‘Science Doesn’t Belong To Any One Person’: Lawmakers Grill Fauci On Pandemic Origins
'Can we include that the White House put pressure on us to censor the lab leak theory?'
Anthony Fauci says he will leave the White House if Donald Trump becomes president in 2024
Dr. Anthony Fauci said that he intends to resign his post as the White House chief medical adviser if former President Donald Trump attains the presidency once again in 2024.
Implying that the Trump administration mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic, Fauci took the opportunity to get in some jabs while on national television, Fox News reported.
While speaking with Jim Acosta on CNN Sunday evening, Fauci laughed off the suggestion that he would remain in his post should Trump return as president, Newsweek reported.
Fauci said, “If you look at the history of what the response was during the administration, I think, you know, at best, you can say it wasn’t optimal. And I think, just, history will speak for itself about that.”
When Acosta clarified that Fauci, in fact, meant that he would not return to his post in a second Trump administration, Fauci said, “Right. For sure, yeah.”
However, it is no secret that Trump and Fauci frequently clashed during the first year of the COVID pandemic. They found themselves at odds when it came to hydroxychloroquine, testing strategies, when to reopen businesses, instituting travel restrictions from China, and many more issues.
On a campaign conference call in October 2020, just days before the presidential election, Trump said, “People are tired of hearing Fauci and all these idiots, these people. Every time he goes on TV, there’s a bomb, but there’s a bigger bomb if you fire him.”
Trump has not committed to running for president in 2024 but has very publicly flirted with the possibility of running once more to seek the Republican Party’s nomination for president.
In February at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, Trump suggested that the Democratic Party will soon experience a series of high-profile losses at the national level.
He said, “They’re going to find out the hard way starting November 8 and even more so starting November 2024.”
In 2021, after Joe Biden entered the White House, Fauci said that it was “liberating” to work under the new president.
Fauci said, “I can tell you I take no pleasure at all being in a situation of contradicting the president, so it was really something that you didn’t feel you could actually say something and there wouldn’t be any repercussions about it.”
He continued, “The idea that you can get up here and talk about what you know, what the evidence and science is, and let the science speak – it is somewhat of a liberating feeling.”
WATCH: Sen. Rand Paul responds to Fauci's 'juvenile' attacks and 'misdirection’: We still need ANSWERS
After new information came out that suggests Dr. Anthony Fauci intimidated and bribed scientists into dismissing the COVID-19 lab-leak theory, Sen. Rand Paul and Fauci got into a heated debate in a Senate hearing. But instead of providing answers, Fauci accused Sen. Paul of endangering him.
Sen. Paul joined "The Glenn Beck Program" Wednesday with his response and explained why he believes "people live in fear of what [Fauci] will do to them."
"It's all about money. If you cross Tony Fauci, you don't get your money. He controls the purse strings for the entire country, the entire university system. And he's been doing it for forty years," Sen. Paul began.
"It's consistent with his arrogance, this level of arrogance that he's developed. He said several weeks ago, that he is science and any attack on him is an attack on science. Yesterday, he said anybody who opposes him is encouraging death threats," he added.
"Look, I've been on the receiving end of semi-automatic gunfire. I was 20 yards away from Steve Scalise when he almost died. I was 10 feet away from a staffer that was shot. And, you know what? The guy doing the shooting was a Bernie Sanders supporter. But not one of us, not one of the Republicans on the ball field, said, 'Oh, it was Bernie Sanders' fault.' But that's the juvenile level of personal attack that Fauci is now stooping to. He is saying that the personal threats he gets are actually the fault of his critics."
Sen. Paul continued, "But the thing is, [Fauci] needs to answer the question. Everything he did in the committee yesterday was misdirection so he didn't have to answer the question. The question was, why did he smear three scientists from Stanford, Oxford, and Harvard? Why did he smear them as fringe epidemiologists? And why did he conspire against Francis Collins to take them down in a very public way? He wouldn't answer the question."
