incident" in a lab in Wuhan, China.
"The FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan," Wray recently told "Special Report" anchor Bret Baier. "Here you are talking about a potential leak from a Chinese government-controlled lab."
He went on to suggest the Chinese government has attempted to "thwart" the investigation into the origins of how the pandemic began.
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Jordan called out the Biden administration for its handling of COVID, noting how previously peddled narratives have turned out to be false.
But many critics have also slammed the media for its assistance in peddling now-debunked narratives surrounding COVID.
One of those critics is Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., who coined the real danger as the "conspiracy of silence," on "Mornings with Maria" last week.
"The only conspiracy back in the earlier, early part of 2020 was a conspiracy of silence among liberals in the media and the federal bureaucracy and Democrats in Congress to try to suppress the common sense evidence-based conclusion that so many Arkansans had reached is that the Chinese Communists were responsible because of their negligent practices in this lab for unleashing this pandemic on the world," Cotton told Bartiromo on FOX Business.
"That's the only conspiracy… theory that was circulating around, and unfortunately, you still see, in some degree, that conspiracy of silence," he continued.
Despite the new developments surrounding the FBI and Energy Department's assessments, Jordan claims there are still vital questions that need answers ahead of the congressional hearing.
"Again, the fundamental question is why? What was the plot? Was it politics motivating or what?" Jordan asked. "I always say, we're Americans. We're big boys and girls. We can handle it. It's supposed to be a government of the people, by the people, for the people, so tell we, the people, the truth… Quit lying."
Fox News' Danielle Wallace and Adam Sabes contributed to this report.
