Newly declassified documents released on Thursday, June 18, 2026, by the US Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, show that an American laboratory had assessed as early as May 2020 the hypothesis of a laboratory origin of COVID-19 as a serious possibility.
The documents also present evidence of US funded research that included plans for modifications to the spike protein that causes coronaviruses, experiments on receptors, and tests on humanized mice, in collaboration with researchers from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV).
The documents also prove that Anthony Fauci gave false testimony under oath.
Today, on my final day as Director of National Intelligence, I’m releasing never-before-seen communications and documents exposing how Dr. Fauci provided millions in US taxpayer dollars to fund dangerous gain-of-function research at the Wuhan lab, worked with politicized elements… pic.twitter.com/ZMdliW4zyS
— DNI Tulsi Gabbard (@DNIGabbard) June 19, 2026
The release, which took place on the final day of Gabbard's tenure, includes an eight-page assessment dated May 27, 2020, from Program Z of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
This assessment concluded that "all the necessary prerequisites for an accidental leak of a laboratory-engineered coronavirus, specifically a coronavirus adapted to recognize human cellular receptors, existed at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in mid-to-late 2019."
The report assigned equal weight to both the laboratory modification hypothesis and the natural origin scenario.
At the same time, it is worth remembering that, while the government was imposing restrictive measures (lockdowns), Dr. Anthony Fauci and those in his circle were actively manufacturing a narrative about a wet market, which would conceal the possibility of American research being linked to the origin of the virus, despite the fact that his own advisors initially insisted that COVID-19 appeared to be man-made.
In his transcribed interview in January 2024, Fauci was questioned about discussions regarding the same three topics: the origin of COVID, the WIV, and EcoHealth.
When asked about the CIA, he answered in the affirmative: he stated that he had been briefed "once or twice" at an NIH facility and also recalled a briefing in a White House situation room.
The documents coming to light subsequently show a briefing on June 4, 2021, which involved personnel from the CIA/WCP, officials from the National Security Council (NSC), and Fauci.
During it, Fauci expressed views regarding a study on pangolins, the patients of the WIV, evidence supporting one or more lineages of the virus, and recommended scientists whom the intelligence community (IC) could contact.
A separate email with a CIA header states that the same 40-minute teleconference included officials from the CIA/WCPMC and that Fauci provided his views regarding the May 4, 2021, briefing on the origin of COVID and suggested American scientists for consultation.
So, he lied.
According to an announcement released along with the records, "Fauci worked with the leadership of the Intelligence Community (IC) to conceal the truth regarding his actions, the origin of the virus from a laboratory leak, and his role in channeling American funding into this dangerous research that caused incalculable damage and countless losses of life.
These documents reveal the direct role of Fauci in manipulating the IC assessments on COVID-19, as well as how he lied to Congress in 2024, when under oath he denied knowing about or participating in discussions with intelligence agency officials regarding virological research."
US funded research and planning for coronavirus modification
The records include the year 5 progress report for the NIH grant 5R01AI110964-05 to the EcoHealth Alliance.
Under Specific Aim 3, the project outlined plans for:
1) Gene sequencing of the spike protein from bat coronaviruses.
2) Generation of mutant strains to assess how much additional evolution would be required for efficient utilization of the human ACE2 receptor or other receptors.
3) Pseudovirus binding assays with mutant receptors.
4) Infection experiments in cell lines and humanized mice.
This research direction overlaps with work described in the 2018 DEFUSE proposal, which involved the EcoHealth Alliance, Peter Daszak, Ralph Baric of the University of North Carolina, and the team of Shi Zhengli at the WIV.
The proposal sought to create chimeric bat coronaviruses with enhanced infectivity for humans, including examining the insertion of a furin cleavage site to improve entry into lung cells, as well as testing the resulting viruses in humanized mice that had originally been developed in Baric's laboratory.
A 2016 scientific publication from the WIV, which is included in the released material, describes a synthetic shuttle vector system for assembling large DNA fragments, with a demonstrated capability of up to 31 kilobases.
The authors presented the method as a tool for "genome-scale DNA reconstruction," a technique relevant to synthetic biology and viral engineering.
Surveillance activities under the same NIH grant reported that 9 out of 1,497 residents of rural areas in southern China (0.6%) were found seropositive for SARS-related coronaviruses or for HKU10 coronaviruses originating from bats.
And from leaked emails three years ago:
Among other things, the NIH helped fund experiments at the WIV in which genetically modified mice were infected with "chimeric" hybrids of SARS-related bat coronaviruses, in research that some scientists have characterized as unacceptably dangerous.
Andersen, according to The Intercept, put it clearly in an email to Fauci that same evening:
"The unusual features of the virus make up a very small part of the genome (<0.1%), so one has to look very closely at all the sequences to see that some of the features (potentially) look engineered," Andersen wrote.
"I should mention," he added, "that after today's discussions, Eddie, Bob, Mike, and myself all find the genome inconsistent with expectations from evolutionary theory.
However, we have to look at this much more closely and there are further analyses to be run, so those opinions could still change."
Internal discussions and briefing on manipulation research
An internal email dated June 8, 2021, which is included in the released material, refers to a 2016 New York Academy of Medicine meeting where Peter Daszak reportedly discussed his colleagues in China who were "manipulating the spike protein in coronaviruses to make them more infectious."
Other emails from the 2020–2021 period show officials discussing technical concerns, including references to a US Department of Defense (DOD) report regarding a "suspicious furin site addition" and to FBI reports containing unusual genetic descriptions.
An analyst noted the risk of non-experts misinterpreting the technical data, while simultaneously arguing that it needed to be examined carefully. Another remarked that "the Intelligence Community (IC) received direction directly from the NIH... the people who funded the Wuhan Lab" and referred to "a complex web of money and politics influencing the analysis."
Selection of their reviewer
Emails dated July 2021 regarding the selection of external reviewers for the assessments on the origin of COVID show that officials rejected several candidates due to political sensitivity or potential conflicts of interest:
1) James Clapper was considered too politically "charged."
2) Anthony Fauci was flagged due to his position as a "client" of the assessment, because of the funding ties through the NIH.
3) Michael Morell was considered "too public a figure."
4) Sue Gordon and one more individual referred to only as "Beth" were also set aside.
And so.
These documents provide primary documentation that a US national laboratory assessed the laboratory origin as being equally probable to the natural emergence of the virus, during a period when major scientific publications were publicly emphasizing a natural zoonotic origin and characterizing alternative hypotheses as conspiracy theories.
These include the February 2020 letter in The Lancet and the March 2020 article in Nature Medicine titled "The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2," as well as the subsequent reinforcement of this position by the leadership of the NIH.
The research details described in the declassified grant reports and research proposals included techniques and modifications, spike-protein engineering, receptor adaptation, testing in humanized mice, and the examination of furin cleavage sites, which later found themselves at the center of the scientific debate regarding the characteristics of SARS-CoV-2.
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