Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) has publicly alleged that several major news organizations, including Fox Digital, declined to publish an opinion article he authored concerning his investigation into the safety of COVID-19 vaccines and the federal government's handling of adverse event reports. The Wisconsin Republican made these claims concurrently with the release of the op-ed and an interim report from the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which he chairs.
"I consider this to be the biggest government scandal in my lifetime, and one that is crying out for full media attention and coverage." — Senator Ron Johnson, (R-WI)
Senator Johnson posted the opinion piece on X (formerly Twitter) and subsequently published it on his official Senate website under the headline, "The story the media — and the government — don’t want you to hear." In the article, Johnson asserts that federal health agencies failed to adequately inform the public about potential safety concerns associated with COVID-19 vaccines. He further accused prominent media organizations of refusing to provide a platform for his claims. "The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA TODAY, and Fox Digital have all declined or ignored requests to publish this op-ed," Johnson wrote in his piece. He also stated that several television news organizations, including NBC, ABC, PBS, CNN, and MSNBC, did not provide coverage of the findings contained in his committee's report.
The senator's allegations are directly tied to the release of a Majority Staff Interim Report from the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. This report scrutinizes how federal health officials responded to reports of adverse events following COVID-19 vaccination. According to Johnson, the report suggests that health officials within the Biden administration were aware of potential safety concerns related to the vaccines but did not alert the public. The report specifically cites cases involving "death and sudden death" associated with the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.
A significant focus of Johnson’s investigation is Peter Marks, identified as the former director of the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. This division of the FDA is responsible for overseeing vaccine approvals and monitoring their safety. Johnson alleges that Marks and other officials were informed that an algorithm used to analyze data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) could potentially obscure signals of adverse events. According to Johnson, federal officials received data over several months indicating possible vaccine-related risks. Rather than publicly disclosing these concerns, Johnson claims that officials instructed a data analyst to cease pursuing the issue. "Rather than warning the public, they ordered the data analyst to ‘cease and desist’ and then lied to the American public that ‘they weren’t seeing safety signals,’" Johnson wrote in his op-ed.
Senator Johnson characterized the matter as one of the most significant controversies of his political career. "I consider this to be the biggest government scandal in my lifetime, and one that is crying out for full media attention and coverage," he stated. He also cited figures from VAERS, noting that the system currently contains over 1.6 million worldwide adverse event reports and more than 39,000 reported deaths associated with COVID-19 vaccinations, according to Trending Politics.
Federal health officials have consistently maintained that reports submitted to VAERS do not establish a causal link between a vaccine and a reported injury or death. They emphasize that such reports require further investigation and verification to determine causation. Furthermore, federal health agencies have continued to assert that COVID-19 vaccines provided substantial public health benefits during the pandemic, significantly reducing severe illness, hospitalization, and death. While Fox News did cover Senator Johnson’s committee report in May, it had not published the senator’s specific opinion article at the time of its public release. The allegations contained within Senator Johnson’s report have not been independently adjudicated by a court or other neutral body.
