Fauci Ordered To Turn Over Emails Within 21 Days

In July, U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty ordered the Biden government to produce documents demanded by the plaintiffs as part of the discovery process as soon as possible. This includes Dr. Anthony Fauci, who was ordered to turn over emails within 21 days.

High-ranking members of the Biden administration, including Dr. Anthony Fauci and White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, were mandated by a federal judge (read below) on Tuesday to turn over their correspondence with five major social media platforms within 21 days.

The decision arises from a lawsuit filed earlier this year by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt and Louisiana Attorney General Jeffrey Landry asserting that the Biden administration conspired with Big Tech corporations Twitter, Meta (Facebook’s parent organization), Youtube, Instagram, and LinkedIn to try to suppress certain viewpoints in the name of preventing the dissemination of “misinformation” or “disinformation.”

In July, U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty ordered the Biden government to produce documents demanded by the plaintiffs as part of the discovery process as soon as possible.

Schmitt and Landry requested documents and information from the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and its director, Anthony Fauci; White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre; Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy; and former Disinformation Governance Board executive director Nina Jankowicz on August 2.

The plaintiffs’ attorneys also requested discovery from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and its director, Jen Easterly, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the United States Health and Human Services Department (HHS).

Following the requests, a number of documents surfaced that showed 12 American agencies and more than 50 Biden administration employees had participated in a campaign of social media censorship.

Some government representatives, such as Fauci, objected with the plaintiffs’ requests for records and refused to respond to their inquiries, citing executive privilege as a defense.

The government argued that Fauci should not be obligated to respond to the plaintiff’s inquiries or provide records pertaining to his roles as director of NIAID and chief medical officer for Biden. The government also tried to deny Jean-Pierre access to documents and answers.

On Tuesday, Judge Doughty decided that both Fauci and Jean-Pierre had to abide by the interrogatories and provide the requested records, ending the deadlock.

“First,” Judge Doughty said in the ruling, “the requested information is obviously very relevant to Plaintiffs’ claims. Dr. Fauci’s communications would be relevant to Plaintiffs’ allegations in reference to alleged suppression of speech relating to the lab-leak theory of COVID-19’s origin, and to alleged suppression of speech about the efficiency of masks and COVID-19 lockdowns. Jean-Pierre’s communications as White House Press Secretary could be relevant to all of Plaintiffs’ examples.”

As stated by Judge Doughty:

“Government Defendants are making a blanket assertion of all communications to social media platforms by Dr. Fauci, and Jean-Pierre based upon executive privilege and presidential communications privilege.

“Plaintiffs concede they are not asking for any internal White House communications, but only external communications between Dr. Fauci and/or Jean-Pierre and third-party social media platforms.

“This Court believes Plaintiffs are entitled to external communications by Jean-Pierre and Dr. Fauci in their capacities as White House Press Secretary and Chief Medical Advisor to the President to third-party social media platforms.”

Judge Doughty gave Fauci and Jean-Pierre a deadline of 21 days to abide by his orders, and he also stated that Fauci must fully respond to inquiries regarding his position as director of the NIAID.

An official from the Biden administration responded to the decision by defending the administration’s actions, telling Fox News, “As we have said over and over again since the beginning of the administration in our battle against COVID-19, it has been critical for the American people to have access to factual, accurate, science-based information.”

“We believe in and we support freedom of speech, and we also believe it is important for all media platforms, including social media, to represent factual scientific information and combat misinformation and disinformation that can cost lives,” the official concluded.

The decision is “really good news,” according to Mary Holland, president and general counsel of Children’s Health Defense.

Holland said:

“Up until now, Dr. Fauci has operated under this cloak of ‘untouchableness,’ thinking he has been above the law. He likely didn’t expect his emails to be made public.

“We can only imagine what this tranche of emails will likely reveal about Dr. Fauci’s bare-knuckled censorship — it won’t be pretty.”

Judge Doughty’s ruling, according to Holland, was “even-handed” because he “granted some of the Plaintiff Attorney Generals’ discovery requests and denied others.”

Doughty, for example, stated that it would be “unduly burdensome” to have the HHS search among its 80,000 employees for relevant records, but that the HHS employees named in the Meta documents were required to respond to the discovery requests.