Watch the video clip below to hear more of Glenn's conversation with Sen. Rand Paul:
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NIH Director Francis Collins told Anthony Fauci there needs to be a 'quick and devastating' takedown of anti-lockdown declaration by 'fringe' Harvard, Stanford, Oxford epidemiologists: Emails
Newly exposed emails show outgoing National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins commanding Dr. Anthony Fauci to carry out a "quick and devastating" takedown of a statement by public health experts calling for "focused protection" of the most vulnerable populations. Emails show that Fauci would indeed attack the declaration.
What is the Great Barrington Declaration?
Infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists authored the Great Barrington Declaration, a document that argues against COVID-19 lockdowns that was released on Oct. 4, 2020.
"Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health," the declaration stated. "Keeping these measures in place until a vaccine is available will cause irreparable damage, with the underprivileged disproportionately harmed."
"As immunity builds in the population, the risk of infection to all – including the vulnerable – falls," the epidemiologists wrote. "We know that all populations will eventually reach herd immunity – i.e. the point at which the rate of new infections is stable – and that this can be assisted by (but is not dependent upon) a vaccine. Our goal should therefore be to minimize mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity."
More than 15,000 medical and public health scientists have allegedly signed the Great Barrington Declaration and over 45,000 medical practitioners have endorsed the document. The health advice in the Great Barrington Declaration was the complete opposite of what top U.S. public officials espoused.
A 'quick and devastating' takedown is ordered
Four days after the Great Barrington Declaration was released, Collins instructed Fauci and Clifford Lane — the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Deputy Director for Clinical Research and Special Projects — to engage in a "takedown" of the anti-lockdown declaration, according to emails.
The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis obtained and released emails between the public health officials.
"This proposal from three fringe epidemiologists who met with the Secretary seems to be getting a lot of attention — and even a co-signature from Nobel Prize winner Mike Leavitt at Stanford," Collins wrote in an email sent on Oct. 8, 2020.
"There needs to be a quick and devastating takedown of its premises,” Collins wrote in reference to the Great Barrington Declaration.
In new FOIA email dump, NIH Director Collins emailed Fauci to urge a \u201cquick and devastating\u201d propaganda takedown of the Great Barrington Declaration, in which @MartinKulldorff @DrJBhattacharya and @SunetraGupta urged an end to COVID lockdowns and mandates.\nhttps://coronavirus.house.gov/sites/democrats.coronavirus.house.gov/files/2020.10.13%20FOIA-00001024.pdf\u00a0\u2026pic.twitter.com/jxIMPetjue— Michael P Senger (@Michael P Senger) 1639780840
How did Dr. Anthony Fauci respond?
Fauci responded to Collins' direction by promoting a Wired U.K. article with the headline: "There is no 'scientific divide' over herd immunity."
Phil Magness — senior research faculty and interim research and education director at the American Institute for Economic Research – noted that the Wired U.K. article from October 2020 stated that the Great Barrington Declaration is irrelevant because lockdowns are in the "past."
The Fauci-endorsed Wired article is noteworthy for having one of the single worst hot-takes of the entire pandemic. It declared in October 2020 that the GBD should be ignored, because lockdowns were a thing of the past and would not be returning! \n\nhttps://www.wired.co.uk/article/great-barrington-declaration-herd-immunity-scientific-divide\u00a0\u2026pic.twitter.com/U3LtPK97zc— Phil Magness (@Phil Magness) 1639844416
Fauci then shared an article from progressive The Nation titled: "Focused Protection, Herd Immunity, and Other Deadly Delusions."
"But Kulldorff, Bhattacharya, and Gupta’s plan, enshrined as the Great Barrington Declaration unveiled at the American Institute for Economic Research this week, is not the way forward," the article read. "If we’re going to build toward a new politics of care, it will be by relying on progressive principles of justice and equality—not some notion of the survival of the young and the fittest."
