House SSCP public hearing — Fauci (June 3, 2024)
CNBC broadcast of the June 3, 2024 House Select Subcommittee public hearing with Fauci as witness, covering the operative definition of gain-of-function research and his remarks on the six-feet distancing guidance.
Six-feet clip heavily shared on X
Details
Transcript
Rule 7D, members of
the committee may participate in today's select subcommittee hearing for purposes of questions. At the discretion of the chair and pursuant to an agreement with the Committee on Energy and Commerce, the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Mr. Morgan Griffith and Ms. Kathy Castor are permitted to participate in today's
hearings for the purposes of questions and
give three-minute opening statements. Without objection, pursuant to Clause
4A3A of House Resolution
5 and Clause 2J2C of House Rule 11, the chair may recognize staff of the select subcommittee for questions for equal periods of
time, not to
exceed 30
minutes. Pursuant to Rule 7D of
the Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Mr. Jordan and Mr. Moskowitz, members of the full
committee may participate in today's hearing
for the purposes of questions. I
would like to remind members that the issues we are debating today are important ones
the members feel deeply
about. While vigorous disagreement is part of the legislative process,
members are reminded
that we must adhere to established standards of decorum in debate. There is a reminder that it is a violation of House
rules and the rules of this committee
to engage in personalities regarding other members or to question the motives of a colleague. Remarks of that type are not permitted by the rules and are not in keeping with the best traditions of our committee. The chair will enforce these rules of decorum at all times and urges all members to be mindful of their remarks. Finally, without objection, the chair may declare a recess at any time. I now recognize myself for the purpose of making an opening
statement. Good morning
and welcome Dr.
Fauci. First I want to thank you for your decades of public service. You served your country through multiple epidemics,
pandemics, and health
crises. I do want to say I'm
sorry about the threats that you have
received. As someone who has been shot at and received threats
as well, my heart goes out to
you. This should
never happen in
America. Regardless of any disagreements we
may have, you chose to serve and I
want to extend our appreciation and
gratitude. I want to thank you publicly for
working with our doctor's caucus
during Operation Warp Speed
and the time you spent with
us and Dr. Collins.
I also want to thank you for your willing
cooperation with the SLEC subcommittee.
You have voluntarily sat for more than 14 hours of testimony and are appearing voluntarily today. This is more than we can say about other witnesses we have called and we appreciate it. Dr. Fauci, we're here to investigate the COVID-19 pandemic and to explore lessons learned,
positive or negative,
and to better prepare for future
pandemics. Simply put,
America cannot move forward,
though, without looking
back. We must know what went right and what went wrong in order to best ingrain proficiencies
and remedy deficiencies.
In 15 months, the SLEC subcommittee has sent more than 115 investigative letters, conducted 30 transcribed interviews, resulted in hundreds of hours of testimony, held including today 27 hearings or briefings, and reviewed
more than
one and a half million pages of
documents. We aren't here to throw the baby out with the bathwater. That's not the
intent. We are following the facts, holding
wrongdoers accountable, and
planning for a better, more prepared
future. Beginning early in 2020, you became the figurehead of public health. There were drinks named after you. You got bobbleheads made in your likeness, you were on the cover of Vogue, throughout the first pitch at a Washington Nationals
game. Almost overnight,
you became a celebrity in a household name,
in addition to being a public health
official. Americans from coast to coast and beyond listened to your words. And this is where I think we could have done better. And this goes to both sides
of the aisle. We should have been more
precise. We should have used words and phrases that are accurate and not
misleading. And we should have been
honest, especially about what we didn't know.
Dr. Fauci, I'm not a virologist, but I am a
physician, and like most physicians, we are
constantly learning, which
is why we do continuing medical education,
and we always seek new information.
We learn new things based on new data, and we want to give our patients the best possible care based on new findings and improvements in science. At a time when you were prompting the proximal origin paper,
whose focus was to
"disprove the lab leak theory,"
I was in lockdown researching
with another physician in Ohio to try and understand
the pathology, the
affected physiology,
and what treatments worked, and
even how to diagnose COVID before we had specific
COVID tests. My friend even made a phone
call to an infectious disease doctor
in China, looking for
help. As well, during that time,
we discovered the Barack Xi 2015 article on creating a chimera using gain-of-function type technology. While policy decisions should have been based on scientific data, some, frankly, were not. The burdensome six-foot social distancing rule did not have sufficient scientific report.
In your
words, it just sort of
appeared. Distancing made
sense, but the six feet was
arbitrary. Even Dr. Collins said he still hasn't seen any empirical evidence
to support the six-foot rule. A
rule that shut down schools and businesses, a rule that will have negative ramifications for decades.
As the pandemic wore
on, more mandates also just sort of
appeared. But the
American public didn't get to see the scientific data to support these mandates. Americans were aggressively
bullied,
shamed, and silenced
for merely questioning or
debating issues such as social
distancing,
masks, vaccines,
or the origins of
COVID. Many Americans were willing to comply with the 15 days to slow the spread and understood the necessity of banning travel from certain countries
in an attempt to slow down the
virus. But many Americans became very frustrated when components of those 15
days stretched into years.
And it should not have been the case that
Americans were forced to comply with oppressive mandates when those who chose to illegally cross
our southern border were
not. Or when Governor Newsom
or Governor Whitmer
were throwing parties at
nice restaurants.
Not a good
look. Americans do not hate science, but Americans know hypocrisy when they see it. Dr. Fauci, under your leadership, the United States Health Agency's adopted specific policy aims as a single dogmatic truth without
the benefit of debate,
out of a desire for a
single narrative. Dr. Fauci,
you once said, "If you disagree with me, you disagree with science." Science doesn't belong to any one
person. I was never taught
that science turns a blind eye to hypotheses.
They serve to be proven or
disproven, and done so with irrefutable facts,
if able. It was interesting
that you chose not to pursue an aggressive and transparent scientific investigation of both natural spillover and lab leak. We have been investigating both hypotheses. You testified before the select subcommittee in your transcribed interview that the lab leak theory was not a conspiracy
theory. You embraced the proximal origin letter. It
wasn't necessarily a full peer-reviewed research paper, but you embraced proximal origin letter and you shared it with the public from the White House lawn. You stated during your transcribed interview that you did not review published articles that considered a potential lab leak of
COVID-19. This is especially concerning
if the works in question
were conducted in a more risky
and less
safe BSL-2
lab. Nevertheless, any
dissent from your chosen
scientific position was immediately labeled as anti-science.
Anything less than
complete
submission to the mandates could cost you your livelihood,
your ability to
go into public,
your child's ability to attend school. Families were thrown off planes and shamed when their two-year-olds struggled
to wear a mask.
Children with disabilities lost access to therapy that they and
their families
depended on.
Students were out of the classroom and told to attend school remotely, even when the science clearly demonstrated it was safe for them to go back in the classroom. This harmed low-income students the most. And how were single-parent households supposed to teach their own children and work at the same time? Dr. Fauci, you oversaw one of the most invasive regimes of domestic policy the U.S. has ever seen, including mask mandates, school closures, co-heirs vaccinations, social distancing
of six feet, and
more. We've learned many
lessons. Our early fear and confusion was understandable.
COVID-19
was
clearly a novel
virus. Under your leadership, NIAID allowed disgraced characters like Dr. Peter Daszak to use millions in taxpayer dollars to conduct risky gain-of-function experiments in
Wuhan, China. The actions of EcoHealth
and Dr. Daszak call into question
the integrity
of NIAID's policies and procedures as a whole, as well as your role, Dr. Fauci, as NIAID's director. You did sign off on his research
grant. We need to know why,
Dr. David Morens,
your direct
report for more than two decades assisted Dr. Daszak in avoiding oversight and scrutiny and said that you were involved. Your senior advisor and, seemingly,
your chief of staff
repeatedly attempted to evade transparency laws to shield information from public scrutiny. We have senior officials from your office in their own writing discussing breaking federal law, deleting official records, and sharing private government information with grant recipients.
The office you directed
and those serving under your
leadership chose to flout
the law and bragged about
it. Why did you allow your office to be unaccountable to the American people? You were the highest-paid person in the government. This makes you more accountable to
the people, not less. Dr.
Fauci, whether intentional or not, you became so powerful that any disagreements the public had with you were forbidden and censored on social and most legacy media time and time again. This is why so many Americans
became so angry, because this was
fundamentally un-American. If I make
a mistake, I answer to the people
of Ohio who elected me and to
my own conscience.
When you and your agency
made mistakes, Dr. Fauci, what happened?
We all need to be held
accountable. Because
it's as simple as
saying we were
wrong. You took the position
that you presented the science. Your words came across
to so many people as final
and as infallible in matters pertaining to the pandemic. But such rigid demands of an ideologically diverse people, like Americans, shattered public trust in American health
institutions. As I said so, has
never been good enough for
Americans, and it never will
be. It's built into the American spirit. We have a thirst for information, a drive for advancement. Americans were first in
flight. We landed on the moon.
We've cured
diseases. You've been part of
that. And we made innumerable discoveries and explorations that forever changed humanity. Americans do not want to be indoctrinated.
They want to be educated.
And they prefer to make their health decisions in conjunction
with the doctor that they know
and trust.
To be successful, our
federal public health institutions must be accountable to the people again.
To be successful,
our health
organizations must do
what they are supposed
to do. Protect Americans. I look forward to a robust and on-topic discussion. I thank you. I would now like to recognize
Ranking Member Ruiz for
the purpose of making an opening statement.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Hello, Dr. Fauci, and thank you for being here. When I was named Ranking Member of the Select Subcommittee last February, I made a commitment to follow the facts in objectively analyzing the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. I made a promise to keep an open mind about how the pandemic started because understanding whether the novel coronavirus emerged from a lab or from nature is essential to better preventing and preparing for future public health threats and to better protecting the American people. And as the origins of the novel coronavirus still remain inconclusive, I stand by these commitments to this day. But nearly a year and a half into House Republicans' extreme and chaotic majority, I believe we need to take stock of what the Select Subcommittee has accomplished and whether it has meaningfully improved our preparedness for the next public health threat in our nation. Under the guise of investigating the pandemic's origins, House Republicans have abdicated their responsibility to objectively examine how COVID-19 came to be and instead weaponized concern about a lab-related origin to fuel sentiment against our nation's scientists and public health officials for partisan gain. They have done so with one particular public health official in mind, Dr. Anthony Fauci. And they have done so in an effort to deflect blame and anguish for the damage the pandemic inflicted on our society away from the former president whose stumbling pandemic response by some estimates led to 400,000 unnecessary COVID-19 deaths and on to Dr. Fauci who worked tirelessly to stem the crisis. Over the past 15 months, the Select Subcommittee has poured over more than 425,000 pages of documents provided to us by government agencies, universities, and private citizens. We have conducted more than 100 hours of closed-door interviews with 20 current and former federal officials and scientists.
And what we have found is the following.
