> However, my concern is that so many of these political campaigns are billionaire / security state funded efforts to rally the public behind a "blame china" message so that way they can continue military aggression in the east designed to prop up American hegemony.

Surprisingly that does not seem to be the case. I believe the security state is more interested in avoiding any gain of function restrictions bans from the Obama era coming back. Given all major economies close collaborations with the lab, as well as our own biodefense efforts lots of effort has been to suppress this, not to protect China but for their own interests.