By Dylan Housman
A major arm of Chinese Communist Party state media issued a warning to Elon Musk on Monday after the Tesla and Twitter CEO endorsed the lab leak theory of COVID-19 origin.
Musk replied to a tweet Sunday about Dr. Anthony Fauci, indicating his belief that Fauci had funded the creation of COVID-19 at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). That prompted the Global Times, a leading Chinese state-run newspaper, to post on social media pondering whether Musk had bitten the hand that feeds him.
“He did it via a pass-through organization (EcoHealth),” Musk tweeted Sunday, referencing Fauci and his agency’s funding of EcoHealth Alliance, a nonprofit organization that funneled American grant money to the WIV. The tweet he replied to had questioned whether or not Fauci “funded the development of COVID-19” by facilitating gain-of-function research in Wuhan.
He did it via a pass-through organization (EcoHealth)
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 26, 2023
Proponents of the lab leak theory of COVID-19 origin generally believe that the pandemic began due to a leak of COVID-19 from the WIV, where dangerous gain-of-function research on bat coronaviruses was taking place.
Early Tuesday, CNBC’s Eunice Yoon first reported that the Global Times had posted about Musk on WeChat, a popular Chinese social media service. “Elon Musk, are you breaking the pot of China?” the paper posted.
#China Communist Party paper warns @elonmusk against pushing #COVID19 lab leak theory. @globaltimesnews posts on social media “Elon Musk, are you breaking the pot of China?” (“Breaking the pot after eating” is Chinese “biting the hand that feeds you.”) https://t.co/iWmMZAOiGt pic.twitter.com/nN1lhMDlYq
— Eunice Yoon (@onlyyoontv) February 28, 2023
According to Yoon, “breaking the pot after feeding” is a Chinese idiom akin to “biting the hand that feeds you.” (RELATED: ‘The State Department Has Done Almost Nothing’: Democratic Rep. Brad Sherman Rips Biden Admin On COVID Origins)
China is Tesla’s second biggest market, and the company has a major production facility in Shanghai. Musk, who has grown increasingly outspoken politically in recent years, does not have a track record of vocally criticizing the Chinese government.
Tesla did not respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller.
