Sen. Rand Paul has reiterated his view that Dr. Anthony Fauci should go to prison.
The senator cited U.S.-funded gain-of-function research at a lab in Wuhan, China.
In an interview Sunday on “The Cats Roundtable” on WABC-AM in New York, the Kentucky Republican accused Fauci, former Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, of contributing to the deaths of “somewhere between 10 and 20 million” people in the COVID-19 pandemic.
“He’s never been held responsible for this. This is probably the worst decision ever made by a public health official in the history of time,” Paul told host John Catsimatidis on Sunday.
“For his dishonesty, frankly, he should go to prison. If you lie to Congress, and you’re dishonest, and you won’t accept responsibility,” the senator argued.
“Now the mistake in judgment, he should just be pilloried,” Paul said. “He should never be accepted.
“History should judge him as a deficient person who made one of the worst decisions in public health history — in the entire history of the world.”
The conversation begins around the 5-minute mark below:
Following many fiery exchanges with Fauci during his various congressional testimonies, Paul submitted a criminal referral for perjury to the Justice Department last year over Fauci’s comments about funding “gain-of-function” research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Does Fauci deserve prison?
It is not the first time that Paul has demanded that Fauci, who served as White House chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden, face justice.
In an interview on Fox News in October, he said that the 83-year-old should “without question” spend time behind bars.
“We now have proof in Anthony Fauci’s own words, we have his emails,” the senator said. “In public, he’s saying, ‘Oh, if you say it came from the lab, you’re a conspiracy theorist, you’re crazy, it’s a fringe theory.’
“But in private, he’s saying … ‘We’re very concerned because the virus appears to be manipulated. And we’re also very concerned because we know they’re doing gain-of-function research in Wuhan.’”
Sen. Rand Paul: “we now have proof in Anthony Fauci’s own words. We have his emails. So in public he’s saying, “Oh, if you say it came from the lab, you’re a conspiracy theorist, you’re crazy, it’s a fringe theory.” But in private he’s saying…” pic.twitter.com/srDu9OPOF2
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) October 6, 2023
Paul, a physician who had an ophthalmology practice before he was elected to the Senate, wrote a book about Fauci and America’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic titled ‘Deception: The Great Covid Cover-Up.’
“We deserve to know what happened,” he said at the time. “I think the book will go a long way to convincing the rest of America that this man was a traitor to his country.”
Fauci, meanwhile, has dismissed calls for his prosecution as “craziness.”
“I mean, prosecute me for what? What are they talking about? I mean, I wish I could figure out what the heck they were talking about. I think they’re just going off the deep end,” he said during an appearance on CNN in March.
“It doesn’t make any sense to say something like that, and it actually is irresponsible.”
