Intersection of politics with medical research is not a new thing. We have NIH funded researchers that have been suppressing the results of their research cause they were afraid of the political implications for some time now. I am not particularly worried about pre-determined outcomes, but agree that a lot of people seem to have already arrived at a pre-determined position wrt what this study will show or how it will be conducted. IMO, the study will be subject to extreme scrutiny and the methods, data sources, and analyses will either stand on their merits or they will fail. What iwas stupid was to put out a rush job timeline that was obviously going to have to get walked back. If I was on the team, I would publish all the study documentation including protocol and statistical analysis plan as soon as it is available. Put out the methods and let peer reviewers critique it prior to execution of the analyses. Adopt any well reasonable course corrections, than run the analyses. We're talking minimum like 18-24 months to execute, but you would be much better positioned to weather any criticism.