Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wants answers from the Biden regime on whether Dr. Anthony S. Fauci has really retired or is still on the federal payroll despite his announcement last year that he was hanging up his government labcoat.
The Kentucky Republican, who has frequently butted heads with the former longtime head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), sent a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and other officials requesting “additional information regarding Dr. Fauci’s employment status and receipt of taxpayer-funded benefits.”
In the letter which is dated June 16, 2023, Paul notes that in media appearances last year, the elfin bureaucrat said that he was “not retiring” but was going to the “next chapter” of his career and “moving on from my current positions” which also included his role as President Joe Biden’s Chief Medical Advisor.
“While many interpreted these statements to mean Dr. Fauci would be ending his employment with the federal government in December 2022, it is not clear if that is in fact the case,” the senator wrote.
(Image: Screengrab)
“This raises questions about Dr. Fauci’s current employment status and whether he is still receiving certain taxpayer-funded benefits associated with active public service, such as legal counsel and protective services,” Paul added.
Paul wants to find out if Fauci is still affiliated with any federal agencies and if he’s still being paid at the expense of taxpayers. The letter also requests answers on whether Fauci still has access to non-public federal facilities and if he is receiving legal and security services from the federal government.
Nobody wielded more influence during the COVID pandemic than Fauci who became the public face of the fight against the virus and influenced policy decisions that included such un-American measures as lockdowns, forced masking, and vaccine mandates, becoming a celebrity and a hero of the so-called “resistance” for his constant undercutting of former President Donald J. Trump.
The octogenarian bureaucrat’s constantly shifting positions landed him in the hot seat on the occasions when he testified to Congress where he was grilled by Paul in exchanges that often became heated for a man who was unaccustomed to the concept of accountability.
Even after Fauci’s retirement announcement, Paul has kept up the pressure, most recently by accusing him of orchestrating an “elaborate cover-up” over the origins of the virus.
Senator goes after Fauci for orchestrating ‘elaborate cover-up’ of COVID’s origin following new reporthttps://t.co/KHujodN2tC
— American Wire News (@americanwire_) June 19, 2023
“What we know is from the very first days of the pandemic in January of 2020, Anthony Fauci orchestrated an elaborate cover-up. He knew there was a problem. At three in the morning, he was emailing somebody on January 31st and that person was head of the committee that was supposed to review dangerous research,” Paul told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo on Sunday. “But Fauci allowed it to go around that. So he knew from the very beginning not only was he funding the Wuhan research, but he was going around the regulatory apparatus to let it happen, even though the rules said it shouldn’t have happened without more scrutiny.”
“So he knew this from the beginning and it was an active cover-up. He actively got papers placed that were not valid papers into large scientific journals. So, yes, there was a cover-up from the very beginning, but a real judgment error. And this is a man, Anthony Fauci, who said in 2012 that this kind of research to create a new virus was so important that even if a pandemic should take place, that it’d be worth the knowledge. I think there’s several million people, particularly a million Americans, who would question whether that was good judgment or not,” Paul said during his appearance on “Sunday Morning Futures” on Fox News.
Fox News Digital reports that the outlet was told by a Capitol Hill source that “the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, of which Paul is the top Republican, was meant to be notified whether Fauci’s security status ended at the end of his employment with the administration, or if it was extended somehow. The source said the panel has not heard anything from the administration six months after Fauci said he was done.”
Senator Paul has given a 5:00 p.m. June 30, 2023 deadline for the information to be provided to his office.
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