The Dan Bongino Show - Jay Bhattacharya on Secret Bio-Labs, COVID Origins, and MAHA | Episode 44

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

In this episode, NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya peels the curtain on the country's health agency, the true origins of COVID, secret bio-labs in America and more. Also in this episode: Democrat reps take to the streets to riot and assault police.  House GOP Works to Get to 218 on Tax Bill to Pass Without Dem Votes ⁠https://www.newsmax.com/politics/big-beautiful-bill/2025/05/15/id/1211025/⁠ Gabbard Fires Top Intel Officials, Cracks Down on ‘Deep State’ in Bold First Move⁠ https://www.dailyfetched.com/gabbard-fires-top-intel-officials-cracks-down-on-deep-state-in-bold-first-move/⁠ Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Secures Historic $1.2 Trillion Economic Commitment in Qatar ⁠https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/05/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-secures-historic-1-2-trillion-economic-commitment-in-qatar/⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to Vince on a Thursday, baby. Boy, do I have a show for you. Democrats that should be arrested. Yeah, we'll get to that. There's quite a few of them. Also, we got Dr. J. Bhattacharya in the house, the head of the National Institutes of Health. Love this guy.

I want to ask him all about a very scary story developing out of a bio lab and a threat to the American people. We'll address that coming up with Dr. Bhattacharya. And also we've got some updates on Ed Martin and Dan Bongino, what they're up to, and so much more all ahead on this edition of Vince. Always so good to have you with us, whether you're listening to the podcast

or you're watching us live, rumble.com slash Vince. Appreciate you, appreciate the awesome chat. And we've got a lot going on today. I got to thank our sponsors that make this all possible. You know, this July, there's a global summit of BRICS nations going on in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the block of emerging superpowers that includes China, Russia, India, Iran, talk about a crazy group. They're all meeting with a goal of displacing the U S dollar as the

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The head of NIH brought in as a part of an amazing team. Honestly, it's hard to get better than this. All of these health officials that President Trump has brought in, RFK Jr. leading the show at HHS. They're bringing in Casey Means to be the Surgeon General. That's a chef's kiss, primo pic to run that job. Dr. Marty McCary over at FDA and Dr. J. Bhattacharya at NIH. These are guys who are rejecting the corporate corruption,

corporate capture of our federal agencies and instead saying, no, how about we actually operate these agencies for the benefit of American health? Exactly what we want. So Dr. J. Bhattacharya coming up here. I do wanna go over some of the big hearing moments from yesterday involving Secretary Noem, Secretary Kristi Noem,

the head of the Department of Homeland Security was testifying before lawmakers yesterday. And among the lawmakers who were present for her testimony were some of these Democrats who were just caught on camera assaulting police officers just a few days ago at that ICE facility in Newark, New Jersey. Now, of course we saw one Democrat arrested that was the Newark mayor himself

who was arrested for trespassing at the facility. But I don't know about you, hey, chat, how do you feel? You wanna see these guys arrested for assaulting police officers? I do. I'd like to if you strike a police officer, I'm pretty sure the rule is you're supposed to be arrested and charged for that. We haven't seen that yet, which is kind of annoying me actually. But we did see some testimony from the DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. Now remember, the arrests here would be

in the justice department's hands now. So that falls to Pam Bondi, the attorney general. But here's Kristi Noem, at the very least, lecturing these Democrats for the violation of the law. Cut one, Secretary Noem. But first, I would be remiss if I did not address the disturbing actions that we saw last week. There were members of this very committee that took part in an action at Delaney Hall

on May 9th that need to be addressed. I served as a member of Congress in this body for eight years, and I understand the importance of congressional oversight. What happened on May 9th was not oversight. It was a political stunt that put the safety of our law enforcement officers, our agents, our staff, and our detainees at risk. Here are the facts. As a vehicle approached the security gate at Delaney Hall Detention Center, a mob of protesters, including three members of Congress, stormed the gate and they trespassed into

the detention facility. We have footage of those members of Congress slamming their bodies into our law enforcement officers, shoving them, screaming profanities in their faces, striking them with their fists and otherwise assaulting law enforcement. The behavior was lawlessness and it was beneath this body. Members of Congress should not break into to detention centers or federal facilities. Had these members requested a tour, we certainly would have facilitated a tour. That's enough. So you're hearing her saying, look, yeah, yeah, you want to do this the right way, do it the right way. You want to do it the wrong way? That's exactly how you

did it. And you heard her. She ticked off a number of things. Shoving these cops, hitting these cops, otherwise assaulting these cops, striking them. Yeah, in my world, that gets me arrested. Try walking out in the street and punching a cop right now and see how that goes for you. Not gonna go well. Oh, but a member of Congress gets some sort of extraordinarily privilege here.

They just get to roam free after hitting cops. They're on camera doing it. There's a congresswoman from New Jersey called LaMonica McIver, who's on camera, red jacket, striking police officers over and over. And it doesn't matter that she's weak. It doesn't matter that she probably can't even throw a baseball. The fact is she's striking the cop. What message does it send if you let her do it and then don't hold her accountable for it?

