EXCLUSIVE: Biden pardon won’t shield Fauci if he lies to Congress, Comer says
EXCLUSIVE: House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., is warning Dr. Anthony Fauci that his presidential pardon has limits ahead of the former public health official's high-profile day on Capitol Hill.
Fauci is set to testify before a GOP-led Senate panel on Wednesday, days after hundreds of pages of his COVID-19 pandemic-era diary entries were made public.
"We now know why President Biden gave a blanket pardon to Dr. Fauci. While obsessing about his own fame, Dr. Fauci wasn't truthful with the American people about the origins of COVID and advised schools to be closed," Comer told Fox News Digital.
"Americans are still reaping the consequences of Dr. Fauci's actions. Biden's pardon doesn't cover Dr. Fauci's testimony this week and if he continues to lie, he must be held accountable."
Fauci was among several recipients of controversial "preemptive pardons" by former President Joe Biden made during the final hours of the Democratic administration.
The pardon covers any offenses from January 1, 2014, through its issue date, or anything related "to his service as Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, as a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force or the White House COVID-19 Response Team, or as Chief Medical Advisor to the President."
Because the pardon covers conduct during his government service, there will likely be some debate over whether it would protect him from liability stemming from his testimony.
But other House Republicans are also accusing Fauci of behaving in a way that hurts public trust in U.S. health, including the co-chairs of the House GOP Doctors' Caucus — both of whom are physicians themselves.
"Dr. Fauci, enamored with his own fame and vanity, put politics above science during the pandemic. He is primarily responsible for the resulting multi-generational erosion of trust in American medicine," Rep. Greg Murphy, R-N.C., told Fox News Digital. "A perfect example of ego destroying whatever achievements he had prior to the pandemic."
FAUCI'S NEWLY RELEASED COVID DIARIES REVEAL BIZARRE FIXATION ON FAME AS PANDEMIC DEATHS MOUNTED
Rep. John Joyce, R-Pa., told Fox News Digital that Fauci "must be held accountable" by the House as well as the Senate.
"The release of Dr. Fauci's diary entries validates what many Americans suspected all along: he was not honest about the origins of COVID-19," Joyce said. "His fixation on preserving his own image and maintaining a position of power eroded public trust, undermined the integrity of our public health institutions, and failed the American people."
Diary entries made public by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., a longtime Fauci critic and chair of the committee before which Fauci is appearing on Wednesday, show the high-profile doctor reflecting on his pandemic-era fame and raising questions about the disease's origins.
Some entries appear to show Fauci taking credit for influencing policies that closed schools during the pandemic, something that has become one of the most hotly debated aspects of how the government handled COVID.
He told the House Oversight Committee in January 2024, however, "I did not close the schools."
Fauci has long denied any wrongdoing and instead has argued that he's been made a political target by people on the right who are critical of how governments handled COVID-19.