Dr. Fauci did not fund research
through the Echo Health Alliance grant that caused the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Fauci did not lie about gain and function research in Wuhan, China. And Dr. Fauci did not orchestrate a campaign to suppress the lab leak theory. After 15 months, the Select Subcommittee still does not possess a shred of evidence to substantiate these extreme allegations that Republicans have levied against Dr. Fauci for nearly four years. Now I want to make something very clear. In the past month, the Select Subcommittee has held hearings where we have examined various serious issues of misconduct. In following the facts, Select Subcommittee Democrats uncovered troubling misconduct by Dr. Peter Daszak and Echo Health Alliance, including potential efforts to mislead the federal government about the nature of its work through the evasion of reporting and transparency requirements. And less than two weeks ago, we heard from Dr. David Morinz about his flagrant violation of the Freedom of Information Act's transparency requirements and the potential destruction of federal records. Both Dr. Daszak and Dr. Morinz deserve to be held accountable for betraying the public's trust. To hold them accountable is not anti-science, it is the defense of our federal scientific and research institutions'
decades-long legacy of
advancing the scientific enterprise to safeguard human health, but baselessly suggesting without evidence that these discrete instances of misconduct are equivalent to our nation's scientists and public health officials causing the COVID-19 pandemic, which has killed more than one million Americans and inflicted an immeasurable toll on
our society, is
also a betrayal of the public's
trust, which each of us are stewards of as elected members of this body. Today's hearing comes at a pivotal moment for our nation's public health. With the darkest days of the COVID-19 pandemic behind us,
thanks to the
Biden administration's leadership, we are now faced with a crisis of declining confidence in the very science and public health interventions that lifted our society from one of the most challenging periods in our nation's history. And as we look to the future, we find ourselves at a fork in the road. We can go down the path of fueling mistrust in the interventions that saved us like vaccines, masking, and social distancing, and the public health officials like Dr. Fauci who worked tirelessly and with extremely limited and evolving information about a novel virus to save lives during one of the greatest crises of our time, or we can work constructively on the forward-looking policies and solutions that we know are necessary to prevent and better prepare us for the public
health threats that are yet to
come. Since my first day as ranking member,
I set out to take the latter path, the
path of putting people over politics and
prioritizing solutions to better prepare us for the next pandemic. And it has been my hope that Republicans would join Democrats in the forward-looking work that will better protect our constituents. Strengthening oversight of potentially risky research domestically and abroad is an essential part of this conversation, and so is closing pathways for zoonotic transfers of viruses in nature and investing in our public health infrastructure to ensure that when future viruses
arrive,
we are
ready. When Democrats were in the majority, we made important strides in these objectives by passing the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023, which strengthened the protections against undue influence in our biomedical research, improved training and transparency for the handling of select
agents,
paved the way for
the interagency collaboration to fortify zoonotic disease prevention, invested in our infectious disease workforce, and enhanced our supply chain preparedness and ability to rapidly develop and deploy medical countermeasures.
And ahead of today's
hearing, more than 90 health and medical organizations, including the American Public Health Association, the American College of Physicians, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the Infectious Disease Society of America, the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, and the National Association of County and City Health Officials wrote to the select subcommittee urging us to "stand against efforts to weaken the ability of the nation's public health agencies to protect the nation's health and to take additional action to fortify our nation's public health workforce and infrastructure." I seek unanimous consent
to enter this
letter
into the hearing record. As we sit here today, I have not lost hope that in the remaining months of the select subcommittee, we can work together to build on this legacy and make objectively examining the origins of the novel coronavirus a part of this forward-looking work. I stand by my commitments I mentioned earlier to take a serious, balanced look at all possibilities for the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. And I stand ready to work with every member of this select subcommittee on this critically important mission so that we can save future lives. And I believe I still have some time left, so at that I'd like to recognize Mr. Raskin with the remaining
time. Thank you, Dr. Ruiz. Public health is a matter of urgent and comprehensive public concern. Under Donald Trump, when the COVID-19 pandemic began and spun out of control, we came close to becoming a failed state, which the political scientists define as a state that cannot deliver the basic goods of existence to its people. According to Dr. Deborah Birx, Donald Trump's own COVID-19 advisor, America unnecessarily lost hundreds of thousands of people because of the recklessness and indifference of Donald Trump and his administration. Now the people who brought you the political big lie, claiming absurdly that Trump won the 2020 election, which he lost by more than 7 million votes, now bring you the medical big lie, making the outlandish claim that Dr. Fauci was responsible for causing COVID-19. Using the select subcommittee as a platform for this disinformation, House Republicans now find themselves in the familiar position where their own investigation debunks their runaway political rhetoric. Just like the broader committee's impeachment drive proved only that there were no presidential crimes, much less high crimes and misdemeanors attributable to Joe Biden, the investigation of Dr. Fauci shows he is an honorable public servant who has devoted his entire career to the public health and the public interest, and he is not a comic book supervillain. He did not fund research to create the COVID-19 pandemic. He did not lie to Congress about gain of function research in Wuhan, and he did not organize a lab leak suppression campaign. Today, Dr. Fauci's testimony, along with the thousands of pages of documents and dozens of closed door testimony provided to House Republicans as part of the COVID origins investigation, will dispel these hysterical claims and reveal that the people bowing down to a twice impeached convicted felon who told Americans to inject themselves with bleach now want you to believe not only a big political lie, but a big medical lie too. I hope that this committee will be able to correct all of the propaganda in disinformation today, and we will be able to actually return to what the good ranking member has said, which is an authentic investigation of the origins of the pandemic, and I will yield back to the gentleman.
And I yield back. I now recognize Mr. Griffith
for
a three-minute
statement. Good morning. I want to again thank the leadership of this committee for including the Energy and Commerce Committee in this hearing. Dr. Fauci, the recent revelations that Dr. Marenz, a senior advisor, and your chief of staff Greg Fulkers routinely evaded federal records laws, including the Freedom of Information Act or FOIA. And those were a shock. That was a shock. I've been doing oversight now for over 14 years, or right at 14 years, and the scale of the effort to evade FOIA by some at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases or NIAID has surprised even me. These men were among your most senior and trusted staff at an agency you led for nearly 40 years. They worked for you for decades. Your calendars show that you met with them multiple times a week during the pandemic. You co-authored dozens of papers with Dr. Marenz. He directly implicates you. Even the head of the NIAID FOIA office was apparently in on some of this conspiracy. And I know my colleagues on the other side love to say we're always talking conspiracy, but when the facts lead you there, whether you knew about it or not, when the facts lead you that your agency was involved in some form of a conspiracy related to COVID origins, we have to follow those facts. It is hard to believe that all of this occurred without your knowledge and/or approval. In civil law, when one party has destroyed or refuses to produce evidence that's within its possession, a jury is allowed to draw an adverse inference that the information destroyed or not produced was unfavorable, therefore, until we get a full accounting of all of the communications among NIAID's leadership, it's reasonable for us to assume that missing information would mirror the private doubts expressed by so many virologists and other scientists related to your public positions. While telling the public, the media, and Congress that COVID-19 almost certainly emerged from nature, experts you convened as a team privately worried that a research related incident was a possible, if not the probable origin of the virus. Dr. Christian Anderson even said in February of 2020, quote, "I think the main thing still in my mind is that the lab escape version of this is so frigging likely to have happened because they were already doing this type of work and molecular data is fully consistent with that scenario." Further, while you and other NIAID officials were assuring us that the virus could not have come from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, NIAID didn't actually have an idea as to what the full scope of Wuhan's coronavirus research was, or even the trajectory of its gain of function research. Now, that may be because EcoHealth wasn't giving you the reports, I grant that. But this joint investigation has shown just how little oversight NIAID does of risky experiments involving potential pandemic pathogens. NIAID set up a system designed to green light potentially risky experiments while avoiding HHS department level review. The same program officers who act as advocates for their scientific area are responsible for assessing whether experiment is too dangerous. That creates a conflict of interest. I think that means that when an agency is taking the final approval, we ought to take that final approval away from the agencies like NIAID that fund it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I
yield back. I now recognize Ms. Kaster for a three-minute statement and I will oblige you an extra 30 seconds as
well. Well, thank you, Dr. Fauci, for your appearance today and for your decades of service to our country during your 39 years at the helm of America's leading health research institute, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. You tackled some of the most serious health threats, including AIDS, Zika, Ebola, SARS-CoV-1 and COVID-19. Your leadership and service to Republican and Democratic administrations and all Americans saved countless lives and resources. We owe you a debt of gratitude. While the evidence to date points to COVID-19 having originated from an animal market in China, the Chinese Communist Party has blocked access to important information that could help confirm the origin of the virus. This committee should be doing more to fight for those answers, but instead has wasted significant time and taxpayer money fueling conspiracy theories and ignoring the importance of preparing for the next deadly pandemic. Some GOP members falsely claimed you secretly broke into CIA headquarters and coerced analysts. Others claimed that you committed crimes. America's adversaries, like China, Russia and Iran, love it when Americans are divided and distracted. It provided fertile ground for the spread of misinformation about COVID-19 by our adversaries. And unfortunately, fringe far-right conspiracy theories have permeated even mainstream media outlets and some Republican members of Congress have played along. I regret that many of the conspiracies have smeared you, Dr. Fauci, as you and our top scientists did everything to keep Americans safe during the deadly days of COVID-19. Over 1.1 million Americans lost their lives to COVID-19, and today it's still more deadly than the flu. As we learned from Zika and Ebola, the ways viruses are transmitted are not obvious at first, and the development of treatments and vaccines takes time. What you and your team did to speed the development of the safe and affected COVID-19 vaccine was remarkable. That fast timeline was only possible due to years of federal investment in the National Institute of Health and support for medical research in the United States. So one of the lessons learned from the pandemic is the need to continue to invest in medical health research in the U.S. for cancer, for heart disease, for diabetes, but also to prepare for the next pandemic. We must learn from the past so that we can keep Americans safe. That's why Democrats have worked hard to update America's pandemic preparedness law, the Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness Act to short public health and make us more prepared to tackle the next pandemic threat. It's not too late for Republicans to join us and turn the least productive Congress in modern history into one where we are all focused on solutions for the American people to make our country safer and stronger. Democrats were able to prevent harmful rollbacks in medical research last year. And I urge my GOP colleagues to join us and move away from threatening and undermining American medical research at every turn. Public health threats are constantly emerging. In the past month alone, we have been tracking new strains and variants of H5N1, MPOCs and SARS-CoV-2. Dr. Fauci, I'm sorry for the personal attacks you have received and may have to deal with today. But while you are here, I want you to know that the vast majority of Americans appreciate your work over the years. I look forward to continuing to learn from you, to learn everything possible about how we can take the pandemic lessons learned and put them to use to help keep our community safe and healthy. Thank you
