Democrats put whistleblower in the spotlight

House Democrats invited Richard Bright, a former health director in the Trump administration, to testify before the Energy and Commerce health subcommittee about letting scientists respond to the coronavirus pandemic “without fear of retribution.” He said U.S. health officials ignored warnings about the outbreak and failed to boost the production of masks, respirators, and other critical healthcare equipment. The subcommittee also heard from Mike Brown, executive vice president of the mask manufacturer Prestige Ameritech.

Did Bright bring up his whistleblower complaint? He repeated his accusations, detailed in a complaint last week, that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services demoted him because he opposed the use of malaria drugs to treat COVID-19. But the committee did not specifically evaluate the whistleblower complaint. It appears Democrats mainly wanted to call attention to Bright’s criticism of how the White House handled its pandemic response.

Dig deeper: Read WORLD’s timeline of how COVID-19 spread from China to the rest of the world.