One lawyer's rise shows how vaccine misinformation can fuel fundraising and far-right celebrity
In one of dozens of recent media appearances, Ohio attorney Thomas Renz was claiming that coronavirus vaccines were more harmful than the virus itself. “The people that are dying are vaccinated,” he said on a conservative online talk show in July.
As Renz spoke, a message flashed across the screen with his website address. “Donate to his cause,” it urged.
Renz, who became a licensed attorney only months before the pandemic began, has rapidly gained prominence among covid-19 skeptics for leading federal lawsuits in six states that challenge shutdowns, mask mandates and the safety of vaccines while alleging that the danger of the virus has been overblown.
Anti-vaccine groups, conspiracy theory enthusiasts and far-right media have embraced him, and his best-known client, the group America’s Frontline Doctors, calls him part of a “Legal Eagle Dream Team.”
It is a highly visible role for Renz, 44, who passed the Ohio bar exam in November 2019 on his fifth attempt and has limited litigation experience, according to a Washington Post examination of his career.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2021/09/20/vaccine-lawsuits-thomas-renz-covid/
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