Senator Rand Paul to ask DOJ to pursue criminal case against Dr. Anthony Fauci

Republican Senator Rand Paul said he will ask the U.S. Department of Justice to consider criminal charges against Dr. Anthony Fauci after a Senate committee voted that the former top U.S. infectious-disease official had defied Congress by refusing to answer pandemic-related questions.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which Paul chairs, adopted the resolution early Thursday along party lines — Republicans in favor, Democrats opposed — saying the 85-year-old Fauci did not comply with a congressional subpoena. Paul said he will forward the matter to the Department of Justice and that he intends to deliver the request in person to the U.S. Attorney in Washington.

"Dr. Fauci has not committed any crime — and Senator Paul knows that very well," Fauci's lawyer David Shertler said, calling the committee vote "a crude political trick designed to punish Dr. Fauci because he invoked his constitutional rights" and describing the action as "a continuation of personal revenge."

Background and the dispute

Paul has long led aggressive inquiries into Fauci's actions during the COVID-19 crisis, including publicizing Fauci's daily notes and extracting material from his mobile phone, arguing that research funded by Fauci's institute may have supported risky experiments in China and that a lab leak could have triggered the pandemic — claims Fauci and the National Institutes of Health have denied. Intelligence agencies and scientists remain divided on whether the pandemic began with a laboratory accident or a natural animal spillover; there is no evidence the virus was engineered.

Fauci, who retired in 2022 after 38 years as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and as a presidential adviser, relied on his Fifth Amendment right more than 100 times at last week's hearing, saying he feared self-incrimination. Paul argued that a January 2025 pardon issued by President Joe Biden removing the threat of politically motivated prosecutions stripped Fauci of a valid basis to plead the Fifth and that by testifying he waived other legal protections.

Legal experts say Paul faces obstacles. The Justice Department is generally required to consider contempt referrals only when approved by the full Senate or the House. "The Department of Justice has no legal authority to commence a contempt proceeding without the procedures prescribed by law being observed. This will not pass," said Stanley Brand, an attorney who specializes in congressional investigations. Contempt of Congress is a federal offense punishable by a fine of up to $100,000 and up to 12 months in prison.

Advocates and analysts note that the wider fight is part of a renewed effort by Republicans and the Trump-aligned movement to re-examine the pandemic response and seek accountability from the officials who led it. Jennifer Kates, senior vice president and director of global and public health policy at KFF, said of the changing guidance during the pandemic: "As new information became available, recommendations changed — but not always quickly enough or clearly enough." Fauci himself told senators before invoking the Fifth: "If I say anything, I'll end up behind bars."

Photo: EPA-EFE/KEVIN DIETSCH / POOL