• Latest
  • Trending
  • All
  • News
  • Business
  • Lifestyle
Deep State Bureaucrat Pleads For Her Bosses To Save Harvard’s Risky ‘Virus Hunting’ Grant

Deep State Bureaucrat Pleads For Her Bosses To Save Harvard’s Risky ‘Virus Hunting’ Grant

June 3, 2025
GROVER NORQUIST: A Big Beautiful Bill For July 4 Will Make America Stronger

GROVER NORQUIST: A Big Beautiful Bill For July 4 Will Make America Stronger

June 28, 2025
Will The US Finally Pivot To China?

Will The US Finally Pivot To China?

June 28, 2025
JAMES CARTER And SEVASTIAN HORTON: Reauthorize EXIM: A Cornerstone Of The America First Mandate

JAMES CARTER And SEVASTIAN HORTON: Reauthorize EXIM: A Cornerstone Of The America First Mandate

June 28, 2025
BOB RUBIN: AI Is Reshaping Capitalism, Smart Investors Are Paying Attention

BOB RUBIN: AI Is Reshaping Capitalism, Smart Investors Are Paying Attention

June 27, 2025
John Fetterman Breaks With Democrats To Back Trump’s Bombing Of Iran

John Fetterman Breaks With Democrats To Back Trump’s Bombing Of Iran

June 27, 2025
Elites’ Private Jets Drive More Emissions Than All Flights Leaving One Of World’s Biggest Airports, Study Finds

Elites’ Private Jets Drive More Emissions Than All Flights Leaving One Of World’s Biggest Airports, Study Finds

June 27, 2025
Pulitzer-Winning WaPo Reporter Charged With Alleged Possession Of Child Porn

Pulitzer-Winning WaPo Reporter Charged With Alleged Possession Of Child Porn

June 27, 2025
Liberal Justices Melt Down Over Ending District Court Judge Power Grab, Warn Of ‘Our Collective Demise’

Liberal Justices Melt Down Over Ending District Court Judge Power Grab, Warn Of ‘Our Collective Demise’

June 27, 2025
Supreme Court Allows Cut in Funding for Teacher Training

Texas Law Aimed At Blocking Kids From Online Pornography Upheld By Supreme Court

June 27, 2025
DAVID BLACKMON: Enviros Head To Memphis For Another Attack On American Industry

DAVID BLACKMON: Enviros Head To Memphis For Another Attack On American Industry

June 27, 2025
WHO Group Fails To Find Origins Of COVID-19

WHO Group Fails To Find Origins Of COVID-19

June 27, 2025
Judge Gives Abrego Garcia’s Attorneys The One Thing They Were Hoping For

Judge Gives Abrego Garcia’s Attorneys The One Thing They Were Hoping For

June 27, 2025
  • Donald Trump
  • State of the Union
  • Elon Musk
  • Tariffs
  • Congress
  • Faith
  • Immigration
Saturday, June 28, 2025
  • Login
IJR
  • Politics
  • US News
  • Commentary
  • World News
  • Faith
  • Latest Polls
No Result
View All Result
IJR
No Result
View All Result
Home News

Deep State Bureaucrat Pleads For Her Bosses To Save Harvard’s Risky ‘Virus Hunting’ Grant

by Daily Caller News Foundation
June 3, 2025 at 1:53 pm
in News, Wire
235 17
0
Deep State Bureaucrat Pleads For Her Bosses To Save Harvard’s Risky ‘Virus Hunting’ Grant
491
SHARES
1.4k
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

Daily Caller News Foundation

A director of contracting at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) sought to defy President Donald Trump’s cuts to Harvard University to preserve a grant to facilitate risky viral research, according to a Monday legal filing.

The unnamed official “pleaded” with Pentagon superiors that Harvard’s grant may provide proof of concept for the entire DARPA program – called Assured Microbial Preservation in Harsh or Remote Areas (AMPHORA) –  which funds the development of new technology to transport viruses and other pathogens from the wilderness to labs, legal documents show.

Harvard attorneys lean heavily on the anecdote about the disgruntled DARPA official in their motion for summary judgement, first reported by the Boston Globe, as illustrating an extralegal, damaging and “thoughtless” approach by the Trump administration.

