Tag: conflict of interest

CDC Advisers Ousted by RFK Jr. Voted on Vaccines Despite Conflicts

Multiple people who until early June served on a federal vaccine advisory committee cast votes on vaccines despite receiving or recently receiving money from pharmaceutical companies that stood to be affected by the votes, according to an Epoch Times review.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on June 9 removed all members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on vaccines, citing issues such as conflicts of interest.

Dr. Helen Y. Chu, a professor of medicine and allergy and infectious diseases at the University of Washington, reported throughout 2024 receiving funds from Merck, among other pharmaceutical companies. In October 2024, in her first meeting as a member of ACIP, Chu voted in favor of expanding recommendations for vaccination against pneumococcal disease.

Merck manufactures multiple pneumococcal conjugate vaccines.

Chu did not submit any conflict of interest disclosures for the meeting, according to a CDC database.

ACIP members “are required to declare any potential conflicts of interest that arise in the course of ACIP tenure,” according to the CDC’s website. Members who declare perceived or actual conflicts of interest, the site says, “will be asked to recuse themselves from participating in the discussion and decision-making of the issues relating to that interest.”

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ABC forced to delete story as it’s revealed reporter received $16,000 from a weapons company for travel costs

The ABC is investigating one of its reporters after it was revealed he received $16,000 in travel costs from a weapons company he covered in one of his stories. 

Andrew Greene travelled from Sydney to Germany on business class flights worth about $16,000, and was put up in hotels in Hamburg and Kiel to attend a press event for the German weapons company TKMS. The company paid for his trip.

The senior defence correspondent for the ABC later filed a segment for The World Today about TKMS including quotes from its CEO Oliver Burkhard. After revelations of Greene’s junket came to light, the story was removed from the ABC website.

‘We know what we’re doing,’ Mr Burkhard told Greene in the report.

‘I know our competitors, they never have been exported in the past.’

Greene did not disclose the trip to either his ABC audience or his bosses, according to Media Watch. 

As far as the ABC knew, he was on personal leave and had obtained audio of Mr Burkhard’s press conference by email, rather than travelling to Germany in person.

Media Watch host Linton Besser was highly critical of the veteran reporter, saying that ‘while Andrew Greene might have a long history as a news breaker, he’s now been brought undone by weakness before temptation’.

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The Statin Wars

We shouldn’t have been surprised that the Covid experience was so marred by financial conflicts where pharmaceutical industry interests called the shots—too often to the detriment of our health.

Some of us weren’t surprised.

For decades, I’ve been unearthing unthinkable scandals inside our medical establishment. They are stories that I wouldn’t have believed myself had I not spoken to first hand sources and whistleblowers, and seen the proof in hard data and documents.

The Statin Wars is one such example.

I began covering issues regarding cholesterol-lowering statins and conflicts of interest around 2004 when I was an investigative reporter for CBS News.

I continued covering these issues on my independent Sunday television program “Full Measure.”

The statin controversy began when a panel of government advisers decided our cholesterol levels should be lower than we thought. It turns out nearly every one of the “experts” — was paid by statin makers. Yet none of them initially disclosed this financial conflict of interest!

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Vaccine Advisory Committee Dismissed By HHS Had Close Ties To Big Pharma, Donated To Democrats

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) just dismissed every voting member from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), a group made up entirely of Biden appointees, many of whom have seemingly major conflicts of interest because of ties to large pharmaceutical corporations and histories of donating to Democrats.

ACIP, an arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), has a history of rubber-stamping everything it comes across, with some members even voting in favor of major changes like recommending that children ages 5 to 11 receive a coronavirus “vaccine” booster shot without any data to support that intervention.

Other members have taken consulting fees and related payments from Big Pharma, donated to far-left Democrats, and appear to look uncritically at any item regarding vaccines.

“Today we are prioritizing the restoration of public trust above any specific pro- or anti-vaccine agenda,” Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a press release. “The public must know that unbiased science — evaluated through a transparent process and insulated from conflicts of interest — guides the recommendations of our health agencies.”

“A clean sweep is necessary to reestablish public confidence in vaccine science,” he continued. “ACIP’s new members will prioritize public health and evidence-based medicine. The Committee will no longer function as a rubber stamp for industry profit-taking agendas. The entire world once looked to American health regulators for guidance, inspiration, scientific impartiality, and unimpeachable integrity. Public trust has eroded. Only through radical transparency and gold standard science, will we earn it back.”

