A Senate committee voted to hold former White House Covid czar Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress on Thursday following his refusal to answer for his Covid lies and conduct throughout the lockdown period.
“Holding a witness in contempt is a serious thing, and it should be rare,” Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chair Rand Paul, R-Ky., said at the hearing. “But the contempt power exists for precisely this circumstance.”
The committee’s 8-5 vote came along party lines, with all Democrats voting in opposition. Democrats moved to table the vote on the contempt resolution and “then suggested giving Fauci immunity to [Department of Justice] prosecution to come in and testify, but their motions failed,” according to Fox News’ Bill Melugin.
When appearing before the committee last week, Fauci plead the Fifth Amendment more than 100 times to avoid answering questions from lawmakers about his lies to the public and conduct throughout the viral outbreak. This included dodging queries about his role in funding gain-of-function research in China; downplaying the credible lab leak theory; ignoring the Covid shots’ risks and potential treatments; and more.
[RELATED: Fauci Gave 10 Speeches And Interviews In 2026 Before Refusing To Testify To Congress]
Paul reportedly told CBS News that he plans to submit the contempt resolution “directly to the Justice Department as a referral” as opposed to a vote on the full Senate floor, per custom. The move comes amid debates among legal scholars about the validity of Fauci’s move to plead the Fifth over conduct covered by his sweeping pardon from former President Biden.
While discussing Fauci’s pardon — which covers “a period of some 11 years” — Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., argued that “in that context, the assertion of Fifth Amendment privilege only adheres to those instances where the witness has a reasonable fear of future prosecution, and it must be tailored to any such fear.”
“The fact that he wouldn’t answer questions about the tie he was wearing or the color of the carpet or the day of the week — Sen. Paul asked him about, ‘Did he have a folder in front of him?’ He wouldn’t answer that — betrays the fact that his invocation of the Fifth Amendment wasn’t tailored to anything,” Hawley said. “It was a predetermined, premeditated design to evade this committee’s questions on any subject, including emphatically, those for which he has a pardon.”
[READ: Why Fauci’s Refusal To Answer Congress Puts His Pardon In Jeopardy]
Thursday’s vote comes a day after The Wall Street Journal reported that a Senate subcommittee chaired by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., obtained a copy of Fauci’s cellphone from when he worked as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. The acquisition could shed more light on the former health official’s communications throughout the devastating lockdown years.
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