Hi, this is Iris and Missoula Montana. We are currently howling with our city in support

of our essential workers. This podcast was recorded at 154 pm on Thursday, May 14th.

The news has most likely changed by the time that you hear this, but Missoula will still

be howling to thank those on the front lines.

So today, a career government scientist by the name of Rick Bright testified before

members of the House of Representatives and offer this pretty stark warning.

Alison, I want to begin with you. Can you just tell us who Rick Bright is and what brought

him to the hill today?

Sure. Rick Bright is a PhD scientist. He was removed from his job as the director of

the biomedical advanced research and development authority, known as Barda, as part of the

federal government, and he filed a whistleblower complaint with the Office of a Special Council.

He contends that he was removed from his post by top officials at the Department of Health

and Human Services because of his urgings, basically, that funds allocated by Congress

to tackle COVID-19 should be invested in what he called scientifically vetted solutions

and not in drugs, vaccines, and other things that lack scientific merit. In particular,

what became clear in his testimony today, he says the straw that broke the camel's back

was his pushback on expanded use of Chloroquine or Hydroxychloroquine to treat patients during

this pandemic. This was a drug touted by President Trump.

Now his refusal to promote the anti-malaria drug is why he says he was removed from his

job, but in his testimony today, he also painted a much broader picture of what he says was

in action in the early days of the pandemic and suggests without necessarily naming the

President directly in the course of his testimony, but essentially that the Trump administration

...