HHS plans to rebuild the advisory committee from scratch.

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RFK Jr: “Pediatricians who vaccinate 80-85% of the kids in their office, get these GIANT bonuses!”

This is perhaps the most important — and most dangerous — article I have ever posted.

But I have to print the truth wherever I find it.

Let’s start with this clip from RFK Jr. explaining how pediatricians are given an incentive to vaccine your children with ALL the vaccines produced by Big Pharma…

So to summarize what he just said, he claims that pediatricians are given a monetary payout — a BONUS — if they vaccinate a high rate of children in their clinic.

He claims it can be as high as $400/child….

But ONLY IF they maintain high levels of vaccination overall at the clinic.

Which is why they freak out on you if you refuse to get the vaccines or don’t want to follow the CDC schedule.

It’s not hard to imagine in this scenario where they start to see each little kid with a dollar sign over their heads instead of a patient!

RFK Jr. explains how the business model is to increase traffic into the clinic.

Unlike when we were kids, and you only went to the doctor if you got hurt, now you go all the time!

Why?

“BUSINESS MODEL”.

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DC Courts Are Such A Mess Because Leftist Judges, Not POTUS, Pick Their Colleagues

Should sitting judges — especially the controversial James Boasberg and Tanya Chutkan — be able to tell the president what other judges he can appoint? Of course not. But under the current system for selecting D.C.’s local judges, that’s exactly what happens.

It’s bad enough that those challenging Trump administration policies have sought to bring their cases before D.C. federal judges like those mentioned above, who they believe will be inclined to rule against the administration — especially on hot button issues like abortion, immigration, government spending, and trans-identifying individuals in the military, just to name a few. But what’s worse is that those same judges have been empowered to help select other judges who are likely to have the same radically different (and sometimes dangerous) view of their judicial role — regardless of the wishes of the sitting president.

Here’s the backstory: For most of our nation’s history, the president appointed District of Columbia judges via the familiar system outlined in the Constitution. When a vacancy occurred, the president would nominate a replacement and appoint that person once confirmed by the Senate.

But starting in 1973 (and slightly before), with the advent of D.C.’s “Home Rule,” Congress radically altered not only the structure and jurisdiction of the district’s courts but also the method by which their judges were selected. Congress ostensibly enacted these “reforms” to give local leaders a greater say in who sat on D.C.’s newly created courts and to make the process “nonpartisan” and “apolitical.”

But we know that selecting judges is an inherently political exercise. And in practice, any impartial observer would have to admit that the current system has loaded the dice to make it impossible for any constitutionally conservative judge to make it onto the bench.

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FDA Removing Pharmaceutical Representatives From Advisory Panels

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is removing pharmaceutical company representatives from advisory committees in a bid to limit industry influence.

Dr. Marty Makary, the FDA’s new commissioner, issued a directive that eliminates the role of pharmaceutical representative

“Industry employees are welcome to attend FDA advisory committee meetings, along with the rest of the American public, but having industry employees serve as official members of FDA advisory committee members represents a cozy relationship that is concerning to many Americans,” Makary said in a statement on April 17. “In fact, the FDA has a history of being influenced unduly by corporate interests.”

The FDA has 32 different advisory committees, including panels that advise the agency on vaccines, food, and medical devices. Members are primarily a mix of federal employees and experts who do not work for industries.

But each FDA committee has an industry representative and an alternate industry representative. The Vaccine and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, for instance, had a Pfizer officer and a Dynavax officer listed on the roster for its most recent meeting.

The industry representatives do not vote on what advice to convey to the FDA, but “offer perspective of a pharmaceutical company,” Kim Witczak, who has served on several FDA advisory committees, told The Epoch Times in an email.

“Sometimes they will say something that could influence or sway the discussion. I always wondered why they were on the committee,” she said.

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Sen. Warren Introduces Bill to Tighten Ethics Standards for Musk and Other Special Government Employees

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has announced new legislation that will subject Elon Musk and other “special government employees” (SGEs) to the same ethics rules as other federal employees. 

Warren said the legislation was prompted by Musk’s close advisory access to President Donald Trump, coupled with the fact that Musk’s companies have been the recipients of billions in government contracts and subsidies for over a decade.

Her proposed legislation aims to prevent conflicts of interest by preventing SGEs from communicating with government agencies whose work overlaps with their business interests. 