Far from a scientific study refuting the GBD, Gonsalves's article is a political op-ed attacking @Jacobin magazine for breaking "solidarity" with other far-left media outlets on lockdowns. Why? Because Jacobin ran an interview with @MartinKulldorff on how lockdowns hurt the poor.pic.twitter.com/0j85WlKiwY— Phil Magness (@Phil Magness) 1639844418
Gregg Gonsalves — the author of The Nation article — reportedly emailed Collins to "thank" him for speaking out against the Great Barrington Declaration and for "doing it 'undiplomatically.'" Gonsalves also agreed in calling the GBD epidemiologists "fringe."
In the meantime, Gonsalves also gets in contact with Collins to volunteer his services (along with future @CDCDirector Rochelle Walensky) to attack the GBD in the media.\n\nCollins approves, and forwards it to Fauci and a bunch of NIH underlings.pic.twitter.com/UJ2t7C18AA— Phil Magness (@Phil Magness) 1639844421
Fauci attacked the Great Barrington Declaration during an ABC News appearance on Oct. 15, 2020.
"That declaration has a couple things in it that I think are fooling people, because it says things that are like apple pie and motherhood," Fauci told ABC News. "A, we don't want to shut down the country. I say that all the time. B, we do certainly want to protect the vulnerable."
Fauci sent an email to White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Deborah Birx on Oct. 16, 2020.
"Over the past week I have come out very strongly publicly against the "Great Barrington Declaration,'" Fauci wrote, adding that he will "connect" with her "later today or over the weekend."
On the morning of the Covid task force meeting, Fauci sends Deborah Birx this email alerting her about the need to oppose the GBD at the meeting. The unredacted part suggests they are preparing to attack @ScottWAtlas, who was perceived as the task force's champion of the GBD.pic.twitter.com/iqYbiTiZxo— Phil Magness (@Phil Magness) 1639844423
Who are the 'fringe' epidemiologists?
Collins described the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration as "fringe."
The three "fringe" epidemiologists are Martin Kulldorff, Ph.D., an epidemiologist at Harvard University, Sunetra Gupta, Ph.D., an epidemiologist at Oxford University, and Jay Bhattacharya, MD, Ph.D., a professor and public health policy expert at Stanford University.
Bhattacharya reacted to Collins' email by writing on Twitter, "So now I know what it feels like to be the subject of a propaganda attack by my own government. Discussion and engagement would have been a better path."
Kulldorff responded by saying, "A year ago, @NIHDirector Francis Collins asked Fauci to do a 'devastating published take down' of the Great Barrington Declaration. A public debate would have been better. Invitation still open."
Gupta has yet to issue a statement, but she retweeted the above statements made by colleagues.
Dr. Francis Collins attempts to defend his 'takedown'
The House Select Committee on the Coronavirus Crisis said Collins "expressed deep concerns about the herd immunity strategy being advocated by these 'fringe epidemiologists.'"
Collins was asked about the "takedown" during a Fox News interview on Friday, to which he replied, "Well, OK, if it’s that specific. There were people [like] Scott Atlas that said don’t worry about this business of putting on masks or asking people to isolate themselves or stay distanced. Let it rip. Let this virus run through the country until everybody has had it, and we’ll have herd immunity.'"
Atlas — who was an advisor on former President Donald Trump's White House Coronavirus Task Force — does not show up as one of the prominent signatories on the Great Barrington Declaration website.
CROWDER: Woke lefties are at it again, and this time they attacked Larry Elder; Donald Trump Jr. Guests
On today's episode of "Louder with Crowder": The woke lefties are at it again, and this time they attacked Larry Elder ahead of the Newsom recall election. Plus, Donald Trump Jr. guests! And are the hospitals REALLY being overwhelmed, or is it just more media fearmongering? All of that and more!
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WATCH: The GOOD and the BAD in the Texas abortion law
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Fauci’s PATHETIC Dodging: No Wonder So Many Want Him Fired | The News & Why It Matters | Ep 934