The House Judiciary Committee, Chaired by Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), brought in several witnesses for an Apr. 16 hearing on COVID-19 accountability. One of the witnesses was Florida's Surgeon General, Dr. Joseph Ladapo. Ladapo's recommendations were integral to many of the decisions to keep the state open during the 2020-2021 lockdowns. He was also the first to recommend a halt to the COVID-19 vaccines for children and males between the ages of 18 and 39.
Ladapo's testimony is particularly important because he and Governor DeSantis were more open to data and evidence that contradicted federal mandates early in the pandemic. The other witnesses at the Apr. 16 hearing were Conservative Attorney Harmeet Dhillon, Claudine Geoghegan with the Independent Women's Forum, and Professor Michelle Goodwin. Goodwin is the Linda D. & Timothy J. O'Neil Professor of Constitutional Law and Global Health Policy at Georgetown University.
The purpose of the hearing was to review public health decisions made during the COVID-19 "pandemic" and to hold officials accountable for their actions. The Judiciary Committee is looking at recommendations limiting unnecessary governmental overreach during future national emergencies. It quickly became apparent during the hearing that there is still a vast divide in perspectives between Republicans and Democrats in terms of the ways officials handled public health during the COVID-19 crisis.
Roy began the hearing by stating that the government responded in ways that caused "some of the most aggressive usurpations of freedom present-day Americans have experienced. The effects of COVID-19 tyranny are permanent if we don't act to change them." Roy also reminded the Democrats and Republicans that the "liberties reflected in our Constitution are not optional and as a general matter should not be suspended for political expediency nor times of crisis."
The Constitution was written for times like the COVID-19 crisis "to constrain the power of government," said Roy. Many, including Roy, believe that the COVID-19 response was worse in many ways than the virus itself. Small businesses were crushed, while big business thrived. Many lost jobs because of the vaccine mandates and suffered profound economic strain because of business closures. Significant mental health issues that arose from isolation and stress related to compliance with the lockdowns and mandates continue today for far too many. Our military is still suffering losses of personnel because of the mandates—a serious national security issue.
Democrats, on the other hand, seemed to agree that the government struck a good balance with the mandates. Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-PA) stated that civil rights, culture wars, and civil liberties should be the focus of Americans going forward. She didn't like that the Majority changed the name of the Subcommittee from the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties to the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government.
In addition, Scanlon spent several minutes of her opening statement focusing on the Roe v. Wade decision on abortion rights, stating it is "a woman's freedom to make existential decisions about her own care without the meddling of politicians." Concerning COVID-19, she said Republicans convened the witnesses to "peddle dangerous conspiracy theory" on vaccines and to "spread public health misinformation."
Scanlon and Rep. Nadler (D-NJ) stated there was no way to know during the crisis that the lockdowns would be detrimental or the mandates would harm Americans the way they did, even though there was plenty of information and evidence to the contrary very early on in the pandemic. Scanlon accused Republicans of participating in "a destructive exercise of revisionist history" and engaging in a "passion for imposing political and religious views of the far right majority on all Americans," all of which had little to do with an interest in limited government.
Most worrisome is the fact that the Democrats present in the hearing continue to believe that it would be well worth imposing mandates and lockdowns in the future. They blamed Republicans and the vaccine skeptics for causing vaccine hesitancy. Nadler accused "MAGA Republicans" of "relitigating the government response to the COVID-19 pandemic" and "recasting it as a tyrannical power grab as a political winner." He said Republicans' criticism of public health policy made Americans skeptical of crucial public health guidance at the federal level.
Rep. Jim Jordan (OH-R) countered their arguments, sharing his belief that vaccine hesitancy is most likely more common now because public trust was eroded because of the tyrannical edicts and a press willing to promote false narratives. As independent voices finally began to break through the governmental groupthink, Americans realized that many of the policies touted by Fauci and others were ineffective—and, in some cases, blatant lies. Jordan explained that Americans are now skeptical of almost anything the government tells them because of how the crisis was handled.
One of the more disappointing moments during the hearing was when Rep. Nadler accused Ladapo of telling Americans "myths about vaccines." Before being hired by Gov. DeSantis in Florida, Ladapo earned an M.D. and a Ph.D. in Health Policy from Harvard University. He also served as a professor of medicine at New York University before being tenured at the University of California, Los Angeles. He knows a thing or two about medical issues and public health policy. Nevertheless, Nadler threw in an almost laughable criticism of Ladapo at the end of his opening:
"The American people will lose criticizing public health policy, with real consequences. One must look no further than the impact that vaccine skepticism has had on the spread of infectious diseases that we once thought contained but that are now spreading again because of people like Dr. Ladapo who tell us myths about vaccines."
