The architect of New York City’s coronavirus lockdowns has appeared to admit breaking his own rules to attend drug-fueled sex parties in an undercover sting.
Former Covid czar Dr Jay Varma was caught on camera seemingly revealing how he got high and went to underground raves that were ‘not Covid-friendly’ at the height of the pandemic in 2020.
He also detailed how he snuck around to participate in ‘deviant sexual’ gatherings, hosted sex parties at his home and rented a hotel with friends where they would get ‘naked’ and take ‘molly,’ a street name for MDMA or ecstasy.
He was secretly recorded in a sting operation by Mug Club Undercover, an investigative organization run by right-wing commentator Steven Crowder.
Dr Varma was former NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio ‘s most senior Covid advisor, appearing in daily public briefings and championing restrictions like school closures and vaccine mandates.
Dr Jay Varma served as Mayor Bill de Blasio’s senior advisor for public health and Covid-19 in 2020 and 2021
Dr Varma was filmed in an undercover sting operation by Mug Club Undercover. He was captured in what appears to be secretly recorded videos in July and August 2024
Throughout the undercover footage, Dr Varma appears to brag about how he was ‘running the entire Covid response’ for New York City and how he was behind pushing de Blasio’s vaccine mandate.
‘I had to be kind of sneaky about it… I was running the entire Covid response for the city,’ he told a woman off-camera identified only as a Mug Club journalist.
‘I did all this deviant, sexual stuff while I was on TV… and people are like “Aren’t you afraid? Aren’t you embarrassed?” And I was like, no, actually… I love being my authentic self.’
He later added: ‘The only way I could do this job for the city was if I had some way to blow off steam every now and then.’
In a statement to DailyMail.com, Dr Varma said: ‘Unfortunately, I was targeted by an operative for an extremist right-wing organization determined to malign public health officials and take down the public health system in America.
‘This individual has been highly discredited and he has been banned from numerous media outlets for his homophobic slurs and racist rants.
‘In those private conversations that were secretly recorded, spliced, diced, and taken out of context, I referred to events that transpired four years ago.
‘Between April 2020 – May 2021, I participated in two private gatherings. I take responsibility for not using the best judgment at the time.’
The doctor’s statement continued: ‘Facing the greatest public health crisis in a century, our top priority was to save lives, and every decision made was based on the best available science to keep New Yorkers safe.
‘I stand by my efforts to get New Yorkers vaccinated against COVID-19, and I reject dangerous extremist efforts to undermine the public’s confidence in the need for and effectiveness of vaccines.’
In a separate statement, a spokesperson from City Hall told DailyMail.com: ‘Dr Varma is not, nor has he ever been, a member of the current administration.
‘The city’s health department went above and beyond to protect New Yorkers from COVID-19 and continues to protect and keep New Yorkers safe under Mayor Adams leadership.’
DailyMail.com also reached out to SIGA Technologies, where Dr Varma is listed as the chief medical officer and executive vice president, but the company has not responded.
Dr Varma appears to admit on secretly recorded video that he and his wife rented a hotel to gather with friends and take drugs
Dr Varma appears to admit on secretly recorded video that he was attending sex and polyamory parties with large groups of people during Covid
When asked by the MCU journalist what the ‘sex parties were like during Covid,’ Dr Varma admits he never attended ‘a public type’ sex party.
However, he goes on to say that he and his wife had one with their friends in August 2020.
The couple rented a hotel room and Dr Varma advised everyone attending to take a Covid test and send him the results.
At this point in the pandemic, New York City was in the beginning of its reopening plan, but businesses still had to limit their capacities and indoor dining was restricted.
Dr Varma, who also worked on global public health for the CDC, said: ‘It was fun. We all took… Molly [Ecstasy/MDMA] and it was… eight to 10 of us in a room and everybody had a blast because everybody was like so pent up because like everybody was stuck together and stuff like that.
‘And sometimes it isn’t so much about like penetrative sexual stuff. Some of it is just something about like bodies being close to each other. Just being naked with friends.’
Later in the video Dr Varma talks about going to an underground dance party with 200 people in May or June 2021 beneath a bank in New York City where ‘everybody’s high.’
He said: ‘And I was so happy because I hadn’t done that… in like a year or whatever. But I was looking around being like, f***, I wonder if anybody sees me and they’re going to be pissed because this was not Covid-friendly.’
When asked by the MCU journalist if he thinks New York City residents would have criticized him for ‘having sex parties during Covid,’ Dr Varma replied: ‘Yeah. It would have been a big deal.
‘Yeah. It would have been a real embarrassment.’
New York City had some of the strictest lockdown measures in the United States during the height of the pandemic, when the city became the nation’s epicenter for cases and deaths.
Dr Varma appears to admit on secretly recorded video that he would be embarrassed if people found out he was not adhering to Covid lockdown guidelines
On the footage, Dr Varma claimed he was the person who convinced then-New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio to institute Covid vaccine mandates
Schools, libraries, parks, shops and restaurants were closed. Millions were sent home to work remotely and children attended school online.
And in 2022, Dr Varma criticized current Mayor Eric Adams for not doing enough to contain the spread of the virus as a new variant caused a surge of cases.
The undercover videos also appear to show Dr Varma taking credit for vaccine mandates, with the doctor saying he was who convinced then-mayor de Blasio to enforce vaccine requirements.
Dr Varma said: ‘Well, I had actually been talking to him [de Blasio] about it since even before the vaccines were available. I was like, you’re going to have to do it this way and so he came up with this metaphor that we’re going to climb this ladder. We’re going to first start voluntarily and then we’re going to be pushing it.’
He continued: ‘So the way we do it in public health is we make it very uncomfortable to be unvaccinated. With vaccines it’s like, you can’t get a job, you can’t go to a restaurant, kids can’t go to school. It’s like “F*** I’m just going to get vaccinated.”
‘You “force” people by making it really uncomfortable… The whole idea is like you build barriers so that people are like “F*** this. I’m just going to do it because I’m tired of being harassed.”‘
The nearly 18-minute video also appears to show Dr Varma take credit for other Covid-era measures, as well, such as social distancing.
Dr Varma said people asked him how he didn’t ‘go crazy during’ Covid lockdowns. He said: ‘I think the reason I didn’t is because I felt like I had control. It was getting done to [the public, but], it’s like, I was the one making the decisions about what happened.’
