A former senior advisor to Anthony Fauci has pleaded guilty to conspiring to conceal communications in which he plotted ways to fund research asserting that the COVID-19 virus originated from bats rather than a laboratory. The communications were public property because David Morens was a federal employee engaged in schemes to allocate taxpayer funds.
Morens, who served as a senior advisor at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) from 2006 through the end of 2022, admitted to conspiring with others to obstruct legitimate functions of the Department of Health and Human Services. His guilty plea dismisses four additional felony charges involving falsifying records, hiding records, and aiding and abetting.
The government alleges Morens worked with “Co-Conspirator 1,” identified as Peter Daszak, who led EcoHealth Alliance on an NIAID-funded grant, and “Co-Conspirator 2,” Gerald Keusch, a doctor and former associate director of Boston University’s infectious disease lab.
In April 2020, after receiving a letter from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) canceling Daszak’s bat coronavirus research grant, Morens intervened to secure a $7 million NIH grant for the Emerging Infectious Disease Regional Center. He then moved their communications to his Gmail account and plotted ways to conceal federal records from Freedom of Information Act searches.
Morens submitted an article supporting the bat-origin narrative in July 2020, which he instructed co-conspirators to keep hidden from government channels. DOJ documents show he also assisted Daszak in crafting letters to NIH officials and prepared him for a meeting with a senior NIAID official, advising him to avoid public records.
Daszak later sent Morens two bottles of red wine as appreciation for his behind-the-scenes efforts, noting it was part of “the battle against your bosses.” The plea has also raised questions about potential implications for Anthony Fauci, per Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who stated that suggestions to grant immunity to those close to Fauci during the pandemic era aimed to use them as a mechanism to expose him.