If Dr Fauci lied before Congress he should be held accountable. Rules are rules.
In case you missed it, yesterday Senator Rand Paul (who also happens to be a medical doctor) took Saint Anthony Fauci to task for funding gain-of-function research and lying about it before Congress.
Now Senator Paul is going to do something about it.
Senator Rand Paul has said he is writing to the Justice Department seeking 'a criminal referral' for Dr Anthony Fauci, accusing the nation's top public health official of having lied to Congress.
Paul, a libertarian Republican who has frequently sparred with Fauci, engaged in a blazing row with the health official on Tuesday.
Both men ended up calling the other a liar in a remarkable exchange during a Senate hearing.
On Tuesday night Paul told Fox News he wanted to take the matter further.
'I will be sending a letter to Department of Justice asking for a criminal referral because he has lied to congress,' Paul told Sean Hannity.
Paul has insisted that Fauci funded 'gain of function' research in the Wuhan lab in China, whereby viruses are manipulated to make them more lethal and transmissible. The Wuhan lab is now seen as a possible source for the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fauci has confirmed that his organization, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, funded research at Wuhan, but is adamant that the money was not direct towards gain of function.
Photo: Getty Images
Top infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci responds to accusations by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., as he testifies before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee about the origin of COVID-19, July 20, 2021 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Cases of COVID-19 have tripled over the past three weeks, and hospitalizations and deaths are rising among unvaccinated people. (Photo by J. Scott Applewhite-Pool/Getty Images)