Topline

As momentum builds behind the theory that Covid-19 originated in a laboratory in Wuhan, China, some Republicans—namely Sen. Tom Cotton and former President Donald Trump—have criticized the mainstream news media for being too willing to discount the theory early on, and therefore not pursuing it with rigorous reporting.

Key Facts

Cotton blasted the media and “activists in white lab coats” in a tweet Tuesday for denouncing the lab leak hypothesis as a “conspiracy theory” for the “better part of a year,” while Trump released a statement claiming “everybody” now agrees he was “right” about Wuhan lab being the source of the virus after first doubting him. 

Their gripes with the media over the lab leak theory can be traced back to last January, when Cotton floated the lab hypothesis as one possible explanation for the origin of Covid-19 even as many scientists and U.S. officials asserted they were fairly certain the virus originated naturally in wildlife.

Cotton first raised the possibility of a link between the lab and Covid-19 during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on January 30 when he questioned China’s culpability when it came to the initial spread of the virus and said he wanted to “note that Wuhan has China’s only biosafety level-four super laboratory” that “works with the world’s most deadly pathogens.”

In an interview days later, on February 9, CBS News’ Margaret Brennan pressed Chinese Ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai on Cotton’s comments about “China’s biological warfare program,” to which Cui responded it was “dangerous to stir up suspicion, rumors and spread them among the people.”

From there, things snowballed: many news outlets appeared to characterize the lab leak hypothesis as a conspiracy theory about China developing a bioweapon, though Cotton had been more careful in suggesting that was just one possibility, as was an unintentional leak.

After the Post—and several other outlets—ran pieces fact-checking him on the bioweapon claim, Cotton clarified his stance, noting the bioweapon theory was just one of many lab leak hypotheses that needed to be investigated, but the "conspiracy theory" label continued to be used to dismiss the hypothesis throughout the following months.

Crucial Quote

In a tweet thread published on February 16, 2020, Cotton offered four explanations for the origin of Covid-19: “1. Natural (still the most likely, but almost certainly not from the Wuhan food market); 2. Good science, bad safety (eg, they were researching things like diagnostic testing and vaccines, but an accidental breach occurred) 3; Bad science, bad safety (this is the engineered-bioweapon hypothesis, with an accidental breach); 4. Deliberate release (very unlikely, but shouldn’t rule out till the evidence is in)”

Key Background

Most scientists continue to believe that Covid-19’s most likely origin story is that it passed from animal to human in the wild. But theories about a lab leak have picked up steam in recent weeks after a group of 18 prominent scientists published a letter in Science calling the lab accident theory “viable” and several prominent science journalists, including Nicholas Wade, published stories calling for more attention to be given to the theory. President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced intelligence agencies have “coalesced around two likely scenarios’ for the origin of Covid-19, including the lab leak theory and wildlife- to- human spread. Biden said he’s asked officials to “redouble their efforts” to come to a definitive conclusion over the next 90 days. 

Chief Critic

Several mainstream journalists have criticized the media for not doing more due diligence on the lab leak theory. In a blog post published this week, Matthew Yglesias, a prominent blogger and co-founder of Vox, claimed Cotton was “unfairly maligned” by the mainstream media when he pushed the lab leak hypothesis last year. “One lesson for the media is that self-interested denials from the Chinese Communist Party do not equal ‘debunking,’” Cotton wrote on Twitter Tuesday. The senator has been joined by a chorus of Republicans who have used the momentum behind the Wuhan lab theory as a cudgel against Democrats and the media. 

Tangent

Last year, the lab leak theory carried tremendous political weight for Trump, who looked to deflect blame for the pandemic onto China as his administration was accused for its response to the outbreak. Trump repeatedly referred to Covid-19 as the “China virus” and “Kung Flu,” and claimed that China was solely responsible for the outbreak and had covered it up. Though Trump was an early proponent of the lab leak theory, he did not mention it until April. In January and February, he praised China and President Xi Jinping repeatedly.

Contra

“Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) from the start pointed to the lab’s location in Wuhan, pressing China for answers, so the history books will reward him if he turns out to be right,” the Post wrote in a piece published on May 25, 2021.

Further Reading

Trump: ‘I Have Very Little Doubt’ Covid Came From Wuhan Lab (Forbes)