One of the individuals most targeted for censorship regarding COVID-19 will now hold a key role in the Trump administration.
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a doctor and professor who has criticized mainstream COVID-19 policies, was confirmed by the Senate Tuesday as director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Notably, Bhattacharya was identified as one of the medical experts censored by Twitter, following pressure from former NIH Director Francis Collins.
Related: GAME CHANGER: COVID-19 Censorship Target Dr. Bhattacharya Named as NIH Director
Bhattacharya was a signatory of the Great Barrington Declaration, which ignited a firestorm of controversy and censorship for critiquing COVID-19 policies such as lockdowns and mask mandates. While hundreds of thousands of medical and scientific experts signed the Declaration, Bhattacharya was one of its primary formulators. Collins, who left his position at the NIH in 2021, attempted to undermine the credibility of the Declaration and its authors in an effort to suppress criticism of his agency’s COVID policies.
The Twitter Files revealed that before Elon Musk’s ownership, X (then-called Twitter) placed Bhattacharya on secret blacklists, likely due to his pinned tweet promoting the Declaration. In a case of poetic justice, Bhattacharya will now replace his critic, Collins, as Trump’s NIH director.
ICYMI: Dr. Bhattacharya Details Twitter’s Biased COVID-19 Censorship of Him
Bhattacharya has repeatedly spoken in favor of free speech. In October 2024, he posted on X, “Why would anyone oppose free speech? The excuse is always the protection of the public from wrong or harmful ideas. But that is nonsense. The goal of the censors is to obtain power by force because they have failed to obtain it by persuasion.” That same month, he also declared, “If you favor government control of misinformation, you are an enemy of free speech.”
In August 2024, Bhattacharya gave an exclusive interview to Dan Schneider, vice president of MRC Free Speech America, where he strongly condemned censorship and suggested its decline. He stated that “forces of censorship in the United States are on the backheel, and we need to keep pushing really hard on it.”
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