It’s Tuesday, August 11. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Vinay Prasad on the bombshell Fauci text messages. John McWhorter on the Jason Arday scandal and the dehumanization of black academics. Boris Johnson talks Ukraine, Europe, and the Atlantic alliance with Aaron MacLean.
But first: Will China take over the drug industry?
Lithium ion batteries. Solar cells. Steel. Shipbuilding. Drones. These are just a few of the industries that China came to dominate as it rose to become an economic superpower. Now comes perhaps the scariest prospect of all: the potential that China will soon dominate biotech and pharmaceuticals as well. The latest developments are alarming—and have barely been noticed outside of the industry until Bethany McLean started looking into it for us.
Why does this matter? It’s not just a question of manufacturing jobs and outsourcing. Biotech companies discover new drugs, which Big Pharma then tries to turn into medicines that the Food and Drug Administration will approve. Morgan Stanley predicts that by 2040, a third of all FDA-approved drugs could originate from China. Think about the power that will give Chinese companies over what drugs to pursue and what diseases to study. And think as well about the leverage the Chinese government could one day have over the U.S. if they had that much control over the drugs Americans need.
There are, for sure, defenders of this state of affairs, who argue, as The Economist put it recently, “Diseases cross borders. So should their cures.” But as one of Bethany’s sources told her, the question isn’t if China will weaponize biotech, it’s when.
—Joe Nocera
Recently released texts from Dr. Anthony Fauci appear to show the former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) telling fellow health officials in 2021 that a second Covid-19 vaccine “could be associated with miscarriage in the 1st trimester.” But publicly, Fauci never cautioned pregnant women—or anybody, for that matter—against receiving the shot. Nor did he offer any warnings to pregnant women about the possibility of miscarriage. Vinay Prasad, who was a leading critic of the government’s Covid response and worked on vaccine approval in the Trump administration, dissects the evidence for and against the miscarriage possibility—and why Fauci’s deception was so wrongheaded.
Does it matter what crazy things a Democratic politician might have said in 2020—that era of Woke 1.0, as River Page calls it? It sure doesn’t look that way, at least not to Democratic primary voters. The latest example: Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate Francesca Wong, who called for Thanksgiving to be canceled and the police to be abolished in 2020, is the odds-on favorite to win in today’s Wisconsin primary. But will the general election voters be so forgiving?
Academia treats black scholars differently from their white counterparts, according to John McWhorter. But not in the way you might think. Last week, Jason Arday, a black British scholar at Cambridge University, resigned his post amid allegations of serial plagiarism. Read John on why the case is “a symptom of academia’s dehumanization of black scholars and willingness to accept intellectual mediocrity in its self-seeking pursuit of virtue.”
Earlier this year, former UK prime minister Boris Johnson embedded with a Ukrainian army brigade on the frontlines of the Russia-Ukraine war. Today, he joins Aaron MacLean on “School of War” to discuss what he saw, and why Western Europe’s support of Ukraine remains vitally important—more than four years after Russia’s invasion.
MORE FROM THE FREE PRESS
THE NEWS
A 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck Colombia on Monday, killing at least 132 people, flattening buildings in the country’s western region, and forcing evacuations as far as the capital city of Bogotá. Colombia’s interior minister estimates 20 municipalities were struck by the tremor, the most powerful quake in Colombia in the last decade.
A Ukrainian drone struck the Russian city of Nizhnekamsk, roughly 750 miles from the Ukrainian border, late Sunday night, killing at least 13. The strike was characterized by Ukrainian officials as “part of efforts to reduce the Russian aggressor’s military capabilities.” “Russia’s war will be felt more and more at their own home—in Russia,” Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky said after the attack.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order yesterday amending the childhood vaccination schedule, spacing out the recommended timing of administering the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccination into three separate single-disease doses administered at three separate medical appointments.
The State Department announced that it has revoked 175,000 foreign visas since the beginning of the second Trump administration, less than two years ago. The department noted that a majority of revocations were in response to criminal activity like assault or theft, but also extended to those who “called for violence against U.S. citizens, defrauded Americans, abused our immigration system, or endangered national security.”
A Staten Island judge temporarily halted Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s pied-à-terre tax, targeting the city’s wealthiest residents. The order calls for the city to take down an online list of properties and owners who are supposed to pay the tax. Just before the ruling was released, Mamdani said his administration would “vigorously defend” the policy in court.
Todd Blanche was officially sworn in as the next Attorney General of the United States, after the Republican Senate narrowly confirmed him by a vote of 50–49. Republican senators Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins voted against Blanche. Before joining the Department of Justice in 2025, Blanche served as Trump’s personal lawyer.
On Monday the trial began for the former gang leader accused of killing rapper Tupac Shakur in 1996, just shy of 30 years after the rapper was gunned down on the Las Vegas Strip. Duane “Keffe D” Davis, 63, was arrested in 2023 and has pleaded not guilty.
"The order calls for [New York City] to take down an online list of properties and owners who are supposed to pay the [pied a terre] tax."
What I really want to see is a list of every New Yorker getting welfare, housing subsidies, food stamps, and SSI. If anyone should be shamed, it's the people who've been grifting off the rest of us for 3-4 generations in the same families since the 1960s.
But you know, the difference is that such people are shameless.