News/Commentary

‘I was not responsible’: Fauci stops just short of calling fmr CDC director a liar over COVID origins call

March 16, 2023 | | Print Article

Dr. Anthony Fauci got his fur up while speaking with NewsNation host Chris Cuomo about former CDC chief Robert Redfield claiming that he was excluded from a COVID origins conference call, stating that he’s not responsible for that and commenting, “He’s wrong on every single account.”

(Video Credit: News Nation)

The interview occurred on Tuesday night. Cuomo asked Fauci for his take on the origins of COVID and wanted to know how he felt about the political attacks against him, specifically from former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Robert Redfield.

Redfield is obviously a sore point with Fauci. The former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) director commented on Redfield’s claim that Fauci was one of those who tried to bury and discredit the lab leak theory on COVID, claiming instead that the virus emerged naturally.

“First of all, he had no idea what my ideas were because I kept a completely open mind. Secondly, I was not responsible. I didn’t include or exclude anybody from the call. Because the people that were responsible for setting up the call were Jeremy Farrar from the Wellcome Trust in the UK, Eddie Holmes from Australia, and a bunch of other very competent evolutionary virologists. It’s sad that he’s so wrong, and he’s publicly saying that I excluded him,” Fauci contended.

“Now, the other thing that’s important, he’s saying that I excluded him because his idea was different from my idea — and his idea was that it came from a lab. Well, half the people on the call felt it might be from a lab! So his rationale for why he thought he was excluded doesn’t make any rational sense,” he disingenuously claimed.

(Video Credit: C-SPAN)

Fauci continued to call Redfield a liar without using the term. He proceeded to savage the former CDC director.

“So on every single level, he’s incorrect. So I don’t know what he was saying at that hearing, or what prompted him to say that. He says, ‘I was told that.’ Well, if I were one of the people on the hearing, I would have said ‘Well, who told you that?’ Because it doesn’t make any sense and it’s not true,” Fauci claimed.

Redfield is a staunch proponent of the Wuhan lab leak theory. He testified before Congress on it this month. During testimony, he asserted that he was sidelined from the call Fauci held with evolutionary virologists. He stated that “it was told to me that they wanted a single narrative and that I, obviously, had a different point of view.”

Fauci has been giving interviews to media outlets to counter Redfield’s accusation while publically proclaiming that people who support the lab leak theory were included in the call. Cuomo asked Fauci for his response on Redfield’s testimony and he said, “It’s really sad, Chris, that he’s wrong on every single account.”

He previously told Fox News host Neil Cavuto during an interview this month, “He is totally and unequivocally incorrect in what he’s saying that I excluded him. I had nothing to do with who would be on that call.”

Fauci told Cavuto what he told Cuomo, that he believes “it is unfortunate” that Redfield made “that absolutely incorrect statement” in a public setting. He insisted he did not add or remove anyone’s name from the list of who would be included in the call.

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