Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) announced that he intends to reissue a criminal referral to the Department of Justice for former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Anthony Fauci.
“Today I will reissue my criminal referral of Anthony Fauci to Trump DOJ!” Paul declared on Monday morning. He added, “Perjury is a crime. And Fauci must be held accountable.”
The announcement follows former President Joe Biden’s admission to The New York Times that he did not individually approve each name for the categorical pardons affecting large groups of people. Fauci was among those pardoned.
Paul previously issued a criminal referral for Fauci in 2023. “Dr. Fauci testified that ‘the NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain-of function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.’ In a subsequent hearing, I warned Dr. Fauci of the criminal implications of lying to Congress and offered him an opportunity to recant his previous statements,” he wrote in the letter to former United States Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves.
Despite Fauci’s pardon, numerous efforts are underway to investigate and arrest the former NIAID director for state-level crimes.
Texas gubernatorial candidate and former Green Beret Lt. Col. Dr. Pete Chambers threatened to arrest Fauci for crimes against humanity, saying his team would “look it up in the statutes, it’s in there. And we’ll handle it, and then next one will fall, and then next one, and so on.”
Numerous state attorneys general have also demanded that Republican congressional leaders investigate Fauci for his role in the COVID-19 pandemic.
