Facts

• An anonymous senior-level CIA whistleblower, who testified Tuesday before the US House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic and Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, has claimed that the agency bribed analysts to cover up their findings that COVID originated in a lab in Wuhan, China.
• The testimony alleges that only one analyst of the seven-member COVID Discovery Team originally believed the virus emerged from zoonosis, with the others believing "the intelligence and science were sufficient to make a low confidence assessment" that it was spurred by a lab leak.
• According to a letter sent by House Coronavirus Subcommittee Chairman Brad Wenstrup and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner to CIA Director William Burns, the whistleblower is a "multi-decade, current Agency officer."
• The Republican congressmen from Ohio set a Sept. 26 deadline for the CIA to hand over all documents related to the Discovery Team and communications with other federal agencies, including the FBI, the State Dept. and the Energy Dept.
• In response, CIA spokeswoman Tammy Kupperman Thorp said the agency is "committed to the highest standards of analytic rigor, integrity, and objectivity," adding that they "do not pay analysts to reach specific conclusions."
• As of today, the FBI and Dept. of Energy support the lab leak theory, while other federal agencies still believe natural contact with wild animals caused the outbreak. The CIA reportedly remains undecided between both hypotheses.