You might think that after a bioengineered virus, funded by the U.S. government, escaped from a Chinese lab and triggered a worldwide pandemic, the U.S. would have put a stop to any risky virus research in China.

But instead of shutting it down, the U.S. government is still, in 2024, funneling money to Chinese labs to fund the same type of research that led to COVID-19. And even worse, they are lying about it under oath, without facing any consequences so far.

In March, during a congressional hearing, Congressman Ben Cline asked U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack about research collaborations between the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). Specifically, he asked about $1 million in U.S. taxpayer money being used for dangerous gain-of-function research on bird flu in China.

Vilsack’s response was, “It’s really not a collaboration… To my knowledge, we’re not sharing data with China, and everything we’re doing stays with us...