Holland added:

“Most importantly, the court ordered that Dr. Fauci’s and Karine Jean-Pierre’s external emails to social media platforms must be produced by September 27, within 21 days of the ruling.

“Stay tuned and get the popcorn. Those emails likely will reveal how the censorship has worked — and the path to ending it now.”

The Epoch Times spoke with Jenin Younes, litigation counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance and an attorney for some of the Plaintiffs:

“We know from the previous round of discovery that efforts to censor the speech of those who disagree with the government on covid policy have come from the top.

“Americans deserve to know Anthony Fauci’s participation in this enterprise, especially since he has publicly demanded that specific individuals, including two of our clients, Jay Bhattacharya and Martin Kulldorff, be censored on social media.”

“It is time for Dr. Fauci to answer for his flagrant disregard for Americans’ constitutional rights and civil liberties,” Younes added.

The lawsuit was joined in August by the New Civil Liberties Alliance, which stated in its case summary that it also represents epidemiologists and co-authors of the Great Barrington Declaration, Drs. Jayanta Bhattacharya and Martin Kulldorff, as well as Drs. Aaron Kheriaty and Jill Hines.

Plaintiffs push to interrogate other Biden officials, file amended complaint

Judge Doughty’s judgment on Tuesday also allowed the plaintiffs to ask additional questions of government representatives based on their review of the documents they had previously requested through a discovery request.

Despite the fact that Fauci and Jean-Pierre failed to comply with the initial discovery request, the government records obtained “unveiled an army of federal censorship bureaucrats, including officials arrayed at the White House, HHS, DHS, CISA, the CDC, NIAID, the Office of the Surgeon General, the Census Bureau, the FDA, the FBI, the State Department, the Treasury Department, and the U.S. Election Assistance Commission,” the NCLA said in a Sept. 1 press release.

“Communications show these federal officials are fully aware that the pressure they exert is an effective and necessary way to induce social-media platforms to increase censorship. The head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency even griped about the need to overcome social-media companies’ ‘hesitation’ to work with the government,” NCLA said.

The defendants named 45 officials from five federal agencies as those who communicated with social media firms about misinformation and censorship.

Emails and other documents made available by Meta, Twitter, and Google, however, revealed that a number of other officials, including those from the White House and other federal agencies, were involved in the endeavor.

Additionally, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently revealed that Facebook stifled the spread of the first story about Hunter Biden’s laptop and that the FBI had notified him about disinformation prior to the 2020 election.

“With each of these new revelations, Plaintiffs have approached Defendants and requested that they supplement their discovery responses to include responsive communications from the newly disclosed federal officials,” the Plaintiffs said in a recent filing.

“Defendants have refused to do so, on the grounds that none of these newly discovered officials have been sued or served with discovery as yet, and that it would be unduly burdensome to identify and produce their communications.”

In order to address the issues, the plaintiffs requested to file a revised complaint, enabling them to name all the additional officials as defendants.

They claim that the amended complaint will permit them to seek records and information from each of the officials who weren’t orginally divulged by the Biden administration.

They claim that the amended complaint will permit them to seek records and information from each of the officials who weren’t orginally divulged by the Biden administration.

CHD awaits decision in similar lawsuit against Facebook

In August 2020, Children’s Health Defense filed a similar lawsuit against Meta Platforms Inc., also known as Facebook, its “independent fact-checkers,” and Mark Zuckerberg over allegations of cooperation with the American government in stifling free speech in the country.

The CHD lawsuit claims that Facebook struck a deal with the White House to censor a whole category of speech, deplatformed CHD Chairman Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and removed CHD’s “donate” button on Facebook, redirecting users to an outside fact-checking organization that asks for donations in its place.

In December 2020, CHD filed an amended complaint. On June 29, 2021, the Northern District of California federal district court dismissed the case.

In a 45-page verdict, Judge Susan Illston ruled that CHD’s allegations — that Facebook is essentially a “state actor” on behalf of the federal government, participating in false advertising and racketeering — failed to state legal claims.

CHD appealed. It is now awaiting a decision after arguing against the dismissal motion.

Read the document below:

Fauci-Ordered-To-Turn-Over-Emails-Within-21-Days