And so one of the things that's driving me absolutely bonkers this week is that they're not getting arrested. And now I, you know, I've been talking about this. I mentioned this on the radio show yesterday too. Maybe there's some sort of legal, some sort of like political consideration going on at the very top of the Trump administration. Oh, don't arrest these guys. Maybe if we do, then the left is gonna turn them into

martyrs and then they will use that against us and there's gonna be maneuvering. Let me just tell anybody in the Trump administration who's having that impulse right now stop it it doesn't matter what you do they're gonna attack you. You don't arrest them they attack you. You arrest them they attack you. Here's what I want I just want equal application of the law for people who actually break the law. And it's on camera. I don't know how much more clear you can get. Just arrest these people. They don't have to spend the rest of their lives in jail, but send a message,

give them the old perp walk that there are consequences for your actions. That is what we voted for, by the way, a restoration of order, not an uneven distribution of justice, not the abuse of our justice system tyrannically to go after people who didn't actually break the law or to go after them in a way that's not commensurate with the laws that they violated. Oh, trespassing, lock them up for a million years. No, we're not doing that anymore. But if you strike a cop, you should be held accountable. Arrest these people. I don't know how much more clear I could be on this subject.

Law and order. Now, Congresswoman McIver is still walking free. The Monica McIver, again, who was caught on camera striking cops, body checking them. Here is Julio Rosas, great reporter, chasing her down in the halls of Congress yesterday, cut to asking her, how do you account for yourself? Watch as she doesn't.

Congresswoman, I just wanted to ask you what your response is to being on camera assaulting ICE agents. How do you account for yourself? Watch as she doesn't. Yeahaney Hall are hardened criminals? Yeah, they're hardened criminals. This is... Look at that. She just keeps walking. She's got her AIDS next to her. Yeah, why would she say anything? You had a lot that's good for him. By the way, Julio Rosas is a Marine. And he's seen some stuff. He's been... Here in the United States, he's been at a Marine and he's seen some stuff. He's been here in the United States. He's been at all these crazy riots and Kenosha. He's seen it all.

And so here he is walking down the hallway. And what she's doing, by the way, is just straight up rude. You got a human being is speaking to you. He's not being rude to you. He's just asking you questions. Answer his questions or tell him, hey, I don't really have time to answer your questions or hey, talk to my aid.

We can do something else. She's pretending he doesn't even exist. She's a child. She's an emotionally incontinent child. You're invisible, I can't see you. I'm covering my ears, ridiculous. I can't see you. It's insanity.

Anyway, so she's walking to the halls of Congress pretending he doesn't exist because she has no good answer to that question. She assaulted a cop and You know you get a great Julio Rosa is asking her about it. She refuses to answer And so now where are we going through with these things? So obviously we see these guys violating the law now we have AOC and The dial-up Democrat Hakeem Jeff, the guy who speaks slowly because he thinks slowly, they're all saying that, I dare you,

they're daring the Trump administration to arrest these Democrats. Oh yeah? Oh yeah? Do it, find out is what they're saying. Find out what happens if you do that. Okay, what happens? Is that a threat?

Are you gonna assault more cops now? Is that the plan? Let's start with AOC. Here's AOC cut 3 hilariously threatening Tom Noemann Tom Homan and Kristi Noem take a look anyone's breaking the law in this situation It's not members of Congress. It's the Department of Homeland Security It's people like Tom Homan and Secretary Kristi Noem. You lay a finger on someone on Representative Bonnie Watson Coleman, on representatives or any of the representatives that were there. You lay a finger on them, we're going to have a problem. She doesn't know the names of the other representatives at all. Robert Menendez Jr. and LaMonica McIver.

She didn't remember their names. You lay a finger on Bonnie Watson Coleman or any of the others that are there. She has no idea. She doesn't even know the names of her colleagues but she says you better not do it. If you do it, you are in for some trouble baby. What kind of trouble? What kind of trouble could you possibly create you little agent of chaos? Tom Holman thinks, of course, this is all ridiculous. Jake Tapper asked him about this yesterday. What do you think of AOC's statement here, Tom Homan? Watch Homan torture, cut four, here he goes.

First of all, you can't intimidate me. Come on, give me a break. You know, I was enforcing, I was wearing a green uniform, Borvichill agent for five years before she was even born. I had more than three decades enforcing immigration law before she became a member of Congress. I've worked for six presidents. I've seen policies, I've seen hundreds of policies, some work some

didn't. But you can't deny the success of the Trump administration when it comes to border security. Again, the most secure border in history of this nation. And I said from day one, and she knows this, you cannot support ICE, shame on you. You can support sanctuary cities, shame on you. But you can't cross ice shame on you you can support a shorter cities shame on you but you can't cross the line you can't knowingly impede a lot of ice law enforcement officers that is a felony you can't harbor conceal knowingly harbouring concealed illogical in from

ice that is a felony and you search certainly can't commit criminal trespass you know you can't in as far as New York, her district, this administration has done more to protect her district than she has. The number of criminal aliens we took off the streets of New York made her community much safer. She ought to be thanking the members of this administration, the men and women of ICE, who protect this country and make her community safer. So you know, politics over public safety is just

ridiculous. She ought to love her community more than she hates Trump because we're doing a lot to protect her community. That's the money shot. He stuck the landing there, baby. She ought to love her community more than she hates Trump. Yeah, big time, big time. Jake Tapper had nothing to say to that. He's just staring and he's like,

the guy's right, I don't even know what to say to this. Yeah. And again, you assault cops, arrest these people. Nothing to say to that. He's just staring. He's like, the guy's right. I don't even know what to say to this. Yeah. And again, you assault cops. Arrest these people. Just put cuffs on them. Put a camera out there. Let them know that that happened.