and I yield back my time. Thank you. Our witness today is Dr. Anthony Fauci. Dr. Fauci was the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases from 1984 to 2022 and Chief Medical Advisor to President Joe Biden from 2021 to 2022. Pursuant to Committee on Oversight and Accountability Rule 9G, the witness will please stand and raise his right hand. Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony that you are about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you guide. Thank you. Let the record show that the witness answered in the affirmative. The select subcommittee certainly appreciates you for being here today and we look forward to your testimony. Let me remind the witness that we have read your written statement and it will appear in full in the hearing record. As requested, please limit your oral statement to six minutes. As a reminder, please press the button on the microphone in front of you so that it is on. When you begin to speak, the light in front of you will turn green. After five minutes, the light will turn yellow and when the red light comes on, your six minutes has expired and we would ask that you please wrap up. I now recognize Dr. Fauci to give an opening statement.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Ruiz, members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to testify. Prior to my retirement from federal service in December 2022, I had been at the NIH for 54 years and director of NIAID for more than 38 years. In those posts, I was deeply involved in the scientific and public health response to several infectious diseases outbreaks, including HIV/AIDS, pandemic flu, Ebola and Zika. And so, under my leadership, we were well positioned to respond to COVID-19. For at least two decades prior to the COVID outbreak, we at NIAID had invested billions of dollars in research on mRNA technology and immunogen design, both of which led to the swift development of COVID vaccines. Less than 11 months after the identification of this new virus, safe and highly effective vaccines were widely available and unprecedented accomplishment in the history of vaccinology that saved tens of millions of lives worldwide. I will now use my remaining time to directly address certain issues that have been seriously distorted concerning me. The first issue concerns my actions regarding the possibility that SARS-CoV-2 might have resulted from a lab leak. On January 31, 2020, I was informed through phone calls with Jeremy Farrar, then director of the Wellcome Trust in the UK, and then with Christian Anderson, a highly regarded scientist at Scripps Research Institute, that they and Eddie Holmes, a world-class evolutionary biologist from Australia, were concerned that the genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 suggested that the virus could have been manipulated in a lab. I participated in a conference call the next day with about a dozen international virologists to discuss this possibility versus a spillover from an animal reservoir. The discussion was lively, with arguments for both possibilities. Two participants have testified before this subcommittee that I did not try to steer the discussion in any direction. It was decided that several participants would more carefully examine the genomic sequence. After this further examination, several who at first were concerned about lab manipulation became convinced that the virus was not deliberately manipulated. They concluded that the most likely scenario was a spillover from an animal reservoir, although they still kept an open mind. They appropriately published their opinion in the peer-reviewed literature. The accusation being circulated that I influenced these scientists to change their minds by bribing them with millions of dollars in grant money is absolutely false and simply preposterous. I had no input into the content of the published paper. The second issue is a false accusation that I tried to cover up the possibility that the virus originated from a lab. In fact, the truth is exactly the opposite. I now quote from an email that I sent to Professor Farrar on February 1, 2020, quote, "Jeremy, I just got off the phone to Christian Anderson and he related to me his concern about the furine site mutation and the spike protein of the virus. I told him that as soon as possible, he and Eddie Holmes should get a group of evolutionary biologists together to carefully examine the data to determine if his concerns are validated and they should report it to the appropriate authorities. I would imagine that in the USA, this would be the FBI and in the UK, it would be MI5. In the meantime, I will alert my US government official colleagues of my conversation with you and Christian and determine what further investigation they recommend. Let us stay in touch best regards, Tony," unquote. It is inconceivable that anyone who reads this email could conclude that I was trying to cover up the possibility of a lab leak. I have always kept an open mind to the different possibilities. Another issue is that of Dr. David Morris, who has the title of senior advisor to the NIAID director and who recently has been investigated for conduct unbecoming a government official. Naturally, given his title, a connection is made to me. With respect to his recent testimony before this subcommittee, I knew nothing of Dr. Morin's actions regarding Dr. Dazak, EcoHealth, or his emails. It is important to point out for the record that despite his title, and even though he was helpful to me in writing scientific papers, Dr. Morin's was not an advisor to me on institute policy or other substantive issues. At NIAID, we had weekly executive committee meetings of the institute leadership and daily morning meetings of my immediate staff, and to the best of my recollection, he attended neither of these. Furthermore, his office is located in a different building from that of the NIAID director. Finally, in a majority staff memorandum of May 22nd, 2024, there is a statement, "Dr. Fauci may have conducted official business via personal email." Let me state for the record that to the best of my knowledge, I have never conducted official business using my personal email. Thank you for listening. I would be happy to address these and any other issues in the
discussion period. Thank you. I now recognize myself for as much time as I may consume for questions with equal time being afforded to the ranking member. Dr. Fauci, February 1, 2020, you were on a call with Dr. Farrar, Dr. Collins, and other scientists regarding the potential that COVID-19 was engineered. Was CDC director Redfield on that call? No, he was not. Okay. Dr. Fauci, you've said that you had to rely on virologists and evolutionary biologists regarding origins because you're not an expert. Is Dr. Redfield a virologist? I believe he is. He is. Prior to the pandemic, NIAID awarded at least three grants via the New York Blood Center to Dr. Zao Yousin. Are you aware of these? I'm sorry, to Dr. Yousin Zao. Are you aware of those grants? Dr. Yousin Zao. Your microphone is not on, doctor. Your microphone is not on.
I'm not familiar with that name.
Okay. Well, NIAID awarded at least three grants via the New York Blood Center to that scientist. He was a high-ranking Chinese PLA official and director of a lab at the Chinese Academy of Military Medical Sciences. Does it concern you if U.S. taxpayer dollars are funding someone like this? Grants that are submitted to the NIAID go through very expensive -- Does it concern you? I'm not talking about the process right now. Does it concern you that U.S. taxpayer dollars would be going to someone who's a high-ranking Chinese PLA official? Yes or
no? I
would have to
know more about that, Mr. Chairman,
because
I don't even know the person you're
talking about. Well, it concerns me. Are you or were you ever aware that the U.S. State Department in 2005 issued warnings that the Chinese government was working on the creation of bioweapons? I was not aware of that. Thank you. Did you discuss the Chinese bioweapons program with anyone in the intelligence community?
I've never discussed the Chinese bioweapons program,
to my knowledge, with anybody. Before, during, or after the COVID-19 pandemic, did you speak to the FBI, CIA, DIA, or any U.S. intelligence agency concerning viral research of any kind? What time frame are you talking about, sir? I said before, during, or after the COVID-19 pandemic, did you speak to the FBI, CIA, DIA, or any U.S. intelligence agency concerning viral
research of any kind? I can't give you the specifics of it, but back in the time of the anthrax attacks, we certainly had a number of briefings by agencies that were intelligence agencies, I don't remember who they were, it could have been any of the above that you mentioned, about the possibility that there were bioweapons that had fallen into the hands of bad actors, i.e. terrorists, that might have been used potentially as a bioterror attack. That was at a time when
we
had thought that the
anthrax attacks, I appreciate that, I appreciate your
expertise in
that, but did you at any time talk concerning viral research of any kind?
Again, I say that at the time that there was concern about the fact that Al-Qaeda may have been using or potentially using bioweapons, we had discussions with intelligence agencies about that possibility, but not as related to, say, COVID-19. Not to my knowledge about COVID, but let me just make sure we get the facts. After the investigations began about COVID, I was briefed by intelligence agencies about possibilities of there being activities going on in different laboratories. I was briefed by intelligence agencies. Thank
you. Science is always open to debate, and it's a benefit. The science supported restricting travel from certain countries at the beginning of the pandemic, and after these orders went into effect, the president was called racist and xenophobic. Dr. Fauci, you said in your transcribed interview that you supported those orders. Dr. Fauci, were those orders racist and xenophobic? No, they were not. Thank you. The vaccine saved millions of lives, and I want to thank you for your support and engagement on that. However, despite statements to the contrary, it did not stop transmission of the virus. Did the COVID vaccine stop transmission of
the
virus?
That is a complicated issue because in the beginning, the first iteration of the vaccines did have an effect, not 100%, not a high effect. They did prevent infection and subsequently, obviously, transmission. However, it's important to point out something that we did not know early on that became evident as the months went by is that the durability of protection against infection and hence transmission was relatively limited, whereas the duration of protection against severe disease, hospitalization, and deaths was more prolonged. We did not know that in the beginning. In the beginning, it was felt that, in fact, it did prevent infection and thus transmission, but that was proven, as time went by, to not be a durable effect. Yeah, definitely a positive
effect for many people, especially those that were vulnerable, but we knew from the trials that people that got vaccinated still were subject to getting COVID. So was the COVID vaccine 100%
effective? I don't believe
any
vaccine is 100% effective.
I now recognize the ranking member, Dr. Reeves, from California for five minutes of
questions. Thank you. Over the past year and a half, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have relentlessly vilified Dr. Fauci under the guise of investigating the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. But after reviewing nearly half a million pages of documents, conducting 20 closed door interviews and receiving testimony from nearly a dozen witnesses brought before this elect subcommittee for public hearings, they have come up empty handed for evidence of their extreme allegations that Dr. Fauci lied about gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and caused the COVID-19 pandemic. So I'd like to address both of the Republican claims in turn. Throughout the majority's investigation, the select subcommittee has heard three definitions for gain of function research. Of the three, Republicans have relied heavily on an overly broad definition that has no regulatory significance. Let me repeat that, no regulatory significance. In fact, their definition is so broad that it would include the manufacture of flu vaccines as gain of function. Because it is so broad, the National Institute of Health does not use that definition when assessing whether proposed research is or is not "gain of function research." For those assessments, NIH has instead appropriately used the definitions provided in regulations. And to be clear, the select subcommittee has been reminded by witnesses after witness that NIH at all times referred to regulations for the definition of gain of function research. And not to a nebulous, expansive definition with no legal bearing that is so broad it could apply to, again, the manufacturing of flu vaccines. Dr. Fauci, according to the regulatory definitions, for example, in P3CO, that NIH applied to proposed research, did NIH ever fund gain of function research in
Wuhan, China? As you said, Congressman Ruiz, according to the regulatory and operative definition of P3CO, the NIH did not fund gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Thank you. And despite my Republican colleagues' effort to fit a square peg into a round hole, it seems to me that you've been consistent on this issue from the beginning of the pandemic. And they know this, but they still use the terms gain of function loosely. And with respect to NIAID staff's assessments of whether proposed research was or was not gain of function research, were you personally involved in those assessments, or were those assessments made several levels removed from you and by subject matter
experts? Those assessments were done by highly qualified and experienced program people several levels below me.
Thank you. The Republic statements that NIH did not fund gain of function research in Wuhan reflected the assessments made by NIAID, subject matter experts, applying a definition found in the regulation known as the P3CO framework. Is that correct? That is correct. Thank you. And thank you for clarifying that. In fact, all of that is abundantly clear in your 2021 Senate testimony on this matter. When asked by the Senate about gain of function research, you testified, quote, "That is why we have committees. We have a P3CO committee." You also testified in 2021, quote, "Gain of function is a very nebulous term. We have spent, not us, but outside bodies, a considerable amount of effort to give a more precise definition to the type of research that is of concern that might lead to a dangerous situation." You are aware of that. That is called P3CO. That was back in 2021. At the time of your May 2021 testimony, P3CO had been the operative definition of gain of function research for several years, correct? That is correct. So I will note that at your transcribed interview in January, the majority conceded that NIH did not fund research in Wuhan that met the criteria of P3CO. I encourage the audience to read the transcript of that interview so you can evaluate the merit of majority's claims for yourselves. So now if we could quickly turn to the irresponsible and false accusation that you created, SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. So this accusation centers on a grant NIAID awarded to Echo Health Alliance with a subaward to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. And we have been entertained earlier about the suggestion that this funding could have possibly gone to a bioweapons research capacity as well. So I want to be clear, no evidence provided to the select subcommittee demonstrates that the work performed under NIH funding, including at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, led to the creation of SARS-CoV-2. The majority has failed to demonstrate or even credibly suggest that any of the viruses studied under the grant could even possibly have been the progenitor virus. Dr. Fauci, could you briefly explain why none of the viruses studied under the Echo Health Alliance grant could have been the progenitor virus of the
SARS-CoV-2? When you're talking about the evolution of a virus from one to another, the viruses that were studied under the subaward to the Wuhan Institute that had been reported in progress reports in the literature and published papers, those viruses were phylogenetically so far removed from SARS-CoV-2 that it is molecularly impossible for those viruses to have evolved or being made into SARS-CoV-2. It's just a viralogical fact that was so far removed that it could not possibly be a progenitor of SARS-CoV-2.
