The paper behind Trump’s “game changer” COVID-19 cure has finally been retracted, but the damage is done — with many snake oil salesmen headed for Washington.
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At a press conference in March 2020, Donald Trump told the American public that the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) was a “game changer” for the then-relatively new COVID-19 virus and encouraged them to take it to prevent infection.
“What do you have to lose?” he said.
Now, the infamous HCQ paper that kicked off the craze — and a fair number of high-profile anti-vaxxers — has finally been retracted on ethical and scientific grounds.
The paper in question came courtesy of the now-disgraced French researcher Dr. Didier Raoult, who, since he became a pandemic star with his HCQ claims, has suffered a slew of retractions as well as revelations about his history of questionable research ethics.
This retraction is owed to the tireless work of a small group of scientists who called out the many issues with the paper early on — and received massive harassment from Raoult and his supporters for doing so.
Trump, desperate for the pandemic to go away ahead of the 2020 election, latched onto the promise of HCQ, which received a controversial emergency use authorization for clinical trials.
The president endorsing this drug (which carries known cardiac side effects) for public use — when only one small and questionable study involving human subjects existed — was reckless.
Trump’s public messaging spurred a run on the medication resulting in a devastating shortage for those who required it for other uses and led to a self-poisoning death from ingestion of a form of the drug meant for use in aquariums.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, then Trump’s chief medical adviser and the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, publicly countered the president on HCQ, calling the evidence in support of it merely anecdotal in an effort to temper public expectation. This, along with Fauci’s pushing back on Trump’s overly optimistic messaging on the virus’s projected course, appears to have caused a major rift between the nation’s top infectious disease doctor and the president.
Fauci was not the only high-profile public health official to counter Trump on HCQ. That spring, Dr. Rick Bright, the former director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, filed a since-settled whistleblower lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), alleging his removal from his former position was retaliation for his having pushed back on the Trump administration’s embrace of HCQ.
In April 2020, a study on Veterans Affairs COVID-19 patients reported those treated with HCQ to have higher rates of death — results Trump and his media allies would dismiss.
Not long after, in June 2020, a major randomized control trial out of the University of Minnesota showed HCQ to have no use against COVID-19 and HCQ’s emergency use authorization was appropriately rescinded.
However, this would hardly be the end of the HCQ story, as MAGA World claimed Trump’s game changer was being “censored” and continued battling for the empty promise of the medication for the pandemic-causing virus.
In light of the Raoult paper finally being retracted, let us look back on key promoters of HCQ from 2020 — and where they are now.
Elon Musk
As established in previous WhoWhatWhy reporting, Elon Musk played a significant role in building up the HCQ hype. Three days before Trump made his “game changer” comments, Musk tweeted out a Google doc “white paper” citing Raoult, and stated, “This paper matches what I’m hearing from a lot of smart people.”
Of note, Musk is not the only tech billionaire to have gotten in on said hype — by late March 2020 Oracle CEO Larry Ellison was preparing infrastructure to deliver HCQ to the American people. But Musk’s involvement and trajectory into vaccine conspiracy peddling are unique.
Musk’s foundation backed the COVID-19 Early Treatment Fund, which sought to find a cure for the pandemic in the existing pharmacopeia and which partially funded the Minnesota trial that showed HCQ to be ineffective against the virus.
The fund’s leader, tech millionaire Steve Kirsch, has become deeply involved in the anti-vaccine movement and rather extreme in his commitment to it, going so far as to take stolen patient vaccine data in a bid to “prove” the dangerous and false claim that COVID-19 vaccines killed more than they saved.
Musk, whose mRNA vaccine venture failed to produce a viable competitor to the Pfizer and Moderna shots, has personally espoused anti-vaccine views and pushed pandemic conspiracy theories. He has turned Twitter into a cesspool of COVID-19 and other right-wing misinformation following his purchase of the platform and dropping of content moderation policies.
Over the course of the pandemic, Musk increasingly aligned himself with MAGA politics, ultimately becoming a major force in Trump’s 2024 campaign in its final push. Since the electoral victory, Trump has appointed Musk to a co-leadership position in the so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” in the incoming administration.
Laura Ingraham
Fox News host Laura Ingraham served as a key link between Musk and Trump. Musk’s posting of the Google doc made sudden stars of its authors, a lawyer and a doctor-turned-block chain investor. The same day Musk posted about HCQ, Ingraham had Gregory Rigano, the lawyer, on her show. Within a couple days, Rigano appeared on Tucker Carlson’s Fox program and Glenn Beck’s podcast.
Ingraham was particularly aggressive in her promotion of the antimalarial drug for COVID-19, and her Twitter handle was shown in a 2021 study on the propagation of HCQ misinformation to be “the most central node in the [misinformation] network.”
The same week she hosted Rigano, Ingraham emailed Trump adviser Jared Kushner about the drug and used her show to put pressure on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to make moves on HCQ. The following month, she took a meeting with Trump to further push the medication.
