Rand Paul Suggests Fauci May Be Forced to Testify Under Oath
Dr. Anthony Fauci may be forced to testify about COVID-19 origins, Rand Paul wrote on X. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said a pandemic “truth commission" could be established to investigate Fauci and others.
Anthony Fauci photo credit: Christopher P. Michel via Wikimedia.
Dr. Anthony Fauci may have to testify under oath regarding his knowledge of the origins of COVID-19, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wrote in a series of posts Monday on X.
“The Senate is now gearing up to subpoena Fauci to testify under oath. The American people deserve complete transparency on the origins of COVID-19,” wrote Paul, chairman of the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Paul said he is working with FBI Director Kash Patel “to investigate Fauci malfeasance in office” and examine “the vast COVID coverup” involving the virus’s origins and federal funding of gain-of-function research.
Gain-of-function research increases the transmissibility or virulence of viruses. Such research, often used in vaccine development, was performed at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, prompting fears that the SARS-CoV-2 virus was developed at the lab and subsequently leaked.
The subpoena, if issued, would form part of Paul’s ongoing investigation into the origins of COVID-19, launched last year. In January, Paul subpoenaed 14 federal agencies, including the FBI, CIA, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as part of this investigation.
This is not the first time Paul has suggested Fauci will have to appear before Congress. In May, Paul said Fauci will have to testify “either voluntarily or involuntarily” about the origins of COVID-19 and federal funding of gain-of-function research.
Paul has long been a critic of Fauci. In 2021 and 2023, he submitted criminal referrals against Fauci to the U.S. Department of Justice. In both referrals, Paul accused Fauci of perjury — a federal offense that can carry a prison sentence of up to five years.
Rutgers University molecular biologist Richard Ebright, Ph.D., a critic of gain-of-function research, welcomed Paul’s statements.
“Fauci willfully violated federal policies on gain-of-function and enhanced potential pandemic pathogen research, committed conspiracy to defraud and perjury, used federal funds to commit crimes, and caused a pandemic that killed 20+ million and cost $25+ trillion,” Ebright told The Defender via email.
In 2021, Paul claimed Fauci was “spreading mistruths.” In a book published in 2023, Paul accused Fauci of leading the “great COVID cover-up.”
RFK Jr: ‘Truth commission’ a possible means of bypassing Fauci pardon
Paul’s comments came as Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suggested Monday during an interview on “The Tucker Carlson Show” that a “truth commission” could investigate people like Fauci and their actions during the pandemic.
“In those cases, what happens is you have a commission that hears testimony on what exactly happened. Anybody who comes and volunteers to testify truthfully is then given immunity from prosecution,” Kennedy said.
“At least the public knows who did what. And people who are called and don’t take that deal and perjure themselves, they then can be prosecuted criminally.”
Such a commission may be one means of bypassing Fauci’s “preemptive pardon,” which former President Joe Biden issued in the final minutes of his administration in January, Kennedy said.
The pardon, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2014, addresses “any offenses” Fauci committed against the U.S. during this period, including in his former capacities as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), member of the White House COVID-19 Response Team and chief medical adviser to Biden.
Experts on law and policy said Fauci still faces potential legal challenges, despite the pardon. “Fauci’s pardon only covers criminal liability under federal law,” attorney Rick Jaffe said. “It does not shield him from testifying before Congress, nor does it immunize him from perjury prosecution.”
Fauci can invoke his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination, Jaffe said, but “his pardon cannot prevent civil lawsuits, congressional contempt findings or administrative actions like pension forfeiture.”
The pardon also does not provide Fauci with immunity from state-level charges. In February, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, said the state could pursue such an investigation.
Journalist Paul D. Thacker, a former U.S. Senate investigator, said Fauci can still be invited to testify before Congress and may face perjury charges if he lies under oath. Suggesting that Fauci has previously lied to Congress, Thacker said:
“If Fauci is placed under oath and fails to admit that his testimony was misleading, he can be prosecuted for that lie. If Fauci continues to lie and fails to admit that he was conducting NIH business with reporters on his private email, he can be prosecuted.
“The NIH hid documents from Congress and the press for many years. HHS is now going through those documents and releasing them quietly to Congress. If Fauci lies and misleads about these documents during a congressional deposition — and Fauci doesn’t know what Congress has — he can be prosecuted for that.”
During a U.S. House of Representatives interview in January 2024, Fauci stated over 100 times that he didn’t recall details about the U.S. government’s COVID-19 pandemic response and government funding of gain-of-function research.
