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Comment by Mariannette Miller-Meeks

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U.S. representative and physician from Iowa
I'm not suggesting that laboratory manipulation was deliberate or was a bioterrorism, but by your own statements, Dr. Andersen, it seems to me that you're actually saying that it's inconclusive whether or not this emerged accidentally or on purpose from a laboratory, or if there was a manipulation, or if it came from science despite the thousands of animals that had been looked at to see if it could have emerged. I think my time is up, and I think it's--what we're finding today is that it's not as conclusive as you would like us to believe that it emerged through nature.
AI Verified (Jul 11, 2023)
Source:
Debbie Lesko, remarks in "Investigating the Proximal Origin of a Cover-Up," House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic hearing, July 11, 2023.
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Policy proposals and claims
COVID-19 originated from a lab-related incident rather than natural zoonotic spillover
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Statement relation comments

AI Verified Relevant: the quote is directly about whether COVID-19 came from a lab-related event or from nature, and the speaker says the evidence is inconclusive and less conclusive for natural emergence than claimed. That is enough to make an abstention/uncertainty stance on the complete statement substantially more likely. The source page also shows these remarks were made during Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks’s questioning, not Debbie Lesko’s. ([govinfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-118hhrg53002/html/CHRG-118hhrg53002.htm)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
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Vote answer comments

AI Verified The transcript shows this remark is from Dr. Miller-Meeks, and she argues the evidence is "not as conclusive" for a natural origin while saying the witnesses' own statements leave a lab/science-related origin unresolved. That implies a lean toward the lab-related-incident theory over confident zoonotic spillover, even though she stops short of claiming certainty. ([govinfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-118hhrg53002/html/CHRG-118hhrg53002.htm)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago

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Quote authenticity comments

AI Verified The quote appears verbatim in the official GovInfo transcript for the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic hearing "Investigating the Proximal Origin of a Cover-Up," held on July 11, 2023; the text matches at lines 1514-1523 of the HTML transcript (and corresponding PDF lines 1167-1175). ([govinfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-118hhrg53002/html/CHRG-118hhrg53002.htm)) The surrounding transcript shows these remarks were made during Dr. Miller-Meeks's questioning period, which begins when she is recognized at lines 1428-1430 and ends immediately before Dr. Bera is recognized at line 1525, so attribution to Mariannette Miller-Meeks is correct. ([govinfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-118hhrg53002/html/CHRG-118hhrg53002.htm)) The submitter-provided source passage naming Debbie Lesko conflicts with the official transcript, but the stored author, date, quote text, and source URL are correct. ([govinfo.gov](https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-118hhrg53002/html/CHRG-118hhrg53002.htm)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 2h ago
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