The bill “would apply standard ethics rules to SGEs starting on the SGE’s 61st day in government,” would require the Office of Government Ethics to sign off on any conflict-of-interest waivers issued to SGEs, and make such waivers public. 

A fact sheet on the bill states that “While most ethics laws for regular federal employees apply to SGEs, some apply more loosely and others do not apply at all.”

It would also allow public access to some SGE financial disclosures and require the Office of Personnel Management to keep a list of which federal workers are designated as SGEs. 

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Chairman of Assassination Task Force Touts Mental Health Bill, While Withholding Mental Health Information About Alleged Shooter

Congressman Mike Kelly—the lawmaker blocking access to critical documents about the Butler assassination attempt—must not be allowed to advance a bill that ignores glaring conflicts of interest in behavioral health linked to the Butler, PA assassination attempt of President Trump. KILL THE BILL: HR 2085

Key Connections Being Hidden:

  • Crooks’ Parents & Behavioral Health Influence: Investigative documents withheld by Kelly’s office may reveal ties between Thomas Crooks’ parents (behavioral health “experts”) and entities like Genesis HealthCare, which employed Crooks at its Bethel Park facility.
  • Genesis HealthCare’s Reach: A major behavioral health and nursing home provider, Genesis has subsidiaries spanning 19 states and investors linked to behavioral health tech firms.

Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP represented Genesis in these matters. What is stunning about the law firm that rescued Bethel Skilled Nursing home from Department of Justice inquiries was that Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP is deeply entrenched in the psychiatric drug sector.

The firm has extensive ties to pharmaceutical companies. In fact, the firm handled one of the largest psychotropic drug settlements in United States history in 2017, M.B. v. Tidball, on behalf of a group of nonprofits that the firm also just happens to represent.

The results of this insider settlement by vested stakeholders, psychotropic drugging continues to skyrocket. Big Pharma and the Behavioral Health Industrial Complex was able to walk away from any accountability without losing access to children in State care.

  • AGR Building Investors: The AGR Building is reportedly tied to stakeholders in behavioral health technology—a sector incentivized by bills like H.R. 2085, which lacks ethical guardrails.

Roper Technologies retains a 49% minority stake in Indicor, the industrial company that owns the AGR Building in Butler, PA, through its subsidiary AGR International.

Simultaneously, Roper is aggressively expanding into behavioral health with its pending $1.65 billion acquisition of CentralReach, a leading provider of cloud-based software for Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) therapy serving autism and intellectual/developmental disabilities (IDD).

CentralReach is projected to generate $175 million in revenue and $75 million in EBITDA for the fiscal year ending June 2026, reflecting Roper’s focus on high-growth, tech-enabled healthcare solutions.

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Judge who blocked Trump deportations took junket to event with anti-Trump speakers, sponsor

Months before he blocked President Donald Trump’s deportations of illegal alien gang members, U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg attended a privately-funded legal conference in Idaho that featured sponsors and speakers who have expressed clear anti-Trump sentiments — particularly on immigration — and a theme that echoed the Democrat Party’s 2024 stated mission of saving democracy, according to a judicial ethics report.

Boasberg was one of nine Democrat-appointed judges and three Trump nominated jurists to attend the conference in ritzy Sun Valley, where two of the four sessions were titled “Role of Judges in a Democracy” and the “State of Democracy,” the report shows.

Called a “Privately Funded Seminar Disclosure Report,” the document discloses that Boasberg was in attendance, but offers no details of whether Boasberg was paid for his attendance or travel, or what the remuneration was. 

Overseen by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, the ethical rules governing federal judges require that a private entity who “issues an invitation to a federal judge to attend an educational program as a speaker, panelist, or attendee and offers to pay for or reimburse that judge, in excess of $480, must disclose financial and programmatic information.” The rules do not require a specific accounting for each judge, or even how much was paid to judges at all.

You can view that disclosure here, which is also linked to the official website of the D.C. District Court.

BoasbergDisclosureReport.pdf

Just the News was alerted to the conference and to Boasberg’s attendance by a retired Democrat-appointed judge, who was concerned the July 2024 conference’s focus on judges’ role in a democracy was too close to a political party’s theme for comfort. He declined to be named.

It is possible that his “payment” was merely reimbursement for expenses, but Boasberg did not respond to a request for comment from Just the News.

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