I mean, they did it to Roger Stone, right? The left, they abused their power. They send the feds down to Roger Stone's house. They surround it, right? They put a police boat in the canal behind his house. They show up with guns to arrest an old man scaring the hell out of his wife. They put a CNN camera outside.

CNN suddenly knew about it. And there they are in an early morning raid. And that kept happening over and over in that Biden administration. They did it to Peter Navarro. They showed up at the airport and they put him in leg irons. OK, you want to do that to people without cause?

How about we arrest people with cause? How about we do that? Driving me absolutely crazy that it hasn't happened yet. Also, Hakeem Jeffries. Very slow. I apologize for that, but nothing we can do about it. It's biological. He just can't get it out quickly. But he too threatens the Trump administration

if these Democrats do have some accountability. Take a look. Here he is. Your statement the other day after there was this incident in Newark, you said they better not touch our members. Correct. What happens if they were to go and arrest these members

or if they would try to sanction them during the House of Representatives? They'll find out. What would you do though? They'll find out. I mean, what's the record? I mean, doesn't that broach a... They'll find out. Doesn't that go across...

That's a red line. They'll find out. What's the red line though? I mean, I know we have the... It's a red line. It's very clear. It's a red line. What does that even mean?

It means literally nothing. I mean, unless it does mean something We're gonna activate the stormtroopers again get the ground troops going you can have them running all over the country Just causing havoc anymore police precincts to burn down anymore laser pointers to point the eyes of law enforcement anything like that Anymore riots more death and destruction is that what's coming attacks on federal courthouses? Is that what you're promising? What exactly are you saying ha keem jeffries And speak slowly. Oh, don't worry, you will. Amazing. Oh, you'll find out. OK, let's find out.

I'd love to test that. Just like Tom Homan said, I'm not intimidated. I'm not intimidated by that. Let's see what happens. And regardless of the tact the Trump administration takes here, this is my message for my friends in the Trump administration. Regardless of the tact you take, they will attack you is my message for my friends in the Trump administration. Regardless of the tact you take, they will attack you.

So just follow the law. Just do the right thing. That's all you have to do. It's very straightforward. So a lot of, you know, the updates we've been getting this week, including from, I talked to Trisha McLaughlin, the DHS spokeswoman earlier this week, she said, look, it's in the hands of the Justice Department right now, they're looking at everything, they're considering everything. Okay, no more looking, no more considering, we've looked, we've considered, we saw people break the law. Hold them accountable. Hold them accountable. We did have some other remainders from the Christie Gnome testimony yesterday. Dan Goldman, the ridiculous New York Democrat, the Levi Strauss heir, he was spazzing out yesterday and Kristi Noem was

completely composed and sober and doing a great job. But Dan Goldman was freaking out and that's because Kristi Noem caught him. What do the kids say? Standing? Yeah, standing for terrorists, for MS-13. Take a look, cut six here, Dan Goldman acting like a spaz yesterday. Mr. Obregol Garcia, pursuant to this court order... It's got to be extremely discouraging to be one of your constituents. To see you fight for a terrorist like this and not fight for them is extremely alarming to me. I'm fighting for due process and that's under the constitution. The gentleman's time has expired.

I just panicked. Oh, I'm fighting for due process. It's like, nah, you're fighting for terrorists actually. Kilmer Abrego Garcia. Just want to repeat the core element of the Abrego Garcia shut. The due process has occurred. He said under sworn testimony that he arrived in the country illegally. Get him out. And of course, President Trump did. Coming up, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya will have his commentary in just a moment.

Big interview ahead. I want to talk about the story of the president of the United States. He's a great man. He's a great man. He's a great man. He's a great man. He's a great man. He's a great man. He's a great man. He's a. And of course, President Trump did. Coming up, Dr.

Jay Bhattacharya will have his commentary in just a moment. Big interview ahead. I want to talk to him about everything going on in health, what he found as he arrived at NIH, and some big concerns about bio labs, including right here in the United States of America. We'll get to that in just a moment. I have to thank our great sponsors. Millions of adults over 65 start to lose their hearing each year

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Thanks for having me, Vince. So good to talk to you again. It's been a few years. It's been a while, but man, I'm so grateful that you're talking to me today, and I'm more grateful actually that you're in the government. I love this. And I'm actually, every so while, but man, I'm so grateful that you're talking to me today, and I'm more grateful actually that you're in the government. I love this.

And I'm actually, every so often, you know, if you start getting pessimistic about anything, one area of a lot of optimism is all of the health officials that President Trump has picked. It's you, it's Dr. Marty McCary over at FDA, it's Casey Means coming in as surgeon general, it's RFK Jr. as the HHS secretary. I mean, it's hard for me to imagine how this cast could get better, sir. Do you feel that way?

It's absolutely incredible. The team is incredible. I mean, I don't know what it's been like in the past, but I don't think I've ever heard of a more cohesive team of people leading Health and Human Services. We work together on almost everything. We managed to get things done that would take years of bureaucratic infighting to accomplish. We do them overnight. And we're all aligned in the same direction.

The focus is how do we improve the health of the American people? It's just amazing, Vince. It is amazing. And also, each of you, to your own extent, was, especially you, were defined by your opposition to senseless government destruction of our country that wasn't predicated on science. So people are going to, if they're hearing the name Dr. J. Bhattacharya and thinking, why do I know that name? Well, the reason for that is because Dr. Bhattacharya was at Stanford and you became famous for signing on to something called the Great Barrington Declaration.

