Jay Bhattacharya: 'I Sued the Biden Administration for COVID Censorship'

Bhattacharya explains the stakes of Murthy v. Missouri, the politicization of medical research, and his RFK Jr. endorsement.

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Jay Bhattacharya: 'I Sued the Biden Administration for COVID Censorship'

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Today's guest is Jay Bhattacharya, a co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration and one of the plaintiffs in Murthy v. Missouri, the Supreme Court case charging that the Biden administration and other parts of the federal government illegally colluded "with social media companies to suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content." A decision in that case is imminent, and a victory for Bhattacharya's side would make it impossible for the government to pressure X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, and other platforms to ban or squelch legal speech. A professor of medicine at Stanford University and a Ph.D. economist, Bhattacharya talks about his experience being blacklisted online because of his criticisms of lockdowns and other COVID policies, the ways in which both Donald Trump and Joe Biden fumbled their responses to the pandemic, and what the public health establishment must do to regain the trust and confidence of the American public.

00:00— Introduction
01:12— Murthy vs. Missouri
17:05— Politicization of the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
20:45— Loss of trust in public health
25:45— Biden vs. Trump on COVID
27:49— What Bhattacharya got wrong
29:35— COVID-19 vaccines mistakes
34:53— RFK Jr. and other vaccine skeptics
39:44— What would Bhattacharya revise?
42:17— How Bhattacharya's politics changed
44:20— How do we restore trust in public health?

Previous appearance:

• Facing Fauci's Fury: Q&A With Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, April 22, 2022

• Video Editor: Ian Keyser

Comments

[Rick James]

Hey, Nick, you gonna get itinerate libertarian minstrel Taylor Lorenz’s take on Jay Bhattacharya? Because they have a past, you know.

Digging through Twitter’s files, I discovered other examples where Twitter granted Lorenz special privileges. After Tucker Carlson did a brief March 2021 Fox News segment deriding Lorenz’s penchant for labeling criticism of herself as “harassment,” one Twitter official alerted colleagues to monitor tweets about the Post columnist—“We need to be careful with her.”

This image inside Twitter of Lorenz as “victim” was likely aided by her near constant stream of complaints, asking Twitter to take down and suspend accounts. In another example, last fall, Lorenz reported and successfully suspended the account of Stanford professor Jay Bhattacharya after he tweeted an email one of her journalist friends sent him.

“It’s shocking that a journalist at the Washington Post would get involved in a minor twitter squabble,” said Bhattacharya, who described the email as harassing. “It’s even more shocking that Twitter responded.”

In one odd incident, Lorenz helped a long-term source try to get his Twitter account restored. In a February 2021 New York Times article, Lorenz quoted Instagram user Jackson Weimer on accounts that were being stolen by hackers. A week later, Lorenz contacted Twitter to see if they could help Weimer after Twitter suspended his account. “Hi there, would you mind taking a look,” Lorenz wrote. “Appreciate anything you can add here.”

[Pepin the short]

A high point in Reason history. Interviewing that harpy.

[Fire up the Woodchippers! (5-30 Banana Republic Day)]

Is ‘harpy’ the new ‘cunt’?

[Pepin the short]

For her? Damn skippy

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

So, basically, Xitter happily censored anything anyone asked them to?

[Fire up the Woodchippers! (5-30 Banana Republic Day)]

This is pre-Musk, when it was still Twatter.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

So, basically, ONS is a lying pile of shit.

[LIBtranslator]

Gosh, a Republican hack shyster peddling Xitter rumors. This central casting flop expects Nick to fall for them... Rotsa ruck.

[Truthfulness]

What makes you think the “Republican hack shyster” is lying? He’s got evidence, and you have no counterargument, just an ad hominem attack instead.

Are you pro-censorship? That wouldn’t be a surprise…

[Chumby]

But Biden and Fauci had to work with social media outlets to suppress strongly discourage DiSiNfOrMaTiOn.

[Fist of Etiquette]

I don't think you're allowed to platform him.

[A Cynical Asshole]

Public self flagellation might do the trick.

what the public health establishment must do to regain the trust and confidence of the American public.

Either that, or ritual suicide.

[block30]

Que ganga!

[charliehall]

It is largely Republicans who didn't listen to the mostly sound advice of the Public Health Establishment and as a result they were more likely to die. The differential mortality changed the result of the Arizona Attorney General election. Killing off your voters is not a good campaign strategy.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

You.
Are.
Full.
Of,
Shit.:
"Why major study argues Florida’s COVID death rate compares favorably to California’s"
https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/why-major-study-argues-floridas-covid-death-rate-compares-favorably-to-californias/
Note this compares the much older FL population and totally ignores the knee-capping of the economy, you steaming pile of lefty shit.
Make your family proud and your dog happy: Fuck off and die

[mad.casual]

25:45— Biden vs. Trump on COVID

Without getting too much into "But Trump! But Biden!" (or at least trying) Jay is a bit wrong here about several things. Some other things he's not wrong but just has a different opinion. Namely,
1. Neither President instituted the lockdowns. Trump didn't prevent them and he did take bad advice but no one was locked down by Presidential decree. Nor was such a Presidential decree even made. The closest you get was the immigration travel bans, some of which were vetoed.
2. He's wrong about the history and development of (conventional) vaccines. He's right that we did "get lucky" that the virus was part of a simple GOF research scheme and wasn't something more like HIV where a vaccine (traditional or modern) would be ineffective, but the 3-10 yr. development lifecycle of a vaccine was specifically because of the steps and procedures Operation Warp Speed circumvented. It was still a stupid idea to pay up front and, despite point No. 1, a President actually did try, multiple times, unconstitutionally, to forcibly vaccinate people.
3. I disagree with him but think history proves him correct WRT "You can't lock down for two weeks." A rational society could take two weeks vacation to make sure people's eyes aren't melting and they're bleeding from their toenails before dying but we weren't, aren't, anywhere near as rational (which requires honesty) as (I think) he or I thinks we are.

[LIBtranslator]

The Kleptocracy reacted about the same way during the Spanish Flu in October 1918. Blame flew like ordure. See on Google News Archives The Deseret News front page for 18NOV1918. It's the only red herring God's Own Prohibitionists have left in their bait bucket. All they can do is whine at the Dems and try to wreck the LP with George Wallace fans from Alabama. Rotsa ruck with that...

[Fire up the Woodchippers! (5-30 Banana Republic Day)]

Pretty sure all the ‘George Wallace fans’ are long dead, you senile centenarian fuck.

[Chumby]

Hank does not like the cut of your jib.

[ingleaccident]

Why is there a CDC 'tattoo" on the splash screen of this podcast? Is this actually a LAW?

[charliehall]

It is Bhattacharya who was politicizing science by promoting unscientific nonsense.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

it is charliehall who continues to make a steaming pile of lefty shit of herself.
Fuck off and die, asswipe.

[DaveH]

These interviews would be better if Gillespie didn't interrupt and sidetrack his subject all the time.