Dr. Ladapo was an important figure during the pandemic, especially in Florida. He led the way in late 2022 concerning COVID-19 mRNA shots. Because he investigated the mRNA technology, Florida was the first state in the country to evaluate the risks of all-cause and cardiac-related mortality following COVID-19 vaccination. His Department of Health conducted an analysis of the risks, as announced on Oct. 7, 2022.
During his testimony, Ladapo described his path from being a hospitalist and professor at UCLA to his move to Florida, where Governor Ron DeSantis appointed him in Sept. 2021 to help with public health policies during the pandemic. "DeSantis," said Ladapo, "was laser-focused on evidence-based approaches to COVID-19." The state has over 6 million seniors, a vulnerable population, and DeSantis worked more consistently than other governors to prioritize COVID-19 treatments. While DeSantis was initially cautious, he soon became a leader in the nation, instituting sensible policies to ensure that "personal liberties would be protected," according to Ladapo. Florida was also the first state to mandate in-person learning for students at the time.
Ladapo recalled the many ways the federal government was inconsistent with its guidelines and actively worked against therapies like monoclonal antibodies that showed promise in many individuals. "These policy decisions were not clinically sensible and Florida was forced to cancel 2000 appointments overnight among high-risk patients with COVID-19 across the state," said Ladapo. "Meanwhile, global research had been detecting risks associated with COVID-19 mRNA vaccines data continued to surface on adverse events including myocarditis, acute cardiac injuries, Bells Palsy, syphilis and other blood clotting events."
One of the purposes of a hearing like this one was to evaluate the policies and measures that worked to mitigate the health-related impacts of the COVID-19 crisis. However, evaluations without accountability mean little and are far too common at the federal level. Prof. Goodwin and the Democrats attempted on multiple occasions to disparage Ladapo, Dhillon, and Geoghegan as conspiracy theorists for saying masks didn't work or that the mandates did more harm than good. There was almost no self-reflection or introspection on the part of the Democrats and Professor Goodwin—which most likely means there is little hope that such a crisis would be managed differently in the future, at least at the national level.
For this reason, governors and health officials should reflect upon the way states handled COVID-19 and commit to the measures that worked based on the abundant data now available. To that end, Ladapo shared that Governor DeSantis petitioned the Florida Supreme Court for a statewide Grand Jury to investigate crimes committed against Floridians related to COVID-19. The interim report for the investigation was published on Feb. 2, 2024. DeSantis petitioned the Court in December 2022.
Sadly, according to the report, the investigative efforts were met with roadblocks "due to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the Food & Drug Administration (FDA), and the U.S. Army refusing to provide representatives to testify before the jury." These entities were integral to the "contracting, approval, and distribution process for the COVID-19 vaccines."
Despite the roadblocks, the Grand Jury investigation confirmed the lockdowns were incredibly ill-conceived, that the risks of the COVID-19 mRNA shots were not adequately evaluated, and that hospitalizations were "inflated to some degree with asymptomatic or minor SARS-CoV-2 infections, in order to financially benefit the hospital."
Most importantly, the Grand Jury investigation found that the collateral consequences of the mandates were "not worth the price." This comes before the Grand Jury has completed its investigation, which includes an ongoing collection of evidence and testimony. The Grand Jury noted:
"Somehow, because of panic, hubris, ineptitude or some unfortunate combination of the three, this widely rejected idea not only made its way back into scientific discourse in 2020, it became the law of the land in most of the United States between 2020 and 2022. It is clear to this Grand Jury that whatever benefits inured from these mandates, they were not worth the price."
The 33-page interim report indicates the apolitical Grand Jury is continuing to investigate the most critical policies that impacted the people of Florida and the world. While raising public awareness and addressing reforms in legislation are the primary intent of the Presentment, the statewide Grand Jury also has the power to hold people accountable. Still, it is "limited to two outputs: Indictments, which subject individuals or organizations to criminal prosecution based on multi-circuit violations of Florida criminal law, and Presentments, which address issues of great public importance for which the law does not always provide a sufficient remedy. Grand Jury Presentments frequently involve allegations of corruption, neglect of duty or malfeasance by governmental agencies, private entities or individuals, and are often accompanied by legislative proposals to curb further misconduct."
The Grand Jury also concluded, at least in the interim:
- That airflow is much more important than social distancing in terms of viral spread.
- Well-financed federal agencies used "flawed observational and laboratory studies" to champion the use of masks
- Lockdowns had a profound, negative, long-term effect on the welfare of children and young adults. Depression and suicide rates have increased.
- "Many public health recommendations and their attendant mandates departed significantly from research that was contemporaneously available to everyone: Individuals, scientists, corporations and governments alike."