And if I remember it correctly, it was that simply focused protection. In other words, the only people who should be subjected to any kind of specialized situation are the vulnerable, but everybody else, young, healthy people, we don't need to lock down society. And yet you were excoriated for that, Doctor, weren't you? I was, it was interesting.

This is October, 2020, we wrote this, Vince, and it was the most common sense thing in the history of common sense things, right? Protect the vulnerable and don't disrupt the lives of kids. Don't harm them by keeping them out of school. We had now years of this opioid epidemic going on. Hundreds, hundreds of thousands of people dead as a result of it.

And it was the lockdowns that accelerated it. Kids that have been behind in school for two years of learning, I mean, we're still picking up the pieces. I don't think people understood how powerful the agencies, the health and human service agencies actually were until the pandemic. And I mean, I was really concerned through the whole pandemic.

I tried my very best to try to sound the alarm bells. It's amazing to me now that I have the chance to be inside and help reform these institutions so that this kind of thing never happens again. What is it like being on the inside? So you arrive at an institution that is full of people who clearly had animosity towards you and what you were saying in public. And in fact, the NIH is a massive budget.

It's near $50 billion that you have at your disposal, that the agency has had at its disposal, and much of it was being dedicated to supposed research that was used to try and debilitate people like you who were saying, hey, this isn't real science. This is nonsense in the service of captured interests. So what is it like working in that agency now? I have two minds in a sense, Vince, because I love the NIH. in the service of captured interests. So, you know, what is it like working in that agency now? I mean, I have two minds in a sense, Vince, because I love the NIH.

I mean, it's supported my research for much of my career, and it has a really illustrious track record of advances in basic scientific knowledge that have resulted in better treatments for people. Its mission is absolutely noble. I completely support it. The idea is that we support research that advances the health and longevity of the American people. Who can be against that? That's exactly the mission. In that sense, I absolutely love the NIH. But it has fallen on hard times. The American people don't really

trust us anymore. For good reason, what we did during the pandemic, now I'm saying we as if I, during the pandemic, I didn't. But what the NIH did during the pandemic, it was, I mean, it didn't do the research that would have resolved some of the, like for instance, like the research on whether the COVID vaccine stops you from getting and spreading COVID. Instead, the NIH leaned in in ways to things that led to mandates. It's led to all kinds of things that were not particularly helpful.

And worse, the NIH actually supported research that very likely caused the pandemic. Pandemic started in China, as I believe as a consequence of research that the Chinese government was supporting. But I'm sad to say that the NIH also supported that same research, this gain of function research, that very likely led to the pandemic.

So the place needs fundamental reform. The plus side is I found lots of great allies. There's a lot of great Americans here who want the best for the country and want to advance scientific knowledge. There's a lot of people that are really, they're sitting, they're concerned because they might lose their jobs and all this. And I have sympathy for them too. But the place needs change. And I think it's been interesting. I've been here six weeks and we've accomplished a lot. I've uncovered some things which I wish

I had never happened but did. And we managed to make a lot. I'll tell you about specifically about an incident at a high security lab that I found maybe as we as we want the conversation but it's been it's been an eye-opening and it's been really useful to learn so many things it's still a great institution but it definitely needs some some changes and I'm working on that. I do want to ask you about your concerns about what's going out of these really important bio labs, including in the United States. But first, on the mission and kind of the, you know, as you mentioned, COVID, NIH funding

going to that Wuhan Institute of Virology, where, of course, it is believed by most thinking people that the virus emerged from. And I wonder, you know, I've heard R.F.K. Jr. talking a lot about this lately, the HHS secretary, and the way he seems to describe a lot of this so-called gain of function research that the president, he just put an executive order out, banning so much of it around the planet,

funding for so much of it. The way I'm hearing people like R.F.K. describe it, it sounds like these are Manhattan projects, that they're not actually designed to improve health, but instead they're being sold to the public as health operations when in fact they're the development of bio weapons. So do you have as a part of your focus right now preventing NIH funding, which is for health, being used for things like bio-weapons programs?

I think the NIH should be an entirely civilian organization, right? It should not be involved in any military kind of research at all. I think that there are other parts of the government that do that and do that better than us. The mixing of missions actually poisons the NIH's primary objective which is to do research that improves the health and well-being of the American people, longevity of the American people. On the question of this gain-of-function research, you know, it's funny, Vince, because the same research was pitched as bio-ense can also be used as bio-offense.

It's the same research, the same exact research. In fact, the civilian justification given to the research agenda that I think led to the pandemic was to prevent pandemics, to go out into the wild places, find all of the viruses and pathogens that live in places where humans generally don't go, bring them into labs and catalog them and ask how close are they in evolutionary space so they'll make the leap into human populations. To do that, you have to essentially weaponize them, make them more infectious in humans and ask how many mutations are needed before they become infectious in humans. It's one of those things where it's an utopian agenda. It was sold as

well. We can prepare for all possible pandemics. And so any possible pandemic in the future, we'll know about before it happens to have countermeasures in place like vaccines and antivirals. That utopian agenda, I think, actually caused the pandemic, because it's not possible to handle those agents so carefully that they never leak. It just doesn't have to be malicious. It's just human error. And I don't know exactly what happened in Wuhan, because the Chinese won't share their lab notebooks with us.