The filing does not reflect concerns among some in the scientific community about the practice of transporting viruses from remote places to metropolitan labs: that it has no payoff for the warfighter; that it could generate unforeseen biological threats; and that similar research may have ignited the COVID-19 pandemic.

DARPA did not respond to requests for comment.

Harvard sued the Trump administration on April 21 after refusing to negotiate on a series of suggested reforms on campus. A Harvard task force concluded in an April 2025 report that some instructors had “mainstreamed and normalized what many Jewish and Israeli students experience as antisemitism and anti-Israeli bias.”

According to DARPA’s July 2023 call for grant proposals, the mission of AMPHORA is to preserve pathogens in the course of detecting emerging threats. Some scientists refer to this discipline as “virus hunting” – the sampling and cataloging viruses in animals across far-flung corners of the globe. Identifying which wild viruses could cause a pandemic sometimes involves amplifying their infectivity and deadliness in the lab.

‘“Samples critical to force health protection can be significantly degraded upon lab receipt,” reads the call for grant proposals. “The AMPHORA program seeks to develop a portable, cold chain free system that can preserve any microbe … increasing the [Pentagon’s] ability to surveil for emerging threats.”

Harvard is the “top performer” on AMPHORA and the termination of its grant “poses grave and immediate harm to national security,” the official told superiors.

Yet some scientists — including National Institutes of Health Director Jay Bhattacharya — say these projects risk triggering new pandemics. Sometimes labs conduct gain-of-function experiments that enhance a pathogen’s ability to spread and cause disease in humans.

“The way this research program has worked is that we fund people – EcoHealth Alliance once upon a time – to go out into the wild places, partner with foreign countries including China, collect the pathogens in the bat caves or wherever, so that we can catalog all of the viruses and pathogens out there, even if it’s very unlikely many humans would ever come into contact with those things and bring those pathogens into labs, often in city centers,” Bhattacharya said in an interview with the Hoover Institution on May 28.

“The actual conduct of this research is very dangerous. And I think it’s very likely that the COVID pandemic was the result of just this sort of research agenda,” he continued.

Jay Bhattacharya on Gain-of-Function Research

“This is a foolhardy way to pretend to yourself that we’ve protected ourselves against a pandemic when we haven’t … And I think it’s very likely that the COVID pandemic was the result of this kind of research.” pic.twitter.com/ddJSCFHrvq

— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) May 30, 2025


In 2023 the U.S. quietly shelved a planned U.S. Agency for International Development virus hunting program called DEEP VZN.

An earlier but similar DAPRA program – the PREventing EMerging Pathogenic Threats (PREEMPT) program – received a proposal involving the Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2018. The Wuhan lab’s American collaborators – EcoHealth Alliance and the University of North Carolina – outlined research plans to construct viruses with some of the unique genomic features of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, according to documents released through a whistleblower and the Freedom of Information Act. Some scientists have described the proposal as akin to a “blueprint” for the COVID-19 virus.

A program officer at DARPA rejected the proposal in part because safety concerns surrounding the gain-of-function research were not addressed, he said in a transcribed interview with congressional investigators.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Tags: DCNFU.S. NewsUS
Share196Tweet123
Daily Caller News Foundation

Daily Caller News Foundation

Advertisements

Top Stories June 10th
Top Stories June 7th
Top Stories June 6th
Top Stories June 3rd
Top Stories May 30th
Top Stories May 29th
Top Stories May 24th
Top Stories May 23rd
Top Stories May 21st
Top Stories May 17th

Join Over 6M Subscribers

We’re organizing an online community to elevate trusted voices on all sides so that you can be fully informed.





IJR

    Copyright © 2024 IJR

Trusted Voices On All Sides

  • About Us
  • GDPR Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Service
  • Editorial Standards & Corrections Policy
  • Subscribe to IJR

Follow Us

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Politics
  • US News
  • Commentary
  • World News
  • Faith
  • Latest Polls

    Copyright © 2024 IJR

Top Stories June 10th Top Stories June 7th Top Stories June 6th Top Stories June 3rd Top Stories May 30th Top Stories May 29th Top Stories May 24th Top Stories May 23rd Top Stories May 21st Top Stories May 17th