Republican Leader of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) spoke with CBS about the COVID-19 origins investigation. She said that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is not cooperating or meeting their own standard of accountability and transparency to answer how taxpayer dollars funded research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV).

She called on the Biden Administration and the NIH to open up and provide documents to the Committee that will inform a complete, comprehensive, and objective investigation.



“We want to know what was funded through taxpayer dollars to the Wuhan lab,” Leader Rodgers said.

“We need these grant letters to better understand when the United States of America, NIH in particular, started funding grants at the Wuhan lab.” 

Leader Rodgers reiterated how the American people are owed the answers after what they’ve endured during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Think about every loved one that we’ve lost, every health care worker that’s been on the front lines of combating the coronavirus, or every student now that is struggling with mental health because of isolation, we deserve these answers.”

CBS News’ Catherine Herridge also asked Leader Rodgers whether politics would be removed from the situation if the NIH turns over the documents. 

“Would providing the records strip away the politics?” Herridge asked.

“Absolutely. Transparency is the key. We need to have answers,” Leader Rodgers said. “We need to know the origins of COVID-19 so that we can protect ourselves moving forward and that this doesn’t happen again.”