What I will say is that we should not be engaged in any of these kinds of utopian exercises that pose a risk to human health at the scale that we saw during the pandemic. It's just a catastrophic mistake that we ever engaged in this. And whether it's a civilian justification or some biodefense justification, it makes no sense to me for us the U.S. government or any other government to be engaged in it. for us to the US government or any other government to be engaged in it. So Dr. Bhattacharya, when you, you know, I know you were standing alongside the president, he just put out this executive order banning gain of function research funding, especially in these risky and adversarial countries, places like China, which of course makes the most common

sense in the world that we would start there. But I understand reportedly that there was a more expansive gain of function ban considered by the president, that they were contemplating going even further and stopping, and I think, I presume domestically as well. Do we need to go further with banning this research in your personal view? That's actually the gain of function ban the president signed is expansive.

It's actually everything I wanted. It essentially directs the US government as well to not support this kind of dangerous research internally and externally. It mentions specifically some adversary nations. It's amazing to me that we cooperate with the Chinese on this kind of research in the past because that's especially dangerous. But part of the reasoning why was that the biosafety standards were more lax in Wuhan than they were here.

And so some researchers, I keep saying we when it wasn't me, some researchers engaged in offshoring this kind of dangerous work because they knew it would be more difficult to do here. But it is also still done here, Vince. And I think it's dangerous no matter where it happens. And the president's order essentially says no more of it. It's a little tricky because gain of function as a tool is actually useful biologically for human health.

Like, so for instance, human insulin is produced at scale using a kind of gain of function work and take E. coli and trick them into making human insulin. The problem is gain of function work that has the possibility of causing a pandemic, that's the work we should not be doing no matter what it is, no matter where it is. And I I I saw secretary kenny say this and I completely agree we should be promoting an international treaty to get rid of this work It helps nobody it won't help us win Battles with our adversaries. It just endangers human populations

Yes, that's right and and I heard rfk also bring up that that kind of gain of function research where viruses are made more infectious and more deadly has never once produced a health benefit, which I've been saying for years. I know I'm sure I'm certain you've been saying too. So in light of that, if it's all risk and no upside, don't do it. It's never proven to be beneficial in any way. I mean, Vince, you're the soul of common sense on this. It's amazing that scientists that have made decisions

that don't have that kind of common sense. We should be focused on things that improve human health. Like that's our mission. Why are we focused on utopian schemes that have never been proven to advance human health and that have the risk of causing worldwide pandemics. OK, I want to talk about bio lab safety with you in just a moment here in the United States.

But first, just on that topic, I don't know if this is a part of NIH's mission at all, but are you familiar with any updates on what's going on with those bio labs that are in Ukraine that've had these dangerous pathogens inside of them or around the planet Is that a part of the mission of NIH at all to oversee any of that? I've not been made aware of any NIH connection to those labs I have read reports about them of the outsides, but you know if if I learn of things I'll let the public know I mean I've been

I've been like uncovering things left and right. And it's been, some of us have been shocking. I'm sure we'll talk about one thing. I'm sure right now you're about to ask me, I hope in a second about it. But I haven't found anything yet about the Ukraine Biolabs. Okay. All right. So let's talk about Fort Detrick in Maryland. This is a US run bio lab here in the United States of America.

It's got it. It's got an interesting history. The more time you spend looking at Fort Detrick and the kind of things that have emanated from there, the more you start to wonder, wait, what is, wait a second, how safe is this place? Because in the early 2000s, there was a researcher there who stood accused of actually being responsible for coming up with the anthrax attacks and then disseminating them around the country. Since that time, there

have been a number of times that research has been paused at that facility because of concern about wastewater contamination coming out of it and the risk that it could pose to the public. And now this week, we get a really dramatic story that I know you're all over that involves some sort of quote lovers quarrel going on that may actually pose a risk to the public or could have. Tell us what happened. Oh goodness this is this one this one's I've been scared by very little in the last five years but this one really scared me. So about three weeks in, three weeks ago, I'd been three weeks in the job, I got a report

from someone who was doing a routine inspection of this lab. The NIH runs one of the labs at Fort Treetrick. They're military labs as well. The lab the NIH runs is a BSL-4 lab. BSL-4 means like the highest security level. You wear basically space suits and stuff. I mean, they're called whatever, biocontainment suits, if you're going to be working in a BSL-4 lab. And some of the stuff that they're analyzing in those labs are just really nasty things. Ebola that are analyzed in those labs are just really nasty things. Ebola, encephalitis viruses, and they're just terrible if they get out into human populations.

Of course, they're not common in human populations. They're certainly not in the United States. The investigation uncovered a security incident that happened in March before I actually signed on, that a contractor had deliberately cut a hole in one of the bi-containment suits of a fellow worker. And let's go over a lover's spat as best I can tell. I'm not sure exactly what happened. In any case, it's leaving aside the contractor and this act, which is effectively an act of attempted murder, if not worse.

The fact that this had happened essentially had been suppressed. What I learned is that the safety culture of the lab was really bad. There were incidents going back into the Biden administration where essentially it was just like, sort of waved aside as if it were just normal. This is not normal. You have people working with some of the most dangerous pathogens on the planet, doing experiments with them that could really, if they, if it leaked, could spread out to the entire population, damage the whole population. I mean, we saw what happened in Wuhan. And when I heard this, I mean, my blood was chilled. I thought, okay, you

can't have a lack safety culture in a lab like this. You absolutely have to have 100% commitment to safety when you are engaged in experiments with these kinds of select agents, you know, like pathogens. And so I ordered the lab essentially a shutdown until further notice. We secured those select agents so that they're not going to pose any risk, the select agents being the viruses and stuff, and shut down all those experiments. I'm not going to reopen the lab until I'm satisfied that whoever is actually running it has safety as job one, two, and three. The experiments,

