FIRST ON FOX: Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., led the entire Republican Senate conference in calling on President Biden to reject agreements that would expand the authority of the World Health Organization (WHO) in the case of a global pandemic.
“We strongly urge you not to join any pandemic related treaty, convention, or agreement being considered” at the 77th World Health Assembly, reads a letter sent to Biden by Johnson and all 48 other Republican senators.
The Republican senators stressed that any such agreement would be considered a treaty, which they noted requires “the concurrence of two-thirds of the Senate under Article I Section 2 of the Constitution.”
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The World Health Assembly (WHA) will take place from May 27 to June 1, and international agreements are expected to be considered.
The WHA is the WHO’s decision-making body, which meets yearly, so it can lay out its goals and craft policies between the 194 member states.
The senators emphasized the U.S. “cannot afford to ignore this latest WHO inability to perform its most basic function and must insist on comprehensive WHO reforms before even considering amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR) or any new pandemic related treaty that would increase WHO authority.”
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The Republicans claimed that the latest draft of the new pandemic response treaty is “dead on arrival.”
“Instead of addressing the WHO’s well-documented shortcomings, the treaty focuses on mandated resource and technology transfers, shredding intellectual property rights, infringing [on] free speech, and supercharging the WHO,” they wrote.
They also claimed such agreements ignore that the origin of the COVID-19 virus still isn’t clear, “because Beijing continues to block a legitimate independent investigation.”
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Biden and his administration have expressed support for the concept of a global agreement between countries to more effectively combat future pandemics.
Johnson and the other Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Minority Whip John Thune of South Dakota, Republican conference Chairman John Barrasso of Wyoming and National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) Chairman Steve Daines of Montana, said any potential support from the Biden administration for the international agreements would be “unacceptable.”
The White House and WHO did not immediately provide comment to Fox News Digital.
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Johnson has been a fierce critic of Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former chief medical adviser to the president, and of the precautions put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S. The Wisconsin senator has also criticized the pharmaceutical industry and vaccinations for the virus that were mandated across the country, as well as advocating for those who said they suffered injuries from the shots.
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