Ingraham would go on to be one of the “earliest, most high-profile proponents” of the next “miracle drug” for COVID-19, ivermectin, which has been thoroughly disproven as an effective treatment against the virus. As with HCQ, there were poisonings from human use of veterinary formulations of ivermectin, with regard to which the FDA would issue public safety announcements — only to be accused of “censorship.”
With both drugs, there were reported cases of individuals taking them in lieu of the vaccines and dying preventable COVID-19 deaths.
Despite the network’s central role in the spread of deadly COVID-19 misinformation, as well as their massive settlement for their 2020 election misinformation, Fox News remains a top fixture of the right-wing media ecosystem — with Ingraham retaining her position as one of its star commentators.
Dr. Oz
Like Ingraham, surgeon and television personality Dr. Mehmet Oz personally lobbied the Trump White House over HCQ. In late March 2020, he emailed Kushner pushing to make the drug a priority, saying “we have a potential pandemic solution at our fingertips” and highlighting the “French data.”
The same day he sent that email, Oz appeared on Ingraham’s show and Fox and Friends, where he discussed Raoult’s paper (it “stunned” him) as well as the HCQ trial he was planning at his former academic institution, Columbia University.
That spring, Oz bought thousands of HCQ doses during the critical shortage. Further, while promoting HCQ for COVID-19, Oz owned shares in companies that supply the drug.
Of course HCQ was hardly the first time the TV doctor promoted dubious medical cures or had his ethics in doing so questioned, including by the Senate.
After running a failed Trump-endorsed Republican campaign for the Senate in 2022, Oz has been nominated by Trump to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in the next administration.
Peter Navarro
In 2022, the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis — not to be confused with their follow up act, the GOP-led House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic — published a report on the Trump administration’s relentless pressure campaign on the FDA after HCQ lost its emergency use authorization. “A Knife Fight with the FDA” highlights the role of economist Peter Navarro, who served various roles in the Trump administration, in this crusade.
The report discusses how, thanks to a former co-host of Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast, Navarro’s office was put in contact with a Brazilian virologist involved in crafting Jair Bolsonaro’s pandemic response to find a “good” HCQ paper after the Minnesota study’s disappointing results.
There was some egregiously unethical COVID-19 “early treatment” research out of Brazil under Bolsonaro, who, like Trump, pushed HCQ and downplayed the virus to the detriment of his citizens.
While serving his prison sentence earlier this year for defying the January 6th Committee’s subpoena, Navarro’s substack and Twitter featured guest posts from his collaborators in the “Knife Fight” report — one of which included the accusation that HCQ was “wrongfully Fauci-blackboxed.”
Shortly after being released from prison this summer, Navarro appeared at the Republican National Convention. Trump recently announced that he is bringing back Navarro as an adviser for his second administration.
American Association of Physicians and Surgeons
Also named in the “Knife Fight” report is the American Association of Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), a conservative physician advocacy group that has long pushed anti-vaccine rhetoric and was initially founded to oppose universal health care. The group has notably included the father-son duo of physicians-turned-politicians former Rep. Ron Paul and current Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY).
The report discusses how Navarro’s office coordinated with Bannon and AAPS Executive Director Dr. Jane Orient to rally support for a petition calling for the FDA to grant a new emergency use authorization for HCQ. The report also discusses how, in early June 2020, AAPS filed a lawsuit against the FDA alleging “FDA officials from prior administrations acted contrary to the wishes of President Donald Trump, by arbitrarily limiting use of HCQ from the Strategic National Stockpile.” This suit was dismissed by a federal district court in August 2020.
AAPS is currently suing medical governing bodies as well as the Biden administration over alleged infringement of First Amendment rights, with three doctors who have promoted “early treatment” and disparaged the vaccines having joined the suit. An attorney for the group claimed the Biden administration “wrongly caused social media platforms to take down postings and videos,” despite the Supreme Court’s June dismissal, for lack of standing, of the Murthy v. Missouri censorship lawsuit that asserted the same.
America’s Frontline Doctors
In July 2020, a month after the results out of Minnesota, a group of rogue doctors staged a press conference on the steps of the Supreme Court, promoting HCQ and speaking out against mitigation efforts being pushed by public health experts. Their stunt was notably promoted by Trump and Donald Trump Jr. online. Leaked audio revealed this group, America’s Frontline Doctors, to have been created in collaboration with the Trump 2020 campaign and the far-right, Christian-nationalist Council for National Policy.
The group was led by Dr. Simone Gold, who would serve a brief prison sentence in 2022 for her participation in the insurrection and has been featured on the “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) movement’s crowdsourcing for Trump 2.0 leadership positions. Founding members also included Dr. James Todaro, co-author of the aforementioned Google doc; physician and pastor Dr. Stella Immanuel, who became infamous for having promoted the idea that some gynecological conditions are a result of sex with demons; and Dr. Joseph Ladapo, who would go on to serve as Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R-FL) deceitful anti-vax state surgeon general.
America’s Frontline Doctors made use of a telehealth platform to hawk COVID-19 “early treatment,” which netted millions of dollars. The group now faces a wrongful death lawsuit in Nevada for the cardiac death of a man prescribed HCQ via telehealth for COVID-19 prophylaxis.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
As previously discussed, notorious anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. joined America’s Frontline Doctors’ Gold on Christian daytime television program Ministry Now to promote HCQ shortly after the Supreme Court steps event. Kennedy claimed the physician group’s video from the event being removed from social media for violating misinformation policies was an act of censorship — a MAGA narrative that persists.
America’s Frontline Doctors and MAGA waged war against the COVID-19 vaccines once they became publicly available the following year, and Kennedy worked his way deep into the far-Right. Kennedy has come to the legal aid of his “early treatment” doctor allies in their fights against accountability, and his anti-vax group Children’s Health Defense rallied against “free speech” violations at the Supreme Court during the Murthy v. Missouri oral arguments.
Just ahead of the election, Kennedy suspended his own campaign and joined forces with Trump for the combined “MAHA” movement taking aim at public health institutions. Weeks before the election, Kennedy tweeted that the FDA “suppressed” HCQ as well as ivermectin, which he has also promoted for COVID-19 while fear-mongering about the life-saving vaccines.
To the horror of the scientific community, Trump has nominated Kennedy to lead the HHS in his second administration. This comes alongside other nominations for leadership positions under the HHS umbrella that have rattled the public health community, as well as the nomination for surgeon general of Fox News contributor Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, who promoted HCQ in 2020.
Sen. Ron Johnson
MAGA loyalist Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), who has been a major spreader and platformer of anti-vax disinformation, was also featured in the “Knife Fight” report. Notably, Johnson hosted a Senate hearing on HCQ in November 2020, many months after it had been disproven as an effective treatment for COVID-19. Arguing on behalf of HCQ were two individuals also featured in the “Knife Fight” report: Dr. Peter McCullough, who would become an anti-vax celebrity on Joe Rogan’s podcast the following year, and Dr. Harvey Risch, who had promoted Raoult’s work in the spring of 2020 and worked with Navarro’s office. Both doctors have appeared on Bannon’s mis- and disinformation-spewing podcast promoting HCQ.
The following month, Johnson hosted a hearing where ivermectin was introduced as the next “miracle drug” for COVID-19. Johnson has worked with members of America’s Frontline Doctors, who would go on to push ivermectin as well as HCQ, hosting members and affiliates at his anti-vaccine panels throughout the past few years. Johnson has also used his political platform to defend his fringe doctor colleagues like McCullough from accountability.
More recently, the senator has been a vocal supporter of “MAHA” and Kennedy’s HHS nomination, and hosted a pre-election Senate hearing featuring the anti-vaxxer and his “wellness” allies.
The Wellness Company
As recently discussed, HCQ is still being marketed to MAGA thanks to The Wellness Company. In addition to selling kits containing HCQ and ivermectin, the company sells a vaccine “detox” supplement backed by McCullough. The American Board of Internal Medicine, which is being sued by AAPS, has finally revoked McCullough’s certifications over his spread of COVID-19 misinformation after alerting him of their decision to do so in 2022. This is one of only a handful of instances of action from medical boards and governing bodies against physician-propagated pandemic misinformation.
McCullough, who serves as The Wellness Company’s chief scientific officer, ran an HCQ trial in April 2020 and argued in favor of deploying it outside of clinical trials, against FDA warnings at that time. He published a problematic pro-HCQ paper with Raoult last year, which has been flagged with an expression of concern. Risch, who co-authored an “early treatment” paper with McCullough in a journal for which the latter previously served as an editor, is The Wellness Company’s chief epidemiologist.
The company was founded by Canadian aviation heir Foster Coulson, who runs a host of other businesses marketed to the MAGA base, including a propaganda outlet. Coulson claims his inspiration for The Wellness Company came from meeting the late Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, a small-town New York state doctor who promoted HCQ for COVID-19 and in so doing caught the attention of Trump.
While the antiparasitic ivermectin has mostly eclipsed HCQ’s star since 2020, it is worth noting that there have also been calls to retract the biggest papers purporting to show ivermectin’s use against COVID-19 as well.
Last year, a small team of doctors and scientists put forth a preprint reanalyzing the data in two papers on an ivermectin study in Brazil published in the journal Cureus. Upon reanalysis, they argue that the reported reduction in “infection, hospitalization, and mortality are entirely explained by statistical artifacts.” One of the reanalyzed papers was corrected to reflect undisclosed conflicts of interest, including payments from Brazilian ivermectin manufacturer Vitamedic to some of the co-authors. This fall, the Web of Science paused indexation of Cureus, with the Retraction Watch article about this action highlighting the ivermectin publications of concern among its many issues.
While Raoult’s overdue retraction is welcomed, the damage has already been done. American physicians and politicians who pushed HCQ and ivermectin — in the face of high-quality studies showing their lack of efficacy — and spread misinformation about the vaccines have faced infrequent consequences for doing so. In fact, it appears to have helped many of them climb the MAGA ladder.
That so many individuals who engaged in this debacle, and lack the humility to admit they were wrong, are being elevated to positions of power under Trump makes for a grim prognosis for public health in 2025. It is just one of many dire consequences of the outcome of an election justly characterized as existential, but one that may result in untold harm to millions.
