On Sunday, a government report was leaked revealing that another federal agency considers the “lab leak theory” to be the most likely explanation for the origin and subsequent spread of the Chinese coronavirus, which became a global pandemic.
Breitbart reports that the United States Energy Department (ED) report, first reported on by the Wall Street Journal, was updated based on new intelligence provided by a document from the office of Avril Haines, the Director of National Intelligence (DNI).
“The new report highlights how different parts of the intelligence community have arrived at disparate judgments about the pandemic’s origin,” the Journal writes. “The Energy Department now joins the Federal Bureau of Investigation in saying the virus likely spread via a mishap at a Chinese laboratory.”
Although the ED report notes that it reached its conclusion with “low confidence,” the assessment nevertheless now makes for one of the most prominent reports by the federal government lending credibility to the “lab leak” theory, which has long been the most popular and most likely explanation for the pandemic. The theory centers around the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), which is known to conduct experiments on various diseases and viruses such as the Coronavirus. The WIV is located close to the city of Wuhan, which features an open-air “wet market” that initially took most of the blame for the virus’s origin.
Biden Administration officials have not yet given a statement on the ED report, but anonymous officials who spoke to the Journal did note that, despite the Energy Department and FBI now reaching the same conclusion on the origins of the virus, they allegedly used different reasons for concluding as such.
Some Republicans spoke out on the Energy Department’s reversal of course, including Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who has consistently voiced his support for the lab leak theory for years, having described the hypothesis as “always reasonable.”