For ads-free news, click here.
From the New York Post: President-elect Donald Trump announced Tuesday that Jay Bhattacharya will serve as the director of the National Institutes of Health during his second term in the White House.
Bhattacharya, a Stanford University professor and staunch critic of pandemic-era lockdowns, will be tasked with leading the federal government’s medical research efforts and will work “in cooperation” with incoming Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the president-elect said.
“Jay is a co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration, an alternative to lockdowns proposed in October 2020,” Trump noted in his announcement, referring to an open letter that called on government officials and public health authorities to rethink extreme measures in response to COVID-19.
Twitter secretly placed Bhattacharya on a “Trends Blacklist,” which prevented his tweets from trending, over his views on the pandemic, the 2022 “Twitter Files” expose revealed.
Bhattacharya, 56, was born in India. He holds both a medical degree and doctorate in economics from Stanford University.
The Washington Post announced last week that Bhattacharya was being considered for the role of NIH Director, and wrote:
Bhattacharya met this week with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and impressed Kennedy with his ideas to overhaul NIH, a nearly $50 billion agency that oversees the nation’s biomedical research, the people said. Bhattacharya has called for shifting the agency’s focus toward funding more innovative research and reducing the influence of some of its longest-serving career officials, among other ideas.
Kennedy said in a statement Tuesday night, “I’m so grateful to President Trump for this spectacular appointment. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya is the ideal leader to restore NIH as the international template for gold-standard science and evidence-based medicine.”
Bhattacharya responded to Trump’s nomination, saying in a statement, “I am honored and humbled by President @realDonaldTrump’s nomination of me to be the next @NIH director. We will reform American scientific institutions so that they are worthy of trust again and will deploy the fruits of excellent science to make America healthy again!”
I am honored and humbled by President @realDonaldTrump‘s nomination of me to be the next @NIH director. We will reform American scientific institutions so that they are worthy of trust again and will deploy the fruits of excellent science to make America healthy again! https://t.co/FrLmYznhfw
— Jay Bhattacharya (@DrJBhattacharya) November 27, 2024
Trump’s pick is being met with praise from conservatives, while liberal media outlets appear less enthused. The New York Times wrote:
Dr. Bhattacharya is the latest in a series of Trump health picks who came to prominence during the coronavirus pandemic and who hold views on medicine and public health that are at times outside the mainstream. The president-elect’s health choices, experts agree, suggest a shake-up is coming to the nation’s public health and biomedical establishment.
Below are video clips of previous interviews with Bhattacharya, as he spoke out against those in charge at the NIH during the Covid pandemic, and slammed the lockdowns as a “catastrophic mistake.”
Meet President Trump’s new Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) – Dr. Jay Bhattacharya.
“A relatively small group – a cartel almost – of very powerful scientific bureaucrats took over the whole apparatus of science, dominated the media, dominated the message to… pic.twitter.com/VA8c6Ois0l
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 27, 2024
It’s great that Dr. Bhattacharya has Dr. Fauci’s old job.
“Lockdowns were a catastrophic mistake. We should recoil with horror. Covid policies violated medical ethics and crushed ability for physicians and scientists to discuss facts…we were silenced…” pic.twitter.com/0z8J2JhSk8
— Liz Churchill (@liz_churchill10) November 27, 2024
Trump just nominated this man to reform the corrupt National Institutes of Health: @DrJBhattacharya.
Dr. Bhattacharya was right about the major health issues during the Covid pandemic.
Just as importantly, he was right about intellectual freedom and patient rights.
Cry harder. pic.twitter.com/eER5C38Tli
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) November 27, 2024
No-one better than @DrJBhattacharya for @NIH
Will be sweet vindication: a giant and much-deserved middle finger to the Lockdown Lunatics and medical establishment for their Covid cruelty, arrogance and authoritarianism. Oh, and their cover-up. Go Jay! 🇺🇸https://t.co/TEbn1hhoWL
— steve hilton (@SteveHiltonx) November 25, 2024
Follow us on X (Formerly Twitter.)
Dennis Michael Lynch personal: www.X.com/TrustDML
The DML News App: www.X.com/DMLNewsApp
The Dennis Michael Lynch Podcast archive is available below, with the most recent on top. Never miss an episode. Subscribe to the show by downloading The DML News App or go to Apple Podcasts.
