THE HUNT FOR COVID-19’s ORIGIN RAMPS UP — Amid calls from both congressional Democrats and Republicans for accountability for the pandemic's beginnings, Biden on Wednesday said he ordered the intelligence community to spend the next three months probing the question in hopes of reaching a “definitive conclusion.” That represents the most transparency yet from the administration about its intelligence efforts as related to Covid. The government is split between two theories of the virus’s origin, Biden said: either the virus naturally jumped to humans from an animal host, or its release was the result of a lab accident in China. The “lab leak” theory had long been dismissed as unlikely by federal health officials. But it’s received renewed attention in recent weeks, after top scientists urged further investigation and reports that three researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology were hospitalized in 2019. On the Hill, lawmakers from both parties have signaled a willingness to look into the theory themselves, POLITICO’s Andrew Desiderio and Erin Banco report. That could further amp up the pressure on the administration, which has argued any investigation will have a better shot at succeeding if run by an outside multinational entity like the World Health Organization (rather than a government with which China has had strained relations). In a statement , the Chinese embassy blasted the talk of a lab leak as a “conspiracy theory” and “smear campaign.” Yet as far back as early 2020, Biden had expressed openness to the possibility — along with Republicans, who now say their long-held suspicions have been validated. On Wednesday night came yet another sign of bipartisan interest: The Senate unanimously passed legislation to require that the Biden administration declassify intelligence related to any possible links between the Wuhan Institute of Virology and the pandemic’s origins. BIDEN TO TAKE ABORTION RIGHTS STAND — The president is expected to leave the Hyde amendment and other anti-abortion provisions out of his forthcoming budget blueprint, his first attempt as president to confront this divisive issue, POLITICO’s Alice Miranda Ollstein reports. Biden’s omission of the Hyde amendment — the longtime provision banning nearly all federal abortion funding — would be largely symbolic, given Democrats’ narrow margins in Congress. But it sends a clear message at a time when states are trying to limit abortion access and the Supreme Court plans to hear a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade. Biden first vowed to do away with the Hyde amendment as a candidate, saying in 2019 that there was “no rationale” for withholding federal funding to care for those covered by federal programs. While many Democrats have long opposed the prohibition, appropriators last year opted not to fight its inclusion, for fear of the political cost of a repeal that would, regardless of their votes, ultimately be blocked by then-President Donald Trump. Any effort to do away with Hyde this year is likely to fail as well ; even some moderate Democrats in the Senate are still in favor of keeping the ban in effect. Still, abortion rights advocates are pressing Biden and Democratic lawmakers to make an effort anyway. Ensuring that poor people, disproportionately affected by cuts to abortion access, can still recieve the procedure is a matter of racial and economic justice, they say. Republicans and anti-abortion organizations are keeping close eye on Biden’s budget, too, highlighting in particular his past support for Hyde during his decades as a senator. GEORGIA SENATORS: FEDERALIZE MEDICAID EXPANSION — Democratic Sens. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff penned a letter to Senate leaders Wednesday, pressing them to “to close the coverage gap in Medicaid non-expansion states through federal action,” POLITICO’s Rachel Roubein reports. The coronavirus relief bill Biden signed in March offered new incentives for holdout states to expand their programs, but so far none have taken advantage of them. The White House and Democratic lawmakers have since weighed using their infrastructure package as a vehicle for covering the 2.2 million people in holdout states who lack coverage. Warnock and Ossoff stopped short of endorsing a specific policy. But the two wrote in their letter that they’re working on a legislative fix. The letter also noted that CMS could potentially fix the coverage gap by creating its own federal workaround. | 