some of them are likely important scientifically and they're worth doing. At least some of them are. We're going to do a review of that as well. But no matter what the scientific benefit might be, it's not worth the risk of harming human populations at scale with a lack safety culture and I won't reopen the lab until I'm satisfied that that has been addressed. That's the proper course of action of course but do you so do you know first and foremost if the person who cut the hole in the other person's biohazard suit has been charged with any crime additionally the person who had the whole cut in their suit,

were they at any time exposed to any of these pathogens? There's an ongoing FBI investigation, Vince, so I shouldn't step in front of it. And I actually have not been briefed yet on what they've found on those specific questions. So, but as far as I know- Oh, okay, but you're satisfied? Yeah, as far as I know, but you're, you're satisfied. Yeah. As far as I know, no one got sick.

Are you satisfied that there's no threat to the public right now? Yeah, I'm satisfied. There's no threat to the public. I mean, I was more, I think that if there was a threat to the public, we would have known before I got into office. I mean, it's the kind of agents we're talking about, like the kind of experiments we're talking about, the kind of experiments we're talking about. So, I'm satisfied that there was no threat to the public, no damage to the public, no risk to the public from this incident, but I'm not satisfied that we won't have

a threat to the public in possible future incidents because it's the safety culture of a lab like this that determines what that risk actually is. In BSL-4 labs, there's no room for error. You cannot have any actions like this. In a safety culture that waves its sides as it's normal, I mean, you can't have people like that running the lab. I mentioned at the outset, Dr. Bhattacharya, that at the NIH you have a huge budget, $48 billion, about $48 billion.

The president has asked you to try and trim things. His proposed budget tries to cut things down to, I believe, around $30 billion. You can, of course, correct me if I'm wrong. But that's a lot of money. And one of the things we've discovered about huge pots of government money with little accountability is that there's often a lot of corrupt interests trying to guide that money. As the NIH director, how much pressure have you discovered from various U.S. senators and congressmen who are trying to have you serve their various pet projects rather than the scientific interests of the public. You know, it's just interesting because like this job normally is bipartisan. Everyone loves you because you're giving doing experiments that advance human health. You go

around the country giving talks, bragging about the scientific advances that actually. So, you know, in normal times, it would be a really fun job. I landed in this job in a setting where It would be a really fun job. I landed in this job in a setting where one of the most prominent people in this institution had to be pardoned by the outgoing president. It's an institution that's in a little bit of a crisis. As I said at the beginning, at the same time, there's a lot of goodwill toward the NIH because it has produced advances that have improved human health. We are able to treat childhood cancers that we weren't able to treat before the NIH's

research. We're able to have advances in how we manage heart disease, treat diabetes. These are big advances that we now have essentially a cure for sickle cell anemia, which these are big advances. And so when I talk to folks in Congress, it's popular, the NIH is popular. And I think it ought to be popular in that sense. What I hear from folks in Congress essentially is, please keep doing this research that advances human health and improves human health, but please don't do any of the politicized stuff that divides people. So that's one of the things I'm really quite proud of. This

even started before I got in the office. There were parts of the NIH portfolio that essentially were like DEI politicized nonsense. They weren't actually science. The NIH is absolutely committed to advancing the health of minority populations. I mean, minority populations are Americans. And our mission is to advance the health of every single American, no matter what race you are, no matter what sex you are, no matter what your beliefs are. There's no Democrat or Republican science. It's just science, right? We're committed to that. But we shouldn't be doing work that politicizes science. And we've managed to get rid of almost all of it. At least I hope almost all of it. There's a let me make the analogy with something that happened at the USAID, the agency that

the Doge sort of looked into first. At the USID, they were doing some really good things. They had a program called PEPFAR, really universally popular because it provided cheap HIV drugs to patients in Africa, saving millions of lives. It was a really good program. I've written about that program in the past. It's a program that was actually rescued and I think brought in by Marco Rubio into the State Department. The same agency had in it a program to add a third gender to the Bangladeshi census. Now, Bangladesh has all kinds of problems. There's arsenic in the drinking water, hundreds of thousands of children dying of diarrheal illnesses, I mean, poverty at scale. And what the US government was doing was adding a third gender to its census. If you take something that's good, you know, PEPFAR,

and then you surround it and marble it with like absolute politicized nonsense, you leave the good things open to political attacks that should never happen. And it was irresponsible for the leaders of the USAID to allow the good things to be surrounded and marbled with politicized nonsense. And I think that in a sense, the transition is to making sure that the NIH focuses on actual science that actually advances human health. That's what we've been doing. I don't want to get too far into the budget, because it's a budget fight, so it's always not fun to talk about.

But I think that there's a lot of support, even from the president himself wrote a letter to his science advisor, Michael Kratzios, committing the US to be the premier nation in biomedicine in the 21st century. And the NIH is going to play a key role in that aspiration. All right, well Dr. Bhattacharya, I'd be remiss if I escaped this interview without asking you about what other things you discovered that have shocked you while you've been in the job.

You mentioned, of course, what's going on at Fort Detrick, shocking enough to hear that a lover's quarrel resulted in a potential massive, massive problem there. What else has shocked you that you've discovered? What are you finding? You know, one of the things, okay, so this is probably not shouldn't be a shouldn't have shocked me, but it did. The way that the press reports some things are so distorted, it's almost, I mean, it's mind blowing. Let me give you an example.

