. >> reporter: until five months ago david asher headed the coronavirus task at the state department. >> i can say it was important and persuasive. we needed to do our due diligence including the potential that it came out of a lab. >> reporter: when a group of scientists gathered by the world health organization went to the wuhan lack earlier this year their access was limited. >> those findings were completely inadequate, were not scientific, were not forensic. >> reporter: this lack of transparency rains true to condoleezza rice who was in 2003. >> we couldn't get answers from the china ease so if we're not going to keep repeating this problem we need to be more aggressive with the chinese about the need to cooperate. >> c.j.: >> reporter: with nearly 400 dead including 600,000 americans, solving the puzzle will combat future pandemics. >> the better we understand the origins of this one the better we can anticipate the origins of the next one. >> in response to our question, chinese foreign ministry said criticism from state investigators is unfounding adding beijing repeatedly em

part of the article says -- >> trace: david asher appeared on capitol last week for a covid-19 originsum. he led the state department investigation into the origins of the virus under president trump. he joins me now. great to have you now. you heard what dr. robert redfield said about the lancet article what do you think? >> it seems like a pop piece. i'd rather have a scientist respond to this letter. it's so devoid of scientific evidence, even though it's -- when i look as a laymen, didn't have a lot of evidence, a lot of conjecture and hyperbole. five factors cited as scientific belated ed of a lab leak in a hearing last week by scientists. the fact there was there was no preepidemic evidence. there was a spike mutation, a weird thing that allows it to get in to your lungs and blood and then optimized. the scientists presented facts at this hearing but they've been unable to get anything published in any peer review journals. >> trace: i read that with the same take-away as you. the evidence seemed to be a little lean on that thing. on the flip side, you talk about the wuhan lab le

two years before that according to david asher into the cody origin french intelligence allegedly warned u.s. government that this had concerns about chinese actions at the laboratory. >> bret: jennifer griffin at the pentagon. thank you. cuban americans take to the streets of washington right in front of the white house to get president biden's attention. first, beyond our borders tonight. white house press secretary jen psaki says the u.s. is concerned about the to your knowledge and urging calm in that country. to your knowledge's young democracy faces its worst crisis in a decade after its president ousts the government and suspends parliament with the help of the army there main parties including islamists are condemning the move as a coup. flames threatened some residential areas. firefighters there say other places are being engulfed by dense smoke. no deaths or injuries had been reported but france and greece are dispatching aircraft to help put out the wildfires there. officials and athletes at the tokyo olympics are keeping an eye on a typhoon expected to arrive in a few hours.

former covid investigator david asher did not mince words when detailing what china was really after. technology, knowledge and material support. so, why did the u.s. ignore these early signs of trouble in wuhan? joining me now are w.h.o. adviser jamie metzl and former state department spokesperson morgan ortagus. hi, morgan. >> hi. >> tammy: let me start with you, jamie. it wasn't just a vegas concern -- vagueconcern was it. they were worried about the potential of what was happening in that lab really meant. their intelligence services were shocked and concerned. tell us more about what was going on. >> there were warning signs. the french government worked with the chinese to build the wuhan institute of virology. and the idea was to have a world class virology institute with a lot of french activity there. and the french thought and there was a division between the french government and french intelligence but the french government thought that would be a way to foster collaboration, to understand more about potential pathogen nic outbreaks coming outs of china. then when china b

. >> according to david asher the state department's lead investor into the covid origin. france's cia were pretty public in sounding their alarm bells, not typical. i can't understand how nih, dod and aid would continue to plow dollars and transfer tech to wiv in the wake of the french being evacuated. >> the signals were clear. we know the chinese had an offensive bioweapons program for decades since they joined bioweapons treaty in the 80s. the french knew that as well. >> tonight we are learning that secretary of state blinken met with the w.h.o. chief today and affirmed u.s. support for a new w.h.o. study into the origins of covid-19. a proposal china has already rejected outright. trace? >> trace: jen, i know have you study deed this what can you tell us about the status of the afghan combat translators seeking to imgreats to the u.s. >> the first plane of combat translators and their families about 250 in total all of them recipients of what is known as special immigrant visas will land in the united states late tomorrow, early friday. and will be sent by bus to for

they ended the investigation that was done by the state department much to the disappointment of david asherigure out where this started. what is going on with the 90-day biden investigation. >> they hoped for 90 days and this issue would go away. what i can tell you is not only is the information starting to get more and more clear, the picture is getting clearer and clearer. when we look at an investigation that was started under the trump administration, terminated under the joe biden administration, now all of a sudden is you're going to see a few admissions of wrong doing just like we have today from the who. but you'll actually say, well, we missed this one indicator. it's not a miss. it was a cover-up and i can tell you that when we start to see that, the person that needs to be testifying about this is dr. fauci. why didn't he share it with the task force and why didn't he share the e-mails that he had with those that stood to be able to hold china accountable but the who accountable. it's we me and several others have said that until you actually eliminate the leadership at the who,

david asher spoke out against a group of medical experts who dismiss the possibility of a lab leaked. take a look at this. >> you can't rule out a lab leaked unless you've gone into the lab and look for the leak. they won't give us access to the lab, so they'll never be able to say yea or nay definitively. but the circumstantial evidence is so substantial, and then there are some bizarre factors in the nature of the coronavirus. >> gillian: i mean, this seems to be a question we ask nearly every day on our air here. but how is it that some media outlets are just now starting to call for a more thorough u.s.-led investigation? we are now over a year and a half into the pandemic. >> you're absolutely right. dr. asher speaks some common sense. where has "the washington post" been for the last year and a half? these were legitimate questions that donald trump and others were asking. yet, to the point of the press conference that donald trump was just having come of that information was also pressed. so how in the world, and july of 2021, did "the washington post" suddenly come up and say,

doctor david asher is a senior fellow at the hudson institute. most recently, he led the new york state investigation into covid's origins and whether china's conduct violated a constitution of the -- thank you for joining us. >> thank you, ranking member gohmert, all the members of the select committee examining the coronavirus. welcome. i equally would welcome the opportunity to meet with the democratic majority side as well. i'm part of the hudson institute. i approached the investigation in a non partisan way. i've done this for democrats and republicans. this issue affects all of us, as you pointed out. in 1960, our founder wrote the book thinking of the unthinkable, talking about thermal nuclear war or methods of coping with consequences. at hudson, we are still guided by those principles, but my main concern for you today, having worked around wmd investigations and terrorist proliferation networks for nearly 30 years, we are entering an era of biological warfare, and this is the beginning of a threat level that will affect the rest of our

the former lead investigator into the covid origin david asher tells us friends french intelligence warnedad concerns about chinese actions at the lab two years before the institute of rolla g was inaugurated. quotes, dts e france cia were pretty publicans hounding their alarm bells, not typical, they were supposed to oversee lab safety at the wuhan institute o rolla g. this was no secret. i can't understand how nia dod and usaid would continue to plo dollars and transferred tech in the wake of the french being evacuated barrett is state department cable dating to 2018 outlined u.s. concerns in an e-mail to then secretary of state rex tiller sent a representative of the u.s. embassy in beijing writes that the lab is quote limited by a shortage of the highly trained technicians and investigators required to safely operate a bs for laboratory, parts of the state department team investigating the covid 19 origin. >> it's critical, it's a critical piece of data that clearly that the cables indicat the chinese had lacked security concerns. >> they were not responsible fo overseeing the safety i