So I want to be very clear on this point that the funding and the research conducted by Echo Health did not produce SARS-CoV-2. That doesn't negate that another lab could have been doing research and it could have leaked from a lab, it still is a possibility, but it was not directly or it was not funded by NIAID or NIH. And just for the record, this information was provided by NIH to then oversight ranking member James Comer nearly three years ago in October 2021. So despite the clear evidence that Dr. Fauci and his agency did not fund gain-of-function research under the P3CO regulatory definition and that the virus is studied under the federally funded grant, Echo Health Alliance grant could not have been the progenitor virus for SARS-CoV-2. Republicans have levied these unsubstantiated allegations knowing very well that they are not true and they have done so to push their extreme partisan narrative that Dr. Fauci and our nation's public health officials caused the COVID-19 pandemic. Now recognize the chairman of the
full committee, Mr. Comer from Kentucky, for five minutes of
questions. Thank you. Dr. Fauci, in your opening statement, you attempt to distance yourself from your previous senior advisor, Dr. Moran's. You say that Dr. Moran's title was just made up, that he was not an advisor to you and that his office was in a different building. So Dr. Fauci, did Dr. Moran's report directly
to you? Actually I'm not sure exactly what the on-paper report is. He is senior advisor to the director but it is conceivable we can get that information. He might have reported through someone lower like my
deity. So your senior advisor did not report directly to you? There were very few people who report directly to me. Okay, Dr. Moran's testified that he could walk into your office any time he wanted to. Is that
true? No, that's not true. You don't just walk into the office. I mean, he's there. I mean, it's conceivable that he could -- Did he ever
walk into your
office? I would say he did occasionally, but the idea -- can I finish the answer to you, sir?
No, because I've got a lot of questions. Okay. Dr. Fauci, did you ever delete an official
record?
No. Dr. Fauci, did you ever conduct official business via email?
To the best of my recollection and knowledge, I have never conducted official business via my private
email. So there's a troubling pattern of behavior from your inner circle, not just Dr. Moran's, but also your chief of staff, Mr. Fauci. Do you agree that it violates NAID policy to use personal email
for official purposes? The Dr. Moran's issue that was discussed by this committee violates NIH policy,
yes. But does using official email -- using a personal email for official business, does that violate
policy? Using a personal email for official business violates NIH policy.
Does it violate NAID policy to delete records to intentionally avoid FOIA? Yes. Okay. On April 28, 2020, Dr. Moran's edited an ecohealth pressure lease regarding the grant termination. Does that violate policy? That
was inappropriate for him to be doing that for a grantee as a conflict of interest, among other things.
So on March 29, 2021, Dr. Moran's edited a letter that Dr. Daszak was sending to NIH. Does that violate policy? Yes, it does. On October 25, 2021, Dr. Moran's provided Dr. Daszak with advice regarding how to mislead NIH on ecohealth's late progress report. Does that violate policy? That was wrong and inappropriate and violated policy. On December 7, 2021, Dr. Moran's wrote to the chair of Ecohealth's board of directors to "put in a word" for Dr. Daszak. Does that violate
policy? Should not have done that. That was wrong. And that violates policy? Well, I'm not sure of a specific policy, but I imagine it does violate policy. He should not have been doing that.
In addition to all those actions, Dr. Moran's wrote to Dr. Daszak, "Peter, from Tony's numerous recent comments to me, they are trying to protect you." Did you ever talk to Dr. Moran's about Dr. Daszak or Ecohealth
Alliance? I can tell you regarding what you said, I never spoke about protecting him. Obviously we knew that Daszak was a grantee, so I may have mentioned and discussed Dr. Daszak because he's a grantee, but I never spoke
about protecting him. You're testifying that Dr. Moran just made that up. I don't know where he got that, but that's not true. By this point, Dr. Fauci, when these emails were written, you should have known that Dr. Daszak was more than two years late on a required progress report with his grant. Dr. Daszak conducted an experiment that resulted in a novel virus showing excess growth, that Dr. Daszak failed to report that experiment, that Dr. Daszak was protecting the Wuhan lab and not sharing its lab notebooks, and that Dr. Daszak failed to disclose obvious conflicts of interest. So why were you trying to protect Dr. Daszak and Ecohealth Alliance? I
repeat
on
the record, I have not tried to protect Dr. Daszak. And that's number one. Number two, you said something that's not true, because I did not know about the compliance issues until well after the fact, when I was being briefed for going to before a congressional committee. So it wasn't as these things were going on, I knew that he was withholding.
Did you know about Dr. Moran's close relationship with Dr. Daszak?
Dr. Moran's made it clear that Dr. Daszak was his friend. I did not engage in any of that interaction
between them. Just lastly, if I may, Mr. Chair, you testified and answered the Chairman's question that you never had any communication with the intelligence community throughout all of COVID. Did I understand that correctly?
No, you heard wrong. I said I did have communication, I was briefed by the intelligence community multiple times during the COVID issue. And you
never... Gentlemen's time has expired. I now recognize the ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Raskin, from Maryland for five minutes of questions.
Okay, first, Dr. Fauci, thank you for your testimony and your extraordinary service to the American people. Let me just start, was there anything you wanted to clear up in that last exchange where you were interrupted?
No, I think I made it clear, I mean, they were talking about my knowing about a lack of compliance, that became clear, Congressman Raskin, well after the fact. It isn't as if they were not complying, and I was not monitoring their non-compliance. I didn't know about it until it
was
a
done deal. Gotcha. You've been a scientist and a scientific administrator for 54 years, is that right, more than a half century? Correct. And you were director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases for more than three decades, is that right? 38 plus years. 38 years, okay. And I assume that you've never been accused of trying to start a disease before. Is that right? That is correct. You have devoted your life to fighting infectious diseases for the American people, is that right? That is correct. I want to go back to this email that you cited in your opening because I think it goes right to the heart of this campaign of character assassination against you. The claim was essentially that you tried to cover up the possibility of there having been a laboratory leak, which, of course, is perfectly possible, and if this committee were doing its job, we could actually be working to advance the investigation of that. But they would rather assert that you tried to cover up this possibility. Here's the email that you sent on February 1st at 12.38 a.m. to Christian Anderson, with a copy to Christian Anderson, but you sent it to Professor Jeremy Farrar. Jeremy, I just got off the phone with Christian Anderson, and he related to me his concern about the furine site mutation and the spike protein of the currently circulating 2019 NCOV. I told him that as soon as possible, he and Eddie Holmes should get a group of evolutionary biologists together to carefully examine the data to determine if his concerns are validated. He should do this very quickly, and if everyone agrees with this concern, they should report it to the appropriate authorities. I would imagine that in the USA, this would be the FBI, and in the UK it would be MI5. It would be important to quickly get confirmation of the cause of his concern by experts in the field of coronaviruses and evolutionary biology. In the meantime, I will alert my U.S. government official colleagues of my conversation with you and Christian and determine what further investigation they recommend. Let us stay in touch. Mr. Harris, Tony, was this the email where you were putatively trying to cover up the possibility of a lab
leak? Yes, Congressman Raskin, and that's the reason why I mentioned in my opening statement that is it inconceivable that anyone could get out of that that I was covering anything
up? Would you have any reason to cover up any new scientific evidence relating to the origins of the COVID-19 virus?
Absolutely not. That's the reason why it was important to get people together that to discuss this in a transparent
way. Have you spent your whole life trying to determine the causes of infectious diseases and then to stop them to protect the American people? Yes, I have. Well, Dr. Fauci, I want to join my colleague from Florida in apologizing to you that some of our colleagues in the United States House of Representatives seem to want to drag your name through the mud. They're treating you, Dr. Fauci, like a convicted felon. Actually, you probably wish they were treating you like a convicted felon. They treat convicted felons with love and admiration. Some of them blindly worship convicted felons. Is there anything else you would like to say to the American people about your service to America during the course of the COVID-19
pandemic? My main job during the COVID pandemic was to play a role with my team at the Vaccine Research Center to develop a safe and effective vaccine, and we did that in an unprecedented short period of time, never seen before in the annals of vaccinology. As we all know, that vaccine and those vaccines have resulted in saving of hundreds of thousands of lives in the United States and millions of lives throughout the world.
Well, you have fought AIDS and HIV. You have fought COVID-19, and you are fearless in doing so. Do you have any reason to be afraid of scientific evidence or data or the truth? Not at all. Thank you. I will yield back to you, Mr.
Chairman. Now recognize Mr. Griffith from Virginia for five minutes of questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good
to see you, Dr. Fauci. So take a deep breath, because my questions change sometimes based on things that happen in the hearing. And I want you to follow the bouncing ball with me, and there's no gotcha at the end of this. I'm just trying to figure this out. You told Dr. Ruiz in his questioning that it was absolutely impossible for any of the viruses that you all were funding. I get that, too, it was impossible for SARS-CoV-2 or SARS-CoV-2 known as COVID-19 to have come from any of the work that was being done at Wuhan. At the same time, you told Mr. Comer that you didn't know about the noncompliance by ecohealth until after the fact and when the virus is already out there, however you got there. In light of the fact that part of that noncompliance was a report where we uncovered and I believe that Dr. Daszak was untruthful to this committee in one of his reports to NIAID and further that in the two most sensitive years related to the humanized mice experiments, we never got lab notebooks from Wuhan Institute of Virology. Can you understand, following the bouncing ball, why some of us doubt that not that you had some hand in it or that you knew about it, but the doubt that you can state with certainty that it was impossible because they might have been doing stuff you didn't know about? Isn't
that true? Actually it's not incompatible at all, Congressman, with what I said. The viruses that were studied, whether you did or did not give a five-year report on time, were still the viruses that phylogenetically would be impossible to be the precursor of SARS-CoV-2. So it was completely compatible with the statement that I made to Dr. Ruiz. Is
that accurate as well, knowing that they had worked on adding a furor and cleavage site to MERS? Sir,
there's a difference between the viruses that were funded by the NIH subaward versus anything else anybody else in China might be doing. Excellent. We were talking about,
did
the NIH- You were
talking about what you funded. What
we funded. All right.
And that's the point. That goes to my next question because I thought you
might
go there and I appreciate that. Because in an off-the-record member-level briefing in February of 2022, I asked about the likelihood of nature of a SARS-related coronavirus to have a furor and cleavage site, particularly since it takes the 12 nucleotide change in there to make it as viral as this was going on. And at the time you said to me pretty much what you just said, and I want you to confirm it for the record, well, that wasn't us. If that was being done, it wasn't us. And you confirmed that for the record, yes? It wasn't you. It wasn't what you were
funding. What I'm saying is that I cannot account, nor can anyone account for other things that might be going on in China, which is the reason why I have always said and will say now, I keep an open mind as to what the origin is. But the one thing I know for sure is that the viruses that were funded by the NIH phylogenetically could not be the precursor of SARS-CoV-2.
And I appreciate that because I've never thought that NIH or NIAD went out to create this thing, but I am a believer that it came out of the lab. And I think you've just made it clear, and sometimes people miss this, Dr. Fauci. One side says one thing, one side says the other. And the actual fact may be that at some time working on that, maybe they used some of our money to get started, maybe they didn't. But a group of scientists getting together might very well at Wuhan have said, hey, let's see what happens if we go over here and do this. Not that NIH funded it, but they on their own went off and did something. Isn't that accurate? Isn't that possible?
Well, I actually would also would want to say that one thing we should put out on the table, that you were talking about a $120,000 a year grant in a $6 billion budget. So I mean, if they were going to do something on the side, they have plenty of other money to do it. They wouldn't necessarily have to use a $120,000 NIH grant to do
it.
