The U.S. Energy Department reportedly concluded that the COVID virus likely leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China. Even though the agency said it was a “low confidence” conclusion, the pronouncement elevated the once-conspiracy theory and appeared to vindicate those who had at least questioned the virus’s origin.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s leading infectious disease expert, had long sought to sell the idea that the virus emerged naturally.

In April 2020, he cited a study that found the virus’s mutations are “consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to a human.”

“There was a study recently,” Fauci told reporters on April 17, 2020, when asked if it was possible that virus came from a Chinese lab, “where a group of highly qualified evolutionary virologists looked at the sequences… in bats as they evolve and the mutations that it took to get to the point where it is now is totally consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to a human.

“So, the paper will be available. I don’t have the authors right now, but we can make it available to you,” Fauci said.

But now, new emails revealed by House Republicans show a completely different story.

The emails show Fauci “prompted” that very study to disprove the theory that the virus leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China. In fact, he had final approval of the scientific paper he had commissioned, the New York Post reported.

That paper, entitled “The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2,” was delivered to Fauci for final approval before it was published in Nature Medicine on February 17, 2020.

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The paper “was written four days after Fauci, and his NIH boss Francis Collins, held a call with the four authors to discuss reports that COVID-19 may have leaked from the Wuhan lab and ‘may have been intentionally genetically manipulated,'” the Post wrote.

The House Oversight subcommittee examining COVID released emails on Sunday that show the paper’s co-author, Dr. Kristian Andersen, said Fauci “prompted” him to write the paper with the specific goal to “disprove” the lab-leak theory.

“There has been a lot of speculation, fear-mongering, and conspiracies put forward in this space,” Andersen wrote on February 12, 2020, in a cover letter when submitting the paper to Nature Medicine. He said the paper was “prompted” by “Tony Fauci” and Jeremy Farrer.

Farrar was then the head of the British nonprofit, the Wellcome Trust, which has long ties to the pharmaceutical industry. On the day the paper was published, emails show Farrar pushed for an edit to the piece. “Sorry to micromanage/micro edit! But would you be willing to change one sentence?”

He wanted to change the word “unlikely” with “improbable” so a sentence would read: “It is improbable that SARS-CoV-2 emerged through laboratory manipulation of an existing SARS-related coronavirus.”

But that wasn’t the case at all. In a newly updated classified intelligence report, the Department of Energy assessed that the COVID virus “most likely” came from a laboratory leak in China, according to CNN.

A senior US intelligence official told The Wall Street Journal that the update to the intelligence assessment “was conducted in light of new intelligence, further study of academic literature and in consultation with experts outside government.”

The issue is far from over.

“We need to do extensive hearings,” Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“I hope our Democratic colleagues in the Congress can support that. I know the Republicans in the House are certainly supportive of that,” he said. “Think about what just happened over the last three years, one of the biggest pandemics in a century. A lot of evidence that it’s coming from the Chinese.”

The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Joseph Curl has covered politics for 35 years, including 12 years as White House correspondent for a national newspaper. He was also the a.m. editor of the Drudge Report for four years. Send tips to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and follow him on Twitter @josephcurl.

A couple claiming they were left stranded in the ocean off a Hawaiian island, forcing them to swim half a mile to land, is suing a Hawaii tour company.

Alexander Burckle and his wife, Elizabeth Webster, who had snorkeled before, have filed a lawsuit against Sail Maui. They had joined 42 other passengers for a snorkeling trip in September 2021 that left Lahaina Harbor in Maui. They claim in the lawsuit that the passengers were informed the boat would remain anchored for an hour in the first ocean location before it sailed on, as the passengers were permitted to swim in the ocean. Passengers returned to the boat at different times, according to the lawsuit, which said the waves were eight feet high.

“It can be really rough water even for people that are experienced in the ocean, much less visitors who may not have any ocean experience or especially not have experience in Hawaiian waters,” the couple’s attorney, Jared A. Washkowitz, told Buzzfeed News.

The lawsuit states that one passenger reported the couple missing when she reboarded the boat, but a crew member said the couple was aboard. The suit alleges three head counts were made, and the first two numbered 42 passengers but the third numbered 44 as the first mate did not make the passengers remain still, instead counting them as they wandered about.

“Plaintiffs realized the Vessel had left them and was not coming back for them, and they decided that their only option for survival at that point was to return to shore,” the lawsuit claims, adding that the couple “were beginning to panic and were struggling to swim in the ocean conditions.”

The couple swam for half a mile to the island of Lanai, the lawsuit states, fatigued and dehydrated, managing to write “SOS” and “HELP” in the sand.

 Local residents then came to their aid. The lawsuit claims that when the couple contacted the tour company, no one was aware they had gone missing.

“It’s kind of scary to think what would’ve happened if they hadn’t made it,” Washkowitz said. “I’m not sure the company would’ve known about it until family members started asking about it. It’s just kind of a scary thought.”

“They’re not giving any statements because they don’t want to have to relive the incident over and over again,” he added. “They’re both getting psychological treatment. They have anxiety and stress from the incident, and they’re coping the best they can.”

Jessica Herbert, a fellow passenger on the snorkeling tour, told Good Morning America that the crew members of the boat told guests “everybody was on … All accounted for, we started to take off, nobody’s looking behind them.”