Rand Paul blasts Fauci after latest fireworks in Health Committee hearing
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul sounds off on 'The Story'
U.S. Sen. Rand Paul sparred once again with Dr. Anthony Fauci in a Senate hearing on Tuesday, with the lawmaker pressing the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases on reports he sought to quash "fringe" epidemiologists' coronavirus mitigation strategies.
The Kentucky Republican also asked Fauci to address accusations that he is at least tangentially culpable in the creation of viruses through gain-of-function research.
Following the hearing, Paul told Fox News' "The Story" there is evidence on a probability of "90 to 10" that the COVID-19 virus came from a Wuhan, China, laboratory and was engineered via gain-of-function research, despite Fauci's denials.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and chief medical adviser to the president, testifies before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing to examine the federal response to COVID-19 and new emerging variants, Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2022 on Capitol Hill in Washington. (Associated Press)
"[Fauci] funded the lab," Paul told host Martha MacCallum. "He tried to obscure the idea that he was giving money to the lab and then he steadfastly, for two years, said it wasn't gain of function, that they weren't taking viruses that don't exist in nature, creating them and creating viruses that are so dangerous that they could actually wipe out a portion of humanity."
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"He continues to deny that if this came from the lab -- yes, he's culpable," Paul added. "So when you ask him to investigate it, he's not exactly interested. He has a conflict of interest because it came from the lab."
‘Doesn’t want to debate'
Paul discussed how Fauci previously appeared to claim to be the human embodiment of science by declaring, "I am the science" in response to another interviewer's question about critics attacking him.
"Dr. Fauci doesn't want to debate. He wants to squelch debate because ‘he is science’. If you criticize him, you're criticizing science," Paul said.
"Dr. Fauci doesn't want to debate. He wants to squelch debate because ‘he is science’. If you criticize him, you're criticizing science."
Paul, a doctor of ophthalmology, further explained that most of the heavily enforced COVID mandates at the federal level have come from Fauci or Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
He explained that by Fauci mostly ignoring the science of immunity – such as through antibodies built via prior infection – he believes the U.S. remains "undervaccinated."
Dr. Anthony Fauci. (Getty Images)
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Paul also responded to Fauci holding up an exhibit during the hearing that showed a fundraising webpage linked to the senator with the phrase "Fire Dr. Fauci." The chief medical adviser to President Biden claimed Paul's continued criticisms have been leading to threats on his life.
Fauci testified that a man who was the subject of a recent traffic stop in Iowa had told police he was driving from Sacramento, California, to Washington, D.C., to kill him.
The suspect, identified as Kuachua Brillion Xiong, 25, was indeed stopped by police for driving aggressively on Interstate 80 in late December -- and was found to have a high-caliber rifle in his vehicle as well as a "hit list" of several high-profile political individuals including Fauci, according to USA Today.
Police said the man began "talking about his disapproval for government due to the sex abuse of children, some of which that has occurred by President Biden." He was cited for speeding and has been charged with one count of a threat to a former president because Bill Clinton was allegedly on the man's list.
On "The Story", Paul said it was unbelievable for Fauci to blame him for the alleged threats from the Interstate 80 suspect.
‘Trying to deflect’
He noted that the 2017 congressional baseball field shooter, James Hodgkinson, was a fervent public supporter of Sen. Bernie Sanders, yet no one blamed the Vermont socialist for Hodgkinson's actions.
"To say that I'm responsible for death threats on him would be equivalent to myself or Steve Scalise saying that the Bernie Sanders supporter that shot us, that it was Bernie Sanders' responsibility," Paul said.
"To say that I'm responsible for death threats on him would be equivalent to myself or Steve Scalise saying that the Bernie Sanders supporter that shot us, that it was Bernie Sanders' responsibility."
"I was 10 feet from a young man who was shot. I was about 20 yards from Steve Scalise, who was shot. Not one Republican came forward and said it was Bernie Sanders' fault because this was a supporter of his. And so when Democrats say that and falsely is a Democrat partisan, when he says it, [Fauci] is trying to deflect."
"He says that he is science and that if you question him or oppose him, you're opposing science," the senator continued. "But this kind of arrogance also led him and Dr. Collins to say they would take a takedown of three epidemiologists who started the Great Barrington Declaration there from Stanford, Oxford and Harvard."
Paul was referring to an email between Fauci and his former boss ex-NIH chief Francis Collins. In the exchange, Collins told Fauci "there needs to be a quick and devastating published take-down of its premises."
‘Political animal’
The three doctors involved in the Declaration, a statement composed in favor of alternative mitigation strategies for coronavirus, included Indian-British epidemiology professor Sunetra Gupta, Stanford University professor of medicine Jay Bhattacharya – a frequent "Ingraham Angle" guest – and Harvard professor Martin Kulldorff.
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"[Collins and Fauci] called them fringe," Paul said. "They orchestrated a takedown campaign in the lay media, not in the scientific journals on the merits, but in the lay media. And so he didn't want to answer my question, so he accuses me of fomenting violence. But it's a misdirection because he doesn't want to accept that basically, he's become a political animal and that everything he does every day is to further his political agenda, not the science."
During the hearing, Paul slammed Fauci for his proclamation of embodying science.
"The idea that someone like yourself would represent science, and that any criticism of you would be a criticism of science itself is quite dangerous," he said.
U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., departs a meeting at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., Dec. 1, 2021. (Reuters)
"Central planning, whether it be of the economy or of science, is risky because of the fallibility of the planner."
Later in the hearing, Fauci also sparred with U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., who is also a medical doctor.
Marshall pressed Fauci on his reported connections to gain of function research funding, as well as a Project Veritas report alleging Fauci's NIAID "went ahead with" the endeavor after a separate request to the Pentagon's "DARPA" agency was denied, citing safety concerns.
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