We found, one of the things I found is that, so researchers often work with foreign universities, foreign labs. It's normal. I mean, it's like international collaboration science is normal. The way the NIH paid for these things was by something called subawards. So, an American university, some university in the United States, researcher says, I'm going to work with somebody in France. We give money to the American university, then the university then gives the money to the lab in France or something like that, anywhere, right? Doesn't matter. What I found out is that the NIH, which gives money to the US university, can't track really

effectively or audit the money that's spent in that foreign lab. The most crucial example of this is Wuhan. We can't get them to give us their lab notebooks for their experiments. We sent them money. So I put in a system that requires the same level of auditing power and scrutiny over the foreign labs that we give money to as we have of our American labs. It's a system that's a little bit of a transition to get there, but it's not that disruptive. We're still allowing foreign collaborations to happen. It's just that now the NIH is going to

be able to audit what's happening over there. The media reported as if I were banning all foreign collaborations. What we're doing is we're being able to audit what's happening with American money in foreign institutions. It's mind blowing to me, Vince, how distorting a reporting can be, something that's really good and allow foreign collaboration to happen in a way that the American people can be proud of, instead is reported as, we're some anti-science group that wants to kill all scientific collaboration. It's so far from the truth, it's remarkable. And yet the media reported it happily without even really asking me what was going on.

Yeah. Well, that's a consistent theme in your life. Anytime you do anything, Dr. Bhattacharya, the media is attacking you, which I think means you're over the target. Thank you, Dr. Bhattacharya, Director media is attacking you, which I think means you're over the target. Thank you, Dr. Bhattacharya, Director of the National Institutes of Health. I'm so grateful that we got some time with you today. I look forward to talking to you again in the future.

Best of luck, sir. Thank you, Vincent. So is the pleasure to talk. Great stuff, great stuff out of Dr. Bhattacharya. Thanks again, Doc, for doing that. That's a really big deal. Great to have him with us. We'll have him back.

I want to talk to all these health officials because they really, really do matter, getting to the bottom of all of this. And I know he's got a lot of sophisticated ideas, a lot of great thoughts on these mRNA vaccines and how out of control they are, and we shouldn't be doing this to the kids. All stuff that he said before,

but we'll have him back to talk more about that because he's really good on that subject. Before we go today, I've got a couple of other things I wanna share with you. One thing that we really need to get to, I think right away is that Ed Martin has now done another interview this time with Tucker Carlson. Ed Martin, remember he was going to be the US attorney

in Washington DC. He already was the US attorney in Washington DC. President Trump wanted to make him full-time. Tom Tillis, the bastard, got in his way, stopped that from happening. So now Ed Martin's going to be dedicated full-time at the Justice Department gap to going after all of the weaponization of our government against its own people. But he had an update on his collaboration with Dan Bongino. Ever heard of him over at the FBI? Here's Ed Martin talking with Tucker about what he's been doing with our friend Dan. Get it out or I'm going to die trying.

Pipe bomber. As a prosecutor, I've got the pipe bomber case in my office. The FBI, Bongino said to the FBI, change all the agents. Everybody look at it again. It's been going on for about five weeks. It's like Keystone Cops, you know? They didn't interview some of the people that you would have said, that might be a suspect, they hadn't interviewed him.

I mean, so the question becomes, what's happening here? Is it incompetence? It feels worse than incompetence, right? And so that information- It does, it does. What do you think? Well, I think it's worse than incompetence. And I think, but I think the only way forward is to not describe what I think of the motives,

but to expose over and over again what's happened. If you expose what's happened and the truth gets out, then accountability is possible. If you don't expose what's happened, the accountability looks like targeting, right? So you gotta do this one to get to this one, and the other side just does this, and then they count on the media to tell us it's okay. We have to do this and this, and that's my answer to some people that say,

what's Dan doing, Bungie? You know, I talk to him every week or so, he's going hammering tongs at this stuff right here. You can't arrest everybody the first month, but you got to get this going. And it's a challenge, but I'm glad people are holding us, you know, pushing everybody it's good, but it's, it's harder than it looks. It really is. He's glad we're all pushing, but he says it is harder than it looks on the inside.

It is good to get updates though. All you want is just some information, give us something. And there's an update, Ed Martin saying, hey, as a US attorney, he's been working closely with the deputy director. And did you hear he gave a timeframe? He said it was five weeks ago that Dan said, we really have to get to the bottom

of this January 6th pipe bomber case. This is of course, as you know, an obsession, a good obsession of Dan's and also a good obsession of Ed Martin's. So Dan says about five weeks ago, five weeks ago, depending on when that interview was filmed, that dates us back to around the beginning of April. Today's May 15th, if we go six weeks back,

that's the beginning of April. So very early in Dan's term, he gets his bearings, he arrives, he is meeting everybody at the FBI, he gets all of the assignments that he needs. And then he says, as one of his first priorities, we're getting to the bottom of the January 6th pipe bomber case. That's what Ed Martin just relayed.

That's what he just relayed. So we'll keep plugging away on that. As Ed told this audience, because he really values this audience, he said his plan is to be back here 20 times. And so, and maybe we'll hold him to even do more than that. But I'll take 20 for a starter pack with Ed Martin to get more updates on what they're doing,

what they're digging, which I think is very, very important. Grateful for Ed Martin and of course for Dan doing all of that. And one other thing, just on Dan and what the FBI is doing, I just want you to keep this in mind. I've been talking about this on the radio too. This is a one-two punch arrangement. The Federal Bureau of Investigation investigates crimes.

