President Joe Biden is calling for more transparency in the effort to find the origins of COVID-19.
Earlier this month the House of Representatives approved the COVID-19 Origins Act in a 419-0 vote. It was signed by Biden on Monday.
"I shared the Congress' goal of releasing as much information as possible about the origin of Coronavirus Disease 2019," he put out in a statement. "My administration will continue to review all classified information relating to COVID-19's origins, including potential links to the Wuhan Institute of Virology."
Last month, a report from the Energy Department on the origins of the virus added to the split on findings between multiple agencies. It posited, with low confidence, that the outbreak likely originated from a lab in China. The Wall Street Journal was first to report.
China disagreed with the report, and the country's foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said, "Certain parties should stop rehashing the 'lab leak' narrative, stop smearing China, and stop politicizing origins-tracing."
The UN, which had been coordinating a global health response to the pandemic and implementing policies to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 and future viruses, said that its own investigation was ongoing.
And in the U.S. the FBI had for some time speculated that the outbreak started in a Wuhan lab, while the CIA had not reached a conclusion on the matter.
"We need to get to the bottom of COVID-19's origins to help ensure we can better prevent future pandemics," Biden added in his statement.
A Texas judge on Thursday granted a pregnant woman permission to obtain an abortion in an unprecedented challenge to the state’s ban that took effect after Roe v. Wade was overturned last year.
House members voted again Thursday to punish one of their own, targeting Democratic Rep. Jamaal Bowman for triggering a fire alarm in one of the U.S. Capitol office buildings in September when the chamber was in session.
The Senate has failed to advance a bill that would provide aid to Ukraine and Israel.
A Nevada grand jury indicted six Republicans who submitted certificates to Congress falsely declaring Donald Trump as the winner of the 2020 presidential race.
Former President Donald Trump has returned to his New York civil business fraud trial again.
Columnist and political analyst Jonathan Harris provided a full recap of Wednesday night's Republican presidential debate.
The U.S. military has grounded its fleet of Osprey V-22 aircraft a week after a deadly crash off the coast of Japan.
But even as he lashed Republicans for their stance, Biden stressed that he is willing to “make significant compromises on the border,” if that’s what it takes to get the package through Congress.
The four Republican presidential candidates debating Wednesday night mostly targeted each other instead of Donald Trump. Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley took the brunt of the attacks as she gets more interest from donors and voters.
Word about McCarthy's future had been expected the approach of the filing deadline to seek reelection. His departure will leave the already paper-thin House GOP majority even tighter, with just a few seats to spare.
