ABC, NBC and CBS spent Thursday morning eagerly touting anti-Trump “whistleblower” Dr. Rick Bright testifying against the Trump administration on Capitol Hill today over their response to the coronavirus, but left out a crucial detail surrounding his testimony. Namely, that he was going to be questioned by a friendly Democrat ally, who’s district benefited financially from him.
This morning all three networks spent reports hyping Bright’s "stark warning" in his upcoming testimony that the Trump administration was leading the U.S. into the “darkest Winter in modern history” because of its mishandling of the coronavirus response. Like they did weeks ago, each network floated Bright’s claim he was forced out as director of the HHS’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority office, responsible for supporting the development of vaccines, because he questioned President Trump promoting Hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19.
The networks continued to ignore the evidence contradicting Bright's story. They also forgot to mention Bright's relationship with the Democrat who chairs the subcommittee he is testifying before today.
But Politico broke that story Wednesday night, in a report by investigative reporter Dan Diamond:
Rick Bright, who was abruptly removed as director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority last month, will air his complaints about the Trump administration's pandemic response in front of a House subcommittee overseen by Rep. Anna Eshoo, a Democrat who represents a Northern California district home to a company that received more than $110 million in awards from BARDA while Bright led the office.
Diamond noted how Eshoo has had a long relationship with Bright’s office, so she’s not exactly a neutral party. She even called him one of her “heroes” in 2018:
Eshoo, who helped craft the 2006 legislation to create BARDA and has since worked to bolster its authorities, also has been a longtime booster of Bright, including for his work to fund the development of vaccines, drugs and diagnostics through public sector-private industry partnerships.
“Dr. Bright, the partnership with BARDA has been a very important one, and I think that you're taking it to new places,” Eshoo told him in a June 2018 congressional hearing, calling Bright one of her “heroes.”
According to Republican lawmakers who spoke with Politico, Eshoo also ignored precedent in how these hearings are structured to rush forward Bright's testimony, and giving them little time to prepare for the hearing. But it seems the media, who eagerly promoted the official's claims he was fired for political reasons, has no problem with liberal whistleblowers and their Democrat allies with "political" agendas.