In a June 2024 House hearing, Fauci defended the government’s COVID-19 policies. Responding to Fauci’s testimony, Paul said NIH — the parent agency of NIAID, which Fauci led for 38 years — was “more secretive than the CIA.”
Thacker said, “Fauci’s main problem is that he has a history of lying and getting away with it, so he will likely continue to lie. But he might finally be prosecuted.”
Paul, RFK Jr. call for investigation of Fauci’s role in gain-of-function research
In his interview with Carlson on Monday, Kennedy suggested that Fauci played a role in covering up evidence pointing to the creation of lab-made viruses through a technique known as “seamless ligation.”
Kennedy said University of North Carolina researcher Ralph Baric, Ph.D., developed the “seamless ligation” technique to hide “evidence of human tampering.” Baric co-authored papers on gain-of-function research involving coronaviruses and led a U.S.-China collaboration that in 2018 submitted a proposal to engineer viruses with similar characteristics to SARS-CoV-2.
In February 2020, Fauci met with Baric, according to a copy of Fauci’s schedule, obtained by Open the Books through a Freedom of Information Act request in 2022.
Concerns over the safety of gain-of-function research previously led the U.S. government to implement a moratorium on such projects between 2014 and 2017.
Monday’s comments by Paul and Kennedy came just days after the World Health Organization’s Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens released a report on the origins of COVID-19, stating that “the weight of available evidence … suggests zoonotic spillover,” but that a lab leak cannot be ruled out.
In April, the Trump administration launched a new version of the government’s official COVID-19 website, presenting evidence that COVID-19 emerged due to a leak at the Wuhan lab. The CIA, FBI, U.S. Department of Energy, Congress and some foreign intelligence agencies have endorsed the “lab-leak theory.”
Paul said government oversight over gain-of-function research is necessary, regardless of the origins of COVID-19.
“You don’t need to be convinced that the COVID-19 virus originated from a lab leak to recognize the imminent need for oversight mechanisms — the mere possibility that the virus could have emerged from such risky research should be more than enough to prompt decisive action,” Paul wrote.
In May, President Donald Trump signed an executive order ending U.S. federal funding of “dangerous gain-of-function research” in China, Iran and other countries.
Trump’s executive order also paused federally funded gain-of-function research in the U.S. for 120 days, during which a new policy for such research will be developed.
Last month, the NIH shut down a research center Fauci established and announced it was ending gain-of-function research and suspending the grants that funded the research. The U.S. Department of Agriculture said it would stop accepting proposals for gain-of-function research as of June 20.
“These policies need to be codified into law,” Ebright said. “Otherwise, the likelihood is high that these policies will be reversed under a future administration.”
In March, Paul introduced the Risky Research Review Act, which would “codify permanent independent oversight” of taxpayer-funded gain-of-function research. In February, Paul introduced the NIH Reform Act, which would overhaul NIAID and “increase congressional oversight on the agency’s leadership.”
Paul’s office did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
Related articles in The Defender
Biden Grants Fauci a ‘Preemptive Pardon.’ Could He Still Face Legal Challenges?
Rand Paul Rips Fauci Testimony: NIH ‘More Secretive than the CIA’
‘I Don’t Recall’: Fauci Unable to Answer Key Questions in Pandemic Probe
Rand Paul Accuses Fauci of Leading the ‘Great COVID Cover-Up’
Rand Paul Accuses Fauci of Perjury, Calls for DOJ Investigation
Have the handcuffs and prison cell ready.
how many 'hearings', 'testimonies', etc. did we get already, around Fauci, covid origin, etc.??? Any consequences so far? NONE. Did any of those actions ever touch the topic of covid genetically modifying injections, for billions, with one the same genetic code of the synthetic toxic, NON-HUMAN Spike protein, which now turns into white clots infesting countless blood vessels of every multiple jabbed and unfortunately deceased ??? Did anyone, ever, will finally get into the REAL PROBLEM of KILLING HUMANITY via annihilation of the HUMAN GENOME, all via illegal GENE THERAPIES in form of the injections, all planned by Fauci and Co. for a VERY LION G TIME??? The entire 'science' is a HUGE issue and the BASICS of critical thinking are being laughed at directly in its face! And here to spend more time, more money, only in order to GAIN TIME and multiply the DEATHS, for something what was told already multiple times??? This CRIME needs to STOP NOW!