Lawmakers seek federal grand jury investigation for COVID-19 statistical manipulation

The CDC adopted a “double-standard exclusively for COVID-19 data collection” that inflated cases and deaths starting early in the pandemic, violating multiple federal laws and distorting mitigation policies, Oregon lawmakers told the feds’ top lawyer in the state.

Advised by “a large team of world-renowned doctors, epidemiologists, virologists, and attorneys,” state Senators Kim Thatcher and Dennis Linthicum petitioned U.S. Attorney Scott Asphaug to approve a grand jury investigation into how the pandemic is being measured.

“Public health policy must be based upon accurate and independently verifiable data to optimize outcomes and strengthen the public’s trust in the people leading them through this crisis,” the Republican lawmakers, whose state has imposed some of the harshest and longest COVID restrictions, wrote in a letter with several attached exhibits.

One is a synopsis of allegations, findings, relevant law and implicated agencies intended to “assist grand jury members in orienting themselves to the scope of alleged crimes committed.”

Their letter is dated Aug. 16, but the materials were not released for a month to “protect those involved,” Stand for Health Freedom (SHF), the holistic medicine and legal nonprofit behind the petition effort, said in last month’s announcement. File Thatcher-Linthicum-Grand-Jury-Petition-AUSA.pdf

“I’m not sure there has ever been an allegation of government wrongdoing on this scale,” so the group wanted to assess “accuracy and safety” before going public, relationship manager Bailey Kuykendoll told Just the News. 

Asphaug’s office said Thursday it referred the petition to the Justice Department’s Office of Legislative Affairs. That office didn’t respond on whether or how it had answered the Oregon lawmakers’ request.

The lawmakers did interviews with SHF before the effort went public.

Thatcher said she was troubled that even as the infection’s high survivability rate became clear, arbitrary restrictions that worsened child abuse, suicide and mental health remained in place.

“I began to really question whether the cure was worse than the disease,” said Thatcher, who is better known in Oregon for her legislative effort to compensate people wrongfully convicted.

Linthicum said the “incessant case counts” for COVID jumped out at him early, explaining that his service on the legislative health committee led him to recognize “confusion, or inaccuracies, or kind of manipulation” of statistics on influenza-like illnesses versus COVID.

“It didn’t take long to actually see that the data was being scrubbed or sculpted to fit a narrative,” he said.

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