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Published On: Fri, May 23rd, 2025

Sen. Ron Johnson: The Biden Administration Was Aware Of The Risks Of Myocarditis In COVID-19 Vaccines

The Senate Homeland Security Committee holds a hearing on federal health agencies failing to warn the public about the potential side effects of the COVID-19 vaccines. At a Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations hearing on Wednesday, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) presented documents and records that he says were kept from him for years. The hearing was titled The Corruption of Science and Federal Health Agencies: How Health Officials Downplayed and Hid Myocarditis and Other Adverse Events Associated with the COVID-19 Vaccines.” Read Johnson’s remarks below. Key findings from the report:

Despite their awareness of the risks, U.S. health officials downplayed the risks of myocarditis and associated heart inflammation conditions after receiving an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine. U.S. health officials delayed for months alerting the public, and ultimately rejected a formal notification to health care providers about the risks to young people of myocarditis and associated heart inflammation conditions following receipt of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine. U.S. health officials were made aware by at least early 2021 that some of their vaccine safety monitoring systems may not have been capturing all cases of myocarditis and associated heart inflammation following receipt of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine.

Sen. Johnson at the hearing:

SEN. RON JOHNSON: What I want to do right now is in a more succinct fashion, go through a abbreviated timeline as it relates to the myocarditis issue. Now, after facing four years of the Biden administration’s efforts to undermine the public’s access to information in my oversight work, I immediately issued a subpoena to HHS when I became chairman of this committee. The subpoena records I’m releasing today, which are discussed in the interim report, do not contain FOIA redactions and will finally provide the public a more complete understanding of the Biden administration’s awareness of the risks of myocarditis following COVID-19 injection. So now here’s a brief timeline. On February 28th, 2021, Israeli health officials notified CDC, quote, of large reports of myocarditis, particularly in young people following the administration of the Pfizer vaccine. Again, that’s February 28th, 2021, two and a half months after the emergency use authorization. On April 12th, over a month later, a DOD consultant raises concerns to CDC and FDA officials about their ability to monitor and track cardiac related adverse events. The consultant notes, quote, if you do not ask, you will not see it, but does that mean it does not exist? Unquote. Around the same time in mid-April 2021, CDC officials discussed safety signals for myocarditis, quote, for myocarditis with mRNA vaccines based on DOD and Israeli data, but do not take immediate steps to warn the public. By the end of April 2021, just four months into COVID injection, VAERS was already reporting 2,926 deaths worldwide within 30 days of injection, with 46% of those deaths occurring on day zero, one, or two following injection. Now I have my first, the first chart I ever did on this, which I presented in our event in Milwaukee with the COVID injection injured, that chart a couple months later is showing, I think, 30 some percent. I can’t see it from that far away, but let me, let me get online. That chart is showing at that time, a couple months later, 4,812 deaths, 1,736, or 36% of those deaths occurring within the day of the injection or within one or two days. Now I was raising that issue. I was going on media. I was showing this chart and I got censored. Radio talk show hosts, when I talked about this, they were deplatformed. Now again, I realized VAERS doesn’t prove causation. I realized it’s grossly underreported, but that’s a correlation that I thought was pretty important. Somebody ought to be looking at it. So when I finally had a meeting with Francis Collins, head of NIH, with a group of other senators, I asked him, are you watching VAERS? I gave him those stats. He did admit that six deaths were associated with the J&J vaccine, but for the other, over a few thousand deaths, he said, Senator, people die. That was his callous reaction. That was the head of the NIH completely blowing off the VAERS system that they had touted before they got the emergency use authorization. I’ll continue. From May 17th to May 21, 2021, CDC officials discussed whether to issue a formal health warning called a health alert network message on myocarditis, noting that, quote, providers aren’t reporting these cases to VAERS. They knew they weren’t. They knew they existed. They knew they weren’t reporting them. A couple of days later, during a May 24, 2021 vaccine safety meeting, notes show that FDA and CDC officials asked, quote, is VAERS signaling for myopericarditis now, question mark, and are told for the age group 16 to 17 years and 18 to 24 years, yes, yes, they saw a safety signal in VAERS, yet from May 25th to May 27th, CDC officials provide up-to-date information on the status of the HAN to Pfizer and Moderna representatives. Not to the public, they’re warning the injection manufacturers, indicating CDC’s preference to keep those companies more informed about vaccine adverse events to the American people. On May 26th, then FDA director, acting commissioner, Janet Woodcock emails then CDC director, Rochelle Walensky, noting that, quote, FDA does not concur with the issuance of the myocarditis HAN as written. The same day, CDC and FDA decide to, quote, nix the HAN and instead publish less formal clinical, quote, clinical considerations about myocarditis on CDC website. Three days following the myopericarditis signal, FDA official Peter Marks appears to raise concerns about even posting the less formal clinical considerations on CDC’s website. He emails Woodcock and Walensky, quote, I need to ask for your patience with me. We still have concerns here if myocarditis and pericarditis have not actually signaled. That same day, CDC officials editing the clinical considerations discuss the need to, quote, walk back a sentence advising doctors to, quote, consider restricting patients with myocarditis from rigorous activity like competitive sports for at least three months until cleared by healthcare professionals. And I’ll be talking to Dr. McCulloch about the danger of eliminating that warning because four days later, CDC posts on its website clinical considerations about myocarditis, which omits any advice to doctors to advise patients with myocarditis to limit rigorous activity. That’s what’s in this report in far greater detail. So I would ask that that information together with my majority staff report, 2,473 pages of records HHS has produced pursuant to my January 20, 25 sub subpoena and my actual subpoena. I’d want those entered into the record.

Dr. Jordan Vaughn testifies at the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Permanent Subcommittee hearing:
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