The broader prosecuting arms of the Department of Justice, they prosecute the crimes. You can't have one without the other. So Dan and Cash can only carry the ball so far up the field. If they don't have prosecutors to support them, it's no good. So the rest of this job falls to Pam Bondi

and the prosecutors will work for her. So eyes on everybody here. It's not just a, like, where's the, you know, where's accountability? Was Dan, did Dan succumb to the deep state? No's accountability was Dan Dan succumbed to the deep state? No, stupid. He did not succumb to the deep state if there's anything I can tell you with confidence is that Also, here's a great picture Leo Turrell Got together with Dan Bongino. These these guys are great. I saw Leo at Dan's birthday party last year

Leo's a great American He has an aura of energy all around him when he's walking through a room. There's Leo Terrell. And so the two of them get together, it looks like on the steps of a government building. I'm not precisely sure where they were. Fair minded friends, do you recognize who I'm with? Leo Terrell, great shot between two good friends. So that's very cool. Look at that guy. Very, very cool to see. I've got some other interesting things to share with you. RFK had an awesome testimony yesterday. Speaking of health,

we were just talking to Dr. Botticharia a few minutes ago. RFK testifying before Congress yesterday and said, man, this government is so slow and it doesn't have to be. We can move faster. Look at this. Congressman DeLauro, you say that you've worked for 20 years on getting food die out. Give me credit.

I got it out in 100 days. I'll give you that credit. All right. So let's work together and do something that we all believe in, which is have healthy kids in our country for God's sake. Mr. and Mrs. Deane. It's not, there's no such thing as Republican children or Democratic children. There's just kids and we should all be concerned with them.

Yeah, RFK goes, Rosa DeLauro, you've been working for years to get the dyes out of the food. I did that in a hot second. Now I have to say something, you can't talk about dye in Rosa DeLauro without mentioning what her hair looks like. Fellas, Justin, can you please pull me a, pull a photo up of Rosa DeLauro without mentioning what her hair looks like. Fellas, Justin, can you please pull me a, pull a photo up of Rosa DeLauro? Rosa DeLauro, speaking of dye, she is,

how old is this woman? A hundred? And she's got, she's got streaks of purple just going through her hair. How about, get the dye out of your brain. How about that? When we start there and then we'll get the dye out of the food.

She's been working for years to get rid of all the dye. What has she been hoarding all of the dye to herself to try and to stop it from getting into the food? It's, oh, look at this lady. Dye is bad for you, says the woman known for the hair dye that's infecting her brain. Oh, Rosa de Lara, come on baby, come on, get the dye out of the food and the dye out of your hair, please, please. Amazing, amazing stuff. Really, really good. Yeah, no, the House, whether it's Democrats or Republicans, the House,

they are full of all sorts of people that just are not doing a very rapid action job, are they? Have you seen these tweets from the House Republicans this week? Not exactly impressive. Take a look at some of these tweets that the House Republicans have been putting out. We need to get Americans off the sidelines. Who the hell tweeted this?

House Republicans, we need to get Americans off the sidelines. I don't know about you, I'm sorry, Chad, are you in the on the sidelines right now? No, nobody's on the sidelines. We're not on the sidelines. We need to get lawmakers off the sidelines. We need to get your butts in the game. You guys have to be doing something to get us off the sidelines. We got off the sidelines. We put you in office. And then this one. Oh my God, what are they doing? Here we go. Audio podcast listeners.

There's a tweet up from House Republicans. It starts in English. It says House Republicans. That's right. I said it starts in English. House Republicans believe in every American's potential to thrive by embracing the power of work. And then they translate it into Spanish, which apparently involves a lot more words,

apparently in this translation. Los republicanos en la camara, cremos en que cada, sio, I'm sorry, sio de dono, I don't even know how to say that, americano tiene el potencial de prosperar y beneficiarse de las oportunidades de trabajo.

My apologies. Not great at Spanish. But why are you including Spanish in your stupid message, House Republicans? What kind of passive aggressive, melodrama, anti-Trump animosity is that? Didn't Trump do a whole executive order that declared that English is the official language? How hard is it for the House Republicans to get on board? Who's running the House GOP account? Get rid of that person. That idiotic. Thank you. Yeah, the chat saying good try Vince. Thank you. Thank you for I love how encouraging you are. Thank you very much for that. I appreciate it. And then finally,

Thank you very much for that. I appreciate it. And then finally, I've got a clip for you of the Indian Congressman Sri Tendahar, who is trying to make a name for himself by impeaching President Trump. Take a look at how ridiculous and hilarious this Democrat is. But they talk about my hair. They talk about my hair. they talk about my hair, they talk about my appearance, they talk about where I was born, they talk about everything, my looks, they talk about my age, they talk about why I should be deported back to the country where I was born. They talk about my past business dealings

and they distort my business records. They do everything. You know, at some point, maybe the conclusion should be, maybe it's you. Maybe you're the problem Sri maybe it's not the rest of us if everyone agrees that you're the problem maybe look in the mirror you're the problem that guy's 80 years old they talk about my age yeah 80 how are 80? And how old is your wig? Questions we need to get the answer to.

I'll keep plugging away for answers on that. Thanks for joining us today on Vince. We'll be back tomorrow with you. You can listen live, rumble.com slash Vince. Also, we've got a nationwide radio show. We do it 12 to three Eastern every single day. Rumble.com slash Vince, or go to thevinceshow.com and get your local radio listings.

Thanks for listening to us today.