And
I appreciate that because it means something could happen. I'm glad you kept an open mind. I would ask this one final thing, though. Do you think they could have done it without the humanized
mice that we gave them? Could have done what,
sir? Could they have done any other research with the humanized mice that we gave them? Would they be successful? If China didn't have the humanized mice before we gave them to Wuhan, isn't it accurate that they might have been able to do extra stuff with our mice? Sorry, sir.
That's a hypothetical that I can't really answer what they could have done.
But
you can't
say it couldn't have happened either.
I
go
back. You'll want
me to prove a negative. Now recognize Ms. Castor from Florida for five minutes of questions.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, these special investigative committees are intended at the outset to bring light to difficult matters. And I think, unfortunately, this select committee has brought more heat than light to things. And one example is nearly five months ago, Dr. Fauci sat for a 14-hour voluntary interview with the subcommittee. I was there for that interview, which included exchanges on many important questions on research, safety, long COVID, vaccine development, and the importance of strong public health systems in our local communities. Also, we discussed pandemic preparedness for hospitals in advance of the next pandemic. But I want the public to know that for five months, the Republicans sat on that transcript. They could have released it at any time. It was released last Friday. If the public had seen it five months ago, they would know that the Republicans failed to find a shred of evidence of their far-fetched conspiracy linking Dr. Fauci to a cover-up of the origins of the pandemic. Instead, the Republicans contorted and mischaracterized Dr. Fauci's words over Twitter to gin up conspiracies about NIH's role in the origins of the pandemic. In the lead-up to this hearing, parts of that interview have again been cherry-picked and distorted in press releases and tweets. So, Dr. Fauci, I want to make sure that you have an opportunity to publicly clear anything up. Does anything come top of mind right off the bat in how they cherry-picked parts of your 14-hour transcript?
I don't want to be casting stones at the distortions of what was said in that. But there are a couple of things that have come to mind. One I'm sure is going to come up later is the issue of the six-foot distance. And I made the statement that it just appeared. And that got taken at like, I don't know what's going on, it just appeared. It actually came from the CDC. The CDC was responsible for those kinds of guidelines for schools, not me. So when I said that it just appeared, it appeared. Was there any science behind it? What I meant by no science behind it is that there wasn't a controlled trial that said compare six-foot with three feet with ten feet. So there wasn't that scientific evaluation of it. What I believe the CDC used for their reason to say six feet is that studies years ago showed that when you're dealing with droplets, which at the time that the CDC made that recommendation, it was felt that the transmission was primarily through droplet, not aerosol. Which is incorrect because we know now aerosol does play a role. That's the reason why they did it. It had little to do with me since I didn't make the recommendation and my saying there was no science behind it means there was no clinical trial that proved that. That's just one of the things that got a little distorted in the response to
that. And I've learned and watched you over the years. I have to go back to the Zika outbreak where we didn't know how exactly it was being transmitted and at one point we weren't aware that some of it was sexually transmitted. That's an example of why with these public health threats that you learn unfortunately as we go along. Talk a little bit about the Zika health threat and how we didn't know what was happening in the early days. I'm glad you brought that up
because it really is also reflective of what went on in the early months of COVID. When you're dealing with an outbreak, that's a novel outbreak. The Zika outbreak that caused microcephaly was novel. We have never seen that before. COVID was novel. We've never seen that before. When you're dealing with a new outbreak, things change, the scientific process collects the information that will allow you at that time to make a determination, a recommendation, or a guideline. As things evolve and change and you get more information, it is important that you use the scientific process to gain that information and perhaps change the way you think of things, change your guidelines, and change your recommendation. That really goes across the board because you're dealing with something that needs to be modified because it's a moving target. Zika was a moving target. COVID was a moving
target. Thank you very much. I want to thank the Democratic staff for your minority report. If it's not already submitted for the record, I'd like to ask unanimous consent to offer into the record the Democratic staff report just completed. Republicans Fauci flops, select committees 15 month probe, fails to find evidence of extreme claims linking Dr. Fauci to COVID-19's origins. Thank the staff. This is an outstanding report that folks should read. Thank
you. I now recognize Ms. Malia Takas from New York for five minutes of questions.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think many of us in the committee are really disturbed by revelations to this committee that there were officials at NIH that deleted government records, they used personal emails to communicate and circumvent freedom of information laws. I just had a couple questions about that. Dr. Fauci, did you delete any emails or records related to the Wuhan lab or the origins of the virus? No, I did not. Okay, Dr. Morins said in a May 2021 email, he indicated that he was connecting people to you in a "secret back channel." Do you know what he was referring
to? I don't have any idea what he's talking about. There is no back channel at NIAID. Okay,
he also said in another email that there is no worry about freedom of information act. I can send stuff to Tony on his private email. Did you communicate with anyone relating to anything regarding NIH or with Dr. Morins on a private email?
I do not do government business on my private email.
Okay, so have you communicated with Dr. Morins via private email, even if it was not necessarily your definition of government business?
It might have been because, as I mentioned in my opening statement, one of his functions is to write chapters, medical scientific chapters with me, so it is conceivable that I communicated with him on my private email when we were writing a chapter, and that was not official.
What about Peter Daszak?
No.
Okay. I just want to clarify for the record, because today you testified that you did not suppress the lab leak theory, yet in the past you have said, "It is a distortion of reality." You've said, "I've heard these conspiracy theories, and like all conspiracy theories, they're just conspiracy theories." That's what you told the American people. Would you like to clarify what signs were you following then versus
there? Yeah, no. Actually, I've also been very, very clear and said multiple times that I don't think the concept of there being a lab leak is inherently a conspiracy theory. What is conspiracy is the kind of distortions of that particular subject, like it was a lab leak, and I was parachuted into the CIA like Jason Bourne and told the CIA that they should really not be talking about a lab leak. Thank you. That's
the conspiracy. Appreciate that. Dr. Fauci, how much have you earned from royalties from pharmaceutical companies since the pandemic began in 2021?
It says, "NIH
scientists made $710 million in royalties from drug makers." You're saying that you did not receive any of the $710
million? On COVID, I received, I think, $122 for a monoclonal antibody that I made 27 years ago.
Okay, so just in general, though, how much have you received? Not related to COVID. Just in general, how much have you received in royalties between 2021 and 2023?
I think none. Okay,
so somebody received the $710 million.
Somebody did, but not me. You
didn't receive any royalties? Okay.
I see no royalties associated with COVID. I mentioned ...
No, I'm
on the
record,
and I want to make sure that this is clear, that I've developed a monoclonal antibody about 25 years ago that's used as a diagnostic that has nothing to do with COVID, and I receive an average of about $120 a year from that patent.
But the bottom line here is that scientists at NIH did receive $710 million in royalties, and I guess my question is, don't you think that if these experiments are made using American tax dollars that any of those royalties, this nearly billions of dollars, should be going back to the American taxpayer and not in the pockets of the scientists? Do you believe that's a law that we should
consider changing? If you want to change the patent laws and the Buy Dole Act, then go ahead. That's not for me to say.
I'm asking your opinion. Okay. Well, anyway, moving on, I just want to say that we know billions of dollars have been funding these animal experiments, both here domestically and in foreign lands. I'm very troubled by the cruel, horrific animal research that has been done on US land and in foreign laboratories. Taxpayers are footing the bill for billions of dollars. These beagle puppies that have their throats slit, they're being injected with ticks. They are murdered after just a few months, piglets, rabbits, you name it. FDA is saying we no longer need to be testing human medications on animals, that there's other ways to achieve this. Can you comment on that if it's time for the United States of America to be moving on from these cruel animal and horrific, costly tests?
I'd be happy to comment, but I'm puzzled as to what that has to do with the origins of
Covid. Well, I have a question about it. Okay. I'd be happy to answer. And it has to do in general with the amount of waste of tax dollars that NIH is
using. Well, the animal experiments that are conducted by and funded by NIH go through strict regulations of the proper use of animals in research. So I'm not, Congressman, with all due respect, I'm not trying to be confrontative. I'm not sure what you're talking about, but the experiments that the NIH funded go through strict regulatory processes of the treatment of animals, the humane treatment of animals.
Well, they're not very humane. And I will say, as the former director, you signed off on these experiments. And so my time has expired, and we will --
Well, I signed off on them because they were approved by a peer review
-- Now recognize Ms. Dingell from Michigan for five minutes of
questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, instead of actually taking a serious look at the various ways by which this virus could have emerged in a lab or in nature, my Republican colleagues and friends have spent the last 15 months trying to pin blame on NIH, NIAID, and specifically Dr. Fauci for the Covid-19 pandemic. And now, and just, you know, let's bring everything in. Look, I want to have a discussion about animal testing too, but I'm really not sure how that comes into here, so -- But I want to be perfectly clear, though, that the select subcommittee has seen no evidence of this. However, allegations by my Republican colleagues amplified in the media have led to real, tangible consequences for Dr. Fauci in his personal life in a way that should be unacceptable to all Americans. Dr. Fauci, you and I have known each other for a long time, and I'm not even going to admit how long. But during that time, I've seen your commitment not just to science, but to advancing the greater good. And I know that this isn't a topic you enjoy discussing, and I'm sorry I'm going to have to ask you about it, but I think the American people need to know what we are doing to those who are serving the common good and public health. I think it's important to make clear the harms that you and your loved ones have suffered because of these deeply irresponsible accusations. Because you know what? You're human, just like the rest of us. So Dr. Fauci, can you please share with us the nature of the threats you have received since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic?
Yes, there have been everything from harassments by emails, texts, letters of myself, my wife, my three daughters. There have been credible death threats leading to the arrests of two individuals, and credible death threats mean someone who clearly was on their way to kill me. And it's required my having protective services essentially all the time. It is very troublesome to me. It is much more troublesome because they've involved my wife
and my three daughters. At these moments, how do you feel? Deeper mic
on.
Terrible. Do you continue to receive threats today?
Yes, I do. Every time someone gets up and says I'm responsible for the death of people throughout the world, the death threats go up. It's
unacceptable that you've been treated this way, especially after you've dedicated your life to science and research for the public interest. You deserve better. Every human being deserves better. And I'm afraid that the treatment you've received will also have far-reaching consequences for the future of science, particularly when done for the public good. Dr. Fauci, how do you think the threats towards you and other public health officials have received will impact bright young scholars thinking about going off into science or public service? How many people want to follow in your footsteps as they did when
I first met you? You know, Congressman Dingle, I think this is a powerful disincentive for young people to want to go into public health and maybe even science and medicine in the public arena because it's very clear that not only I, because I'm very much of a public figure, but many of my colleagues who are less visible than I, whenever they speak up in defense of the kinds of things that we're trying to do to protect the American public, they too get threats. And when they see that their colleagues get threats, they say to themselves, I don't want to go there. Why should I get involved in that? And you have some potentially very good talent that would be important to maintain the integrity and the excellence of the public health enterprise in the United States, we're not getting the best people coming in because they're reluctant to put themselves and their family through what they see their colleagues being put through. Well, you're
right, you're not alone in feeling that way. In fact, ahead of today's hearing, the select sub-committee received a letter from the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, which represents public health officials in communities of all political persuasions detailing the surge of harassment, intimidation, hate speech, threats of violence and death threats that their members face during the pandemic. Okay. Just, I'm going to ask to insert that into the letter, but I wanted to just make the point before I close, Mr. Chairman, that as many as 40% of public health workers have been bullied, threatened or harassed. And I think we all need to take that on as a public health issue. I'd ask to enter the letter into the record and yield back.
Without objection. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I now recognize Ms. Lesko from Arizona for five minutes of
question. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Dr. Fauci, did the National Institute of Health fund the potentially dangerous enhanced potential pandemic pathogens, gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of
Virology? I would not characterize it the way you did. The National Institutes of Health, through a sub-award to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, funded research on the surveillance of and the possibility of emerging infections. I would not characterize it as dangerous gain of function research. I've already testified to that effect a couple of times. So
you're saying no, correct? In his May 16th -- I'm saying no
because they've said no multiple times, including on the transcribed
entity. In his May 16th, 2024 testimony, the NIH Deputy Director Tabak said, and I quote, "I can tell you that the failure of the Wuhan Institute of Virology to provide us with the data that we requested and the lab notebooks that we requested certainly impeded our ability to understand what was really going on with the experiments that we have been discussing this morning." My question to you, Dr. Fauci, if the NIH didn't inspect the Wuhan Institute of Virology and the NIH didn't receive the lab books and data from China, and the required reports from EcoHealth Alliance were not submitted -- in fact, they were late -- how can you definitively say that the NIH did not fund the dangerous gain of function research?
I go back to when I said that the gain of function research by the operative and regulatory definition of P3CO does not include at all the viruses that were studied under the subivore. How
do you know that, sir, if there was no lab books, nothing from China?
We know what viruses they were studying.
How? How do you know? You never
went there. But I'm telling you that
the
NIH funded research on these viruses. If someone else somewhere in China was doing something else -- Well, and that's the
problem,
because
NIH didn't go there, you didn't get the reports that were needed. How in the world would you know? I'm going to go on to the next question. Well,
and you're not hearing what I'm
saying. Dr. Marenz, your senior advisor for over 20 years, sent in an email dated February 24, 2021. I learned from your FOIA lady here now how to make emails disappeared when I am FOIAed. But before the search starts, so I think we are all safe. Plus, I deleted most of these earlier emails after sending them to Gmail. In another email dated 4/21/21, Dr. Marenz said, "I forgot to say there is no worry about FOIAs. I can either send stuff to Tony," meaning you, "on his private email or hand it to him at work or at his house. He is too smart to let colleagues send him stuff that could cause trouble." Dr. Fauci, were you ever engaged in attempts to obstruct the Freedom of Information Act and the release of public documents?
No.
Did Dr. Marenz communicate with you about official business using his private
email? Official business,
no. Did you ever encourage Dr. Marenz to use his private email address for official business? No. My next question, sir, is on February 1, 2020, you, yourself, Dr. Fauci, the NIH Director Collins and at least 11 other scientists were on a conference call to discuss the origins of COVID. A number of the scientists said that they were concerned that COVID was the result of a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and were concerned that a revelation of the lab leak theory would hurt their relationship with China. The CDC Director Redfield testified that he was not invited on this conference call and he believes because he believed the lab leak theory was possible. Three days later, on February 4, 2020, four participants on the conference call authored a paper, Proximal Origin, which was sent to you for editing. Proximal Origin pushed the natural origin theory. On April 16, 2020, the NIH Director, Dr. Collins, emailed you expressing dismay that the Nature Medicine article, which was based on Proximal Origin, didn't suppress the lab leak theory and asked you for more public pressure to suppress the lab leak theory. The very next day, in response to Dr. Collins' request to suppress the lab leak theory, you cited the Nature Medicine article, which discounted the lab leak theory from the White House podium. My question to you, sir, did you cite this article at the White House because the NIH Director asked you to suppress the lab
leak theory? I did not do that in response to anybody's suggestion to suppress anything. It was in response to a question that someone asked at the podium. And I did not edit any paper as shown in my official testimony. So you said about four or five things, Congressman, that were just not true. Well, we have
e-mails, just prove it. Well, you don't. Thank you. And I yield back. I now
recognize Mr. Mfume from Maryland for five minutes of
questions. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and by the way, no, we don't have it. So I get tired of hearing we've got it, and then when we ask for it, it's not there. We do not have it, Dr. Fauci, and for everyone watching this. That's just incorrect. Now, let me just say a couple of things if I sound a little outraged, just because, you know, we sit here and we watch one conspiracy theory after another get debunked. And if I might, on a point of personal privilege to the gentleman from New York who wanted to argue that we should be worrying about testing of human medicines on animals, if this committee really wants to do something, let's talk about the most influenced biomedical research study in the United States, the Tuskegee study, where 400 black men in this country were injected deliberately with syphilis and allowed to die slowly over a 40-year period without any attempt to help them at all. It was condoned by the U.S. Public Health Service. And if we want to talk about testing, let's talk about that as well. I'm going to talk about COVID right now. Mr. Chairman, I have the floor, Mr. Chairman. I want to say
to
you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me ask you to suspend, please. I want to remind the audience of decorum, recognize Mr.
Mfume. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you and ranking member Ruiz for this opportunity. Dr. Fauci, we owe you an apology for the way we have ranked you through the mud. And none of us have said to you, here's where you go to get your good name and your reputation back. It's the most unfair thing I have seen. If there were evidence, if there were facts that supported the charges, I, like everybody else, would be interested. But we haven't seen a damn thing to suggest that these accusations are accurate. You've been a hero to many for 54 years, five-plus decades. You helped lead this country through the anthrax scare, through AIDS, through Zika, through Ebola, through SARS, and through COVID-19, pandemics and epidemics. We owe you a collective thank you. You are a world-renowned scientist and an American patriot. And whether or not people want to believe that, that's on them. But those facts are undisputable. For a year and a half, the Republican majority on this committee has sought to weaponize genuine scientific questions over COVID-19 and to vilify, vilify our public health officials and our nation's scientists with unsubstantiated, with baseless, with allegations that just can't stand the light of day. And so they've tried to do that with COVID-19, and we are here now as a result of the aggregated amount of foolishness that has taken place. And I've always said to this committee every time I've had a chance to speak, let's go back to when we were in the heart of the pandemic, when our family members and friends and coworkers were dying left and right, when we were afraid to get near anybody, where we wanted to wash down our groceries before we bought them into the house, where we were willing to put on mask or head care if it would keep us from being infected. And we turned to our leaders and our public health officials and scientists for answers. And we got some, but then we didn't get some. And then we got some later, like Dr. Deborah Birx, who was Donald Trump's expert on the virus, who said, "No, bleach won't do it. Don't inject yourself with it," and who also said publicly on the record that thousands of American lives could have been spared, spared if we had done what we were being told to do by the scientific community. At least one thing is clear, those 1 million people who died as a result of these conspiracy theories will never come back. And those families have empty seats at the table year after year, and we do a disservice. At the very least, we don't acknowledge their deaths and the harm and the hurt that has been done to their families and learn, learn how to find a way to trust science going forward in this country. Dr. Paltry, you've been accused over and over again of going to the CIA headquarters and sitting down and having a meeting with the CIA to construct a way to make sure that COVID raged in this country. Is that correct? That is incorrect. Dr. Paltry, have you been to the CIA office in the last 20 years or headquarters?
I went to the CIA decades ago during the anthrax attacks to discuss the possibility of terrorist attacks.
Thank you. I wanted to get that on the record because that's the latest theory now that you and the CIA director conspired. This is foolishness. People are not going to agree with you. I understand that. But we take and besmirch somebody's good name. Think about if it were one of us. We'd be jumping up and down trying to find a way to get justice. And so on behalf of those of us who are thankful, who are part of many in a grateful nation, thank you for your service, sir. I yield back.
And I'll recognize Mr. Cloud from Texas for five minutes of
questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for being here. And I do want to echo some of what Mr. Infumei said, because I do think we need to focus on the people. And I think that's really what the angst that's left with the American people. It's what they had to walk through during this time. I'm going to go down a list of mitigation measures that you supported over the course of the pandemic and ask you just to give a yes or no as to whether you still believe these measures were justified. Business closures.
Not hearing you at all. Could you please speak louder?
Sure. I'm going to go through a list of COVID mitigation measures that you supported over the course of the pandemic and ask you to give me a yes or no as to whether you believe these measures were justified. Business
closures. Early on when 5,000 people were dying a day,
yes. Business closures. Same thing. School
closures. Again, the
day at home
orders. These were important when we were trying to stop the tsunami of deaths that were occurring early on.
Early
on. How long you kept them going is debatable.
Mass mandates for adults, mass mandates for children, mass mandates for children under 5. I'm
going back to what I said before, all of that is in the context of at the time. Mass mandates for children under 5, the
scientific evidence for that. Excuse me. Mass mandates for children under 5, there's scientific evidence supporting that. There was
no study that
did
masks on kids before. You couldn't do the study. You had to respond to an epidemic that was killing 4,000 to 5,000 Americans.
Vaccine mandates for employees. Vaccine mandates for students, vaccine mandates for
military. Vaccines save lives. It is very, very clear that vaccines have saved hundreds of thousands of Americans and millions of people worldwide. I'm not debating
it. We're talking about the COVID-19. Did or do the vaccines, the COVID-19 vaccine stopped anyone from getting
COVID? I answered that question to the chairman. Early on it became clear that. They did. No, actually no. From the beginning, it clearly prevented infection in a certain percentage of people, but the durability of its ability to prevent infection was not long. It was measured in months. And they didn't stop you from spreading
it
either. Early on it did if it prevented infection, but what became clear that it did not prevent transmission when the ability to prevent infection waned. I
think what's troubling is when the American people look at the certainty and the case at which people lost jobs, they lost livelihoods, I had rural hospitals in my area that did not have a single case of COVID in their rural community that had to shut down and people not get care that they did need for cancer and some passed away because of those kind of things. Time after time again, people's lives are destroyed and we have not seen the same sort of once the new data came available, we did not see a change of course. And you'll point out, for example, in the schools that the CDC, you know, put out the guidelines, for example. But we know that those guidelines end up being protection from lawsuits. If you don't want to be sued, you better follow the guidelines. So they're not mandates, de facto mandates, but they turn out to be such a mandate. And when the science began to change, we all understand that in the first couple weeks, first few weeks, even a couple months, we were all trying to figure it out. I think there's a lot of grace for that. The concern is that as the science became available, there wasn't like a oh, maybe we should consider the lab leak theory, oh, maybe we should consider natural immunity. We never heard these messaging coming from you or from anyone else who stood on the sidelines talking about these things. And it's left the American people with a tremendous distrust. I want to talk a little bit about the grant process. My understanding from your testimony to us, it says that the NIH process for awarding grants is that basically research proposal goes to peer review committee to receive a priority score, then it goes to an advisory council for NIH personnel. It receives a final, basically the group votes on it, and then eventually it ends up on your desk for signature, right? Now you said in that that sometimes, if I recall correctly, those grants are often approved in block, in mass when they're voted on, and then you sign off on them.
That's
correct. This is one of the things that's really troubling to the American people because they look at their lives being destroyed, and there's no one to hold accountable because these systems of accountability have become systems of plausible deniability. And so your name is on every single grant, but yet you absolve yourself of any sort of responsibility by saying, "Well, you know, it goes to this committee that has a number of people on it, and they're approved in block, and so there's no accountability for anything, any of the taxpayer dollars that are going forth." I
disagree with you, Congressman, because if you look at the number of grants, we fund thousands of grants. It would be physically impossible for me to go through every single grant in a detailed way to understand it. That is true not only for me, but for virtually every institute at the NIH. Then why does your signature go on it? Because somebody has to sign off on it, and you trust the expertise and the competence of the staff that go over it. What is the mechanism for all the elements of what's
happened? I now recognize Ms. Ross from North Carolina for five minutes of
questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you, Dr. Fauci, for your voluntary testimony today, also for so much grace in your 14 hours of testimony. And I, again, want to thank you for your service and your patience. It's truly remarkable. Because it bears repeating, let me just remind everyone that after 15 months, my Republican colleagues' extreme allegations against you remain unsubstantiated. And now, during your two-day closed-door interview in January, you discussed a number of topics regarding the public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic, some of which we've touched on briefly, but I just want to dive in a little bit deeper here. For example, you discussed, both then and here with Congresswoman Castor, the recommendation that we maintain six feet of distance between one another to reduce the spread of COVID-19. And you discussed how social distancing recommendations were developed that you yourself didn't pick this six feet, and it was just really kind of a guideline in the moment. In your view, though, do social distancing recommendations and other public health measures to reduce transmission save lives? Definitely. Okay. I'd also like to go back and take a deeper dive into the COVID-19 vaccine discussion that we just had. And you were also asked about that during your interview in January. In the select subcommittee, we've heard suggestions that the vaccine was ineffective because of breakthrough infections that occur after vaccination. We just heard about that right here. But as I understand it, perhaps the strongest measure of COVID-19 vaccines' effectiveness is the reduction of severe disease and death, not necessarily getting a milder form of COVID. Could you talk about that a little bit?
Yes. It's very clear that when you're dealing with many vaccines, but particularly when you're looking at COVID, as I mentioned, and I'll repeat it quickly for you, that early on, there was a degree, not as much as against severe disease, of protection against infection. Unfortunately, that protection against infection, which is related to transmissibility, waned rather rapidly in a matter of months. What has stood firm well, much better than transmission and much better than infection, is the ability to prevent someone from hospitalizations and deaths. And in fact, the curves, Congresswoman, are stunning. When you look at the deaths and hospitalizations of people who are unvaccinated, it's like this. When you look at the deaths and hospitalizations for people who are vaccinated and boosted, it's like this. The difference is profound. When you're dealing with infection, again, less so because of the waning of protection against infection.
Well, and that was also confirmed by a Commonwealth Fund, December 2022 report, which came out two years after the Biden administration's effort to get COVID-19 vaccines in arms, in their effort to, that it prevented more than 3 million deaths and averted 18 million hospitalizations. And that came out in 2002, but it seems to corroborate what you're saying.
Indeed. And $1.15 trillion in health care
costs. Thank you for that ad. One pillar of the vaccine requirements was to have an increased uptake in the COVID-19 vaccines and that, that at the time was supported by leading physicians, including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Academy of Pediatrics and more were the vaccine requirements, a clinically sound tool for improving uptake of a safe and effective
vaccine. Yes. You would like people to get vaccinated voluntarily and realizing the important effect on it. But the fact that people were vaccinated by whatever the motivation was, clearly saved many, many lives.
And just with the 17 seconds I have, what steps can public health officials take to bolster confidence in these lifesaving interventions since there has been so much misinformation circulating?
That's going to be very difficult, Congresswoman, because there is so much mis and disinformation around that we've got to do a better job of reaching out and trying to get the correct information. But that's difficult when you have a very energetic group of people continually spreading mis and disinformation about vaccines. We've got to be more proactive in putting out the facts and the data and the information that's
correct. Thank you very much for your testimony
and I yield
back. I now recognize Dr. Joyce from Pennsylvania for five minutes of questions. Thank you, Chairman Winstrup, for convening this important hearing and thank you Dr. Fauci for testifying. Dr. Fauci, one of the controversial regulations of the pandemic was the six-foot distancing role. This role became an important policy consideration in subsequent regulations. However, you testified recently, and I'm quoting, this six-foot role sort of just appeared. You think that a role that sort of just appeared is substantial justification for the regulations that we saw based on that six-foot role? Congressman,
thank you for that question. I answered that, but I'll summarize it briefly for you. When saying it just appeared, it came from
the CDC. Okay, you stated that earlier. What was your relationship with the CDC when you saw a regulation which was not based in the current science?
Well, when I say was not based in science, I meant a prospective clinical trial to determine whether six-foot was better than three was better than 10.
But once we realized that the
virus
was not spread by droplets and was aerosolized, did you feel an indication to go back to the CDC and said, let's base this on science. Let's get rid of this six-foot role. This six-foot role crippled businesses. It allowed students to stay at home and not learn. Americans suffered. And that suffering continues because the fracture of trust in American scientists continues to this day. Did you not feel an obligation for something that just sort of appeared? Not to go back to the CDC and say, let's base this on what we know. It was a CDC decision and it was clear. Were you dialoguing with the
CDC? Excuse
me? Were you in communication with the CDC?
The CDC was part of the
coronavirus response team. And you didn't feel an obligation to go to them and say, look, Americans aren't going to trust us. Yeah. We're providing them with misinformation.
We have discussions at the White House about that. We did. But the CDC's decision and was their decision
to make and they made it. And you didn't feel an obligation as the lead scientist at the NIH to challenge that?
I've challenged the CDC multiple times.
Only on this regard? Excuse me? Publicly, you challenged them on the
six
foot distance. It is not appropriate to be publicly challenging a sister organization. Do you agree that Americans now have lost their trust in science, in lead science from government because of misinformation like this? Well, you know,
when you talk about misinformation, I think that you have to be careful. It's not disinformation. It was information that ultimately proved when you put the aerosolization in that it was
not an effective role to have six feet of distancing. Dr. Fauci, let's move on. On April 21st, Dr. Morin's wrote to Dr. Dasik in an email that there is no worry about Foyas. I can either send stuff to Tony on his private Gmail, hand it to him at work or at his house. He is too smart to let colleagues send him stuff that could cause trouble. Do you realize that this impact still considers today? This is your lead trusted researcher who works with you, your advisor. Do you realize the impact of that? It was a terrible thing. It was
wrong and it was inappropriate. Thank you. I should
not have said that. I think we all agree it was incredibly inappropriate. Recently, in an op-ed that Senator Roger Marshall published just yesterday, he raised concern about HHS FOIA compliance following your testimony in front of the Senate Help Committee. Dr. Fauci, what involvement did you have in HHS not responding to FOIA requests following your testimony in the Senate
in 2021? I had no role whatsoever in anything to do with the request. When FOIA is made, it doesn't go directly to a person like me. It goes to a department which then takes care of it. So I don't have any role one way or the other
in FOIA. Let's go on. Were you aware that NIAID employees conducting official work on unofficial emails and inappropriately assisting grantees during your time as a director?
I was not aware of that as it was occurring. It obviously came out during the committee hearings, but I was not aware of that. And I think that you
put an exclamation point on how important these hearings are. Dr. Fauci, would you agree that this demonstrates the need for more accountability and increased oversight
of NIAID? What you saw, I believe, with Dr. Morrens was an aberrancy and an outlier. The individuals at the NIH and NIAID are a very committed group of individuals. And this one instance that you point out is an aberrancy and an outlier. That does not -- From your senior advisor for 20 years. The title is senior advisor. We wrote scientific papers together. He didn't advise me, as I mentioned. Are your senior advisors not trusted staff? Again, I told you that his title was senior advisor, but he is not an advisor on policy. That's very confusing to have
someone's title and not having that to be their obligation of work. But that is
the fact,
though. I think that that supports what we said. There needs to be more oversight and there needs to be more accountability. Mr. Chairman, my time has expired, but these points are very clear to all of us today in this hearing room.
I yield back. I now recognize Mr. Garcia from California for five minutes. Oh, he left. I now recognize Ms. Green from Georgia for five minutes
of questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Fauci, you were quoted on CBS Face the Nation saying it's easy to criticize, but they're really criticizing science, because I represent science. Do you represent science, Mr. Fauci?
I am a scientist who uses the scientific method to gain information.
Yes. You said you represent science. Do you represent science, Mr. Fauci? Again? Yes or no?
No, that's not a yes or no answer.
Yes, it's a yes or no. I
don't think it is.
Okay. Well, we'll take that as a you don't know what you
represent,
but this as director of the NIH, you did sign off on these so-called scientific experiments. And as a dog lover, I want to tell you this is disgusting and evil, what you signed off on and these experiments that happened to beagles paid for by the American taxpayer. And I want you to know Americans don't pay their taxes for animals to be tortured like this. So the type of science that you are representing, Mr. Fauci, is abhorrent and it needs to stop. Mr. Fauci, you also represent the type of science where you confess that you made up the COVID rules,
including
six feet social distancing and masking of children. I
never said I made anything up.
You admitted that you made it up. You made it up. I didn't
say I made it up. So
are you saying this is fake news, Mr. Fauci?
I didn't say I made anything
up. What did you
say?
I
said that it is not based in science and it just appeared.
But this is science.
What does dogs have to do with anything that we're talking about today?
These are scientific experiments. This is what you signed off on. But you also told the American people they had to distance by six feet. They had to wear a mask. But let's also talk a little bit further about the type of science that you represent. NIH scientists made $710 million in royalties from drug makers, a fact that's been hidden. Let's talk about the fact about is it right for scientists and doctors getting paid by the American people, government taxpayer paychecks, to get patents where they're paid millions and hundreds of millions of dollars in royalty fees, especially when the NIH and these government agencies, most powerful agencies in our country, are recommending medical suggestions and advice and making up guidelines like six feet distancing and masking of children. Do you think that's appropriate? Do the American people deserve to be abused like that, Mr. Fauci? Because you're not doctor. You're Mr. Fauci in my few minutes.
No, I don't
need your answer. I want to talk about this right here. Mr. Fauci, I reclaim my time. I reclaim my time. I reclaim my time. Mr. Raskin. And a
lady with
an
order. Mr. Chairman. Just in terms of the rules of decorum. Are we allowed to deny that a doctor is a doctor just because we don't want him to be a doctor?
Yes. Because in my time, that man does not deserve to have a license. As a matter of fact, it should be revoked
and
he belongs in prison. The
gentle lady
would
suspend. The gentle lady should recognize the doctor as a doctor.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Is this what we have become? Is this what we have devolved into? No
decorum. And we can do that hearing about the poor men that were injected with syphilis because I support you in that. That's horrific. And this government that doesn't like that to Americans doesn't have decorum to the American
people. Mr. Chairman. The point of regular order. Please. The gentleman is out of order. Decorum. Recognize the point of order. Go ahead with your point of order.
You got
it.
I mean, I was going to say with Representative Raskinson that it's completely unacceptable to be able to deny Dr. Fauci, who's here a respected member of the medical community, his title. And that's actually in a personal attack on his character.
And I have instructed her.
He's not respected. And
I have instructed her to address him as a
doctor. I'm not addressing him as a doctor. Let's talk about, let's talk about this. I'm reclaiming my time. I'm reclaiming my time.
Words get taken down. I'm
reclaiming my time. Second that.
Point of order. Suspend. A member can only move to have words. I'm sorry. The issues we are debating are important ones that members feel deeply about. And while vigorous disagreement is part of legislative process, as I said at the beginning, members are reminded that we must adhere to established standards of decorum and debate. This is a reminder that it is a violation of House rules and the rules of this committee to engage in personalities regarding other members or to question the motives of a colleague. Remarks of that type are not permitted by the rules and are not in keeping with the best traditions of our committee. The chair will enforce these rules of decorum at all times and urges all members to be mindful of their remarks. Does the gentleman from California have anything
further? She should take it. We should
take
her words. I I
offered that her words be taken down, Mr. Chairman. Point of order, Mr.
Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I'd like to make a point of order. Mr. Griffin. Mr. Griffin is. President Trump. We don't worship President Trump.
Gentlelady will suspend. Mr. Griffin, you have a point of order.
Mr. Chairman, while it may not be polite, I believe the rule only applies to members of this body, the Senate and the President of the United States that do not apply believe that it applies. The rule on taking down words does not apply to a witness again. I'm not condoning the words. I'm just relating or asking whether or not it applies to individuals who are just just happened to be here in front of us.
I agree. The chair over rules. Point of order by the gentleman from Maryland. But ask that members please afford all other members the respect they're entitled, refrain from using rhetoric that could be construed as an attack on the motives or character of another member or the witness. You may proceed.
Thank you. This was a time in history where you got to throw out the first pitch at the Washington Nationals baseball game while Americans were forced to stay home and watch such events that they love from at home alone on their televisions. And what a hypocrisy this picture shows. Here you are without your mask with empty seats everywhere. Remember the cardboard cut out fans. That was one of the most insulting things to Americans having to watch the games from home where you got to go and enjoy the game and sit right next to people not following the six feet of distancing, not wearing your mask and everyone else was forced to stay home and stop enjoying life. And your science here, your science does displayed perfectly in this picture where children children in school were put in plastic bubbles because of your science, your repulsive evil science. And let's go back to your very own email you said earlier you don't use email or you do right here. This is your own email where you said the typical mask you buy in the drugstore is not really effective in keeping out virus. I do not recommend that you wear a mask. This is your email. This is your own words. But yet children, children all over America were forced to wear masks. Only children forced to wear masks muzzled in their schools. And then they were forced to learn from home because of your so called science and your medical suggestions while you and all your cronies get paid from Big Pharma. You know what this committee should be doing? We should be recommending you to be prosecuted. We should be writing a criminal referral because you should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity. If you belong in prison, Dr. Fauci. Mr.
Chairman, I have another point of order. I
recognize Ms. Dingle. I just want
to make sure the record is clear. Dr. Fauci testified that he did not use his personal email for official business. He did not say he did not use email. And I think today this particular has been full of lies and disregard and disrespect and we need to
stick to facts. Thank you. The gentlelady's time had expired before the point of order. I now recognize Mr. Garcia from California for five minutes of questions. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman. Dr. Fauci, I am so sorry you just had to sit through that. That was completely irresponsible. Quite frankly, some we're hearing, this might be the most insane hearing I've actually attended. I've only been in Congress for a year and a half, but I am so sorry that you are subjected to those level of attacks and insanity. Or quote-unquote so-called science that the gentlewoman is referring to has saved millions of lives in this country and around the world. And I want to thank you for that. I also think it's important to note that if my opinion is that you are an American hero and your team has done more to save lives than all 435 members of this body on both sides of the aisle. You guys have worked not just during this pandemic, but over time to save millions of lives in this country and across the world. We lost 1.1 million American lives, 1.1 million American lives, seven million lives around the world. We were having 9/11-like events, death events daily in this country, losing 4,000, 5,000 people every single day. I was mayor during the time of the pandemic. I remember how painful it was to close businesses, to shut down schools, but how quickly we forget the pain and how scared we were as a country. We were washing our groceries as they were coming in. We were keeping seniors at a distance. The tragedy that was happening in our nursing homes, thousands of people were dying a day. And you and your team are the best and the brightest scientists in this country and the world. We're doing everything that you could and working night and day to save more and more of those lives. A lot of my colleagues know that my mom was a health care worker during the pandemic. My mom died of COVID. My stepfather died of COVID. I lost both of my parents during the pandemic. So I take this very personally, especially when other members of this body who are tasked to be responsible and actually help the American people attack medical professionals like you and across the world. Vaccines, a vaccine that you and your team helped foster have saved millions of American lives. These attacks are ridiculous. Now, even before this committee started, I'm going to point a few things out. Even before this committee started, the same member that just went on this rant introduced the Fire Fauci Act and promoted on a podcast seeing that COVID was a bioweapon. That is how insane some of these comments are. And I want to quote this. This is a quote from the same member. I don't believe in evolution. These viruses were not making people sick until they created them. They weaponized these viruses to be able to attach to ourselves and make us sick. It's a bioweapon. They created them, sir, is you. They are attacking you and our medical community for actually creating COVID that has caused the deaths of millions. And we know that these extreme comments are targeting public health officials across the country. I also want to show you this other comment. Same member who just attacked you. The Fauci funded Wuhan lab created the virus. This is so crazy and irresponsible. In this post, the same member of this committee is accusing you of orchestrating a global conspiracy to create COVID on purpose just to make people get vaccines. You've done this, sir. The same member routinely promotes complete misinformation about vaccines and actually has encouraged the routine prevention of vaccinations and even eliminate diseases like the measles. Dr. Fauci, you brought together our nation and the world's best and brightest scientists take on COVID and create a vaccine that works. I want to ask you a question. I want to be crystal clear for the public. You brought together the world and America's best scientists. Do you believe that the vaccine that you all helped create and ensure is safe and effective for the public?
Yes, and its track record has proven
that. And do you also agree that it saved hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of lives in America and across
the world? That is absolutely correct. And it's very clear that it's saved millions of lives here and throughout the world. The Europeans have done the same studies that we have, and the data are incontrovertible that they save lives.
Sir, and do you think the American
public
should listen to America's brightest and best doctors and scientists or instead listen to podcasters, conspiracy theorists and unhinged Facebook memes? You
know, listening to people who you've just described is going to do nothing but harm people because they will deprive themselves of life-saving interventions, which has happened. And you know, some have done studies. Peter Hotez has done an analysis of this and shows that in people who refuse to get vaccinated for any of a variety of reasons, probably responsible for an additional two to three hundred thousand deaths in this
country. Thank you, sir, and your entire team for saving lives in this country. And I'm sorry you have to continue going on with these attacks. I yield back. Oh, thank you. You're not allowed to speak. You're not
allowed. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. Chairman, could you ever remove from me? Yes,
please. Excuse me. I ask the Capitol Police to escort. Yes,
thank you, she can be removed. You can be removed. Actually, you're not allowed to speak. Your time is
expired. Take your Starbucks with you. Mr. Garcia, Mr. Raskin, you're out of line. Your times have expired. Now recognize Dr. Jackson from Texas for five minutes
of questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Dr. Fauci, I have to say I, as so many Americans, am deeply disappointed in your actions during a critical time in our nation's history while you were in key leadership roles as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease and as the chief medical advisor to President Biden. But quite simply, you failed miserably, in my opinion, based on all we have learned during the pandemic and all that we have since learned through this committee's work. I believe your failures stem from both an effort of self-preservation manifested by a series of lies and cover-up and by a total failure of leadership. It was obvious to everyone that you and your organization, NIH, had a lot to lose if the American people were to discover that COVID-19 was most likely leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China, and that you via EcoHealth Alliance and Peter Dacke actually funded this research and that this lab was actively and recklessly conducting gain-of-function research. As such, you did everything in your power to deflect and cover-up this possibility. You even recruited others to help you in this effort. Unfortunately, this cost our country and the world valuable time, time that may have led to answers regarding the origin, may have blunted the spread, and would have almost certainly saved lives. While I think most of us have known all along what I just described, what I have been appalled to discover through sworn testimony to this committee is the level at which you and those that worked for you went to cover-up the obvious. Just a few examples, and I know these have been touched on, but they're important for everyone to hear. Dr. Lawrence Tabak, former acting director of NIH, testified that under the generic definition that NIH did, in fact, fund gain-of-function research. This was based on a definition that was initially used by NIH and a definition that was abandoned and removed from the website in October of 2021 and replaced by a new, much more detailed definition with a much higher bar that you have since conveniently used to define gain-of-function testing and to deny what Dr. Tabak has since confirmed. He also said that EcoHealth Alliance failed to properly and promptly report that their research violated the terms of the grant, something that went completely unaddressed under your watch. Dr. Moran, your senior advisor, who you have tried today to distance yourself from, but whose large volume of emails clearly demonstrate that you had a very close and personal relationship with, and who reported to you directly, has openly bragged about how he subverted FOIA requests. I remind you that the law requires you and your former organization to comply with Freedom of Information Act requests. It is not optional. If you or your employees or your organization that you oversaw were systemically avoiding transparency and illegally hiding or destroying documents that rightfully belong to the American people, then you should be criminally charged and they should as well. In addition, Dr. Gregory Folkers, your chief of staff, also engaged in illegal practices in which he crafted messages using symbols instead of letters to avoid FOIA exposure. In an email, April 2020, from Dr. Moran's to Peter Dasek, he says, "There are things I can't say." Well, I wonder what he couldn't say. He also went on to say, "Except Tony is aware and I have learned there are ongoing efforts within NIH to steer through this with minimal damage to you, Peter, and colleagues, and to NIH and NAID." A few days later, he said, "I have reason to believe that there are already efforts going on to protect you." In February of 2021, Dr. Moran's wrote to Boston University scientist Gerald Kirsh saying, "I learned from our FOIA lady here how to make emails disappear after I'm FOIAed but before the search starts, so I think we are all safe." Dr. Fauci, I want to know what you were being protected from and what you needed to be safe from. I'm going to go on because I have a little time here. He went on to say, "Plus, I deleted most of the earlier emails after sending to Gmail." Once again, illegal and an actual crime. Dr. Moran's noted in another email to Dr. Kirsh saying, "I learned the tricks last year from an old friend, Marge Moore, who heads our FOIA office and also hates FOIAs." It is absolutely amazing to me that Dr. Moran's and Marge Moore still have jobs and taxpayers are still paying their salaries. Dr. Moran's wrote to Dr. Dasek in April of 2021, "P.S., I forgot to say there is no worry about FOIAs. I can either send stuff to Tony on his private email or hand it to him to work or at his house. He is too smart to let colleagues send him stuff that could cause trouble." Apparently, you neglected to surround yourself with equally smart individuals. Dr. Moran's wrote to another collaborator, Peter Hotitz, in June 2021 at Baylor College of Medicine that he had deleted all his emails related to COVID origin when "the shit hit the fan." He said, "I feel pretty sure Tony were too. The best way to avoid FOIA hassles is to delete all emails when you learn the subject is pretty sensitive." In October 2021, Dr. Moran's wrote to Peter Dasek, "Peter, from Tony's numerous recent comments to me and from what Francis has been vocal about over the past five years, we are trying to protect you, and they are protecting their own reputations as well." I'll just jump ahead. The American people can rest assured that we are going to continue to pursue answers and we continue to push for full accountability from you and your colleagues despite continuing efforts to try to cover this up. Dr. Fauci, history will not be kind to you and you will be known as the man who put his personal interests before the interests of the American people, the very people that you were supposed to be protecting. Your actions, along with several others we have had before this committee, have completely eroded America's trust in our public health system and the agency that you represented for half a century. With that, I yield
back. Gentlemen's time has expired and now recognize Mr. Kuda from Hawaii for five minutes of questions.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I hope I'll have an additional 30 seconds like the previous gentleman. And Dr.
Fauci? I have allowed that today. Thank you.
On several occasions. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Dr. Fauci, you deserve better than this. The other side suddenly cares about puppies ironic given recent book publications versus the millions of people that you have kept safe and alive over your lifelong commitment to public health. I'd like to use my time to dispel some of the myths about you that have circulated in right wing circles. We can all acknowledge that yes, suspension of in-person activities during the early days of COVID, it was necessary to save lives and to stop the spread and it was not without its challenges. It was difficult, particularly for our nation's