House Republican Demands Congress Defund WHO Until Chief Resigns

Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA) on Tuesday introduced a resolution demanding Congress withhold funding from the World Health Organization (WHO) until its Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (pictured), resigns from his post.

The measure, which is co-sponsored by over 20 Republicans, also calls for a wide-ranging investigation into WHO’s alleged role in assisting the Chinese Communist Party cover up its handling of the deadly coronavirus strain that originated in Wuhan, China.

“The WHO helped the Chinese Communist Party hide the threat of COVID-19 from the world and now more than 10,000 Americans are dead, a number that is expected to rise dramatically in the coming weeks,” Reschenthaler said in a statement. “The United States is the largest contributor to WHO. It is not right that Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars are being used to propagate China’s lies and hide information that could have saved lives. This bill will hold the WHO accountable for their negligence and deceit.”

According to a Fox News audit, the United States gives hundreds of millions of dollars to the WHO annually:

The United States is the single largest contributor to the WHO. The most recent invoice from the WHO to the United States, which is one of many countries that fund the organization, was for nearly $116 million per year. The United States also voluntarily gives between approximately $100 million and $400 million more per year to the WHO for specific projects — contributions that totaled over $400 million in 2017, the most recent year for which figures are available.

The introduction of the measure comes after President Trump lambasted the WHO, calling the United Nations-backed organization “very China centric” for its advice not to enact a travel ban to prevent the spread of the virus.

“The W.H.O. really blew it,” the president wrote on Twitter. “For some reason, funded largely by the United States, yet very China centric. We will be giving that a good look. Fortunately I rejected their advice on keeping our borders open to China early on. Why did they give us such a faulty recommendation?”

In January, the WHO claimed “preliminary investigations” by the Chinese authorities found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the virus in Wuhan. It also urged countries to keep borders open despite designating the outbreak a global emergency.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) revealed Monday that Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-WI) has agreed to investigate the WHO and called for the organization to be defunded.

“They [WHO] just work for China, Communist China… If they had done their job, everybody would have gotten more ready, we wouldn’t have shut down this economy, and we wouldn’t have all these people dead all over the world,” Scott told Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson Tonight. “I want an investigation. I’m on Homeland Security. I’ve talked to the Chairman, Ron Johnson. He’s agreed to do it. We’re going to investigate why did they do what they did, what was their purpose, and why are we, as American taxpayers, giving them some of our dollars?”

“We should never, ever, buy one more product from China,” he added. “When you buy a product from China, you have to say, that’s the group of people — alright — that completely lied to us and forced us to shut down our economy and killed American citizens and Italians and Spaniards, on top of stealing all of our jobs before.”