On the four-year anniversary of Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb’s stay-at-home orders, state Attorney General Todd Rokita gathered with Hoosiers who had fought the mandates and told them something most of them knew already: Indiana’s Covid-19 data was wrong.
The stats that Holcomb and his state health commissioner Kris Box used to justify the lockdowns inflated death counts and positivity rates, Rokita told his audience. Bad data like those led to bad decisions.
Rokita unveiled his “Analysis of Covid-19” report in the upstairs of a South Bend-area Mexican restaurant, an establishment that made news in 2021 when nearby University of Notre Dame students were chastised and investigated for fraternizing at the bar and grill to get a break from onerous campus restrictions.
“Dr. Anthony Fauci, who oversaw much of the federal government’s initial COVID-19 response, admitted this year that many directives, such as six-foot distancing, ‘sort of just appeared’ rather than being rooted in research. The same appears true of data and policies developed here in Indiana,” Rokita read from his report. The crowd booed at the mention of Fauci’s name.
Rokita’s goal, as his report said, was to “revisit some wrongs so they can be made right.” A review was sorely missing after Covid-19 lockdowns that saw unprecedented numbers of restaurants and businesses permanently close, churches seal their doors, school kids suffer devastating learning loss, constitutional rights ignored, vaccine mandates put into place, and suicide and depression cases climb.
Those gathered to hear Rokita’s findings—local elected officials, activists, anti-lockdown candidates for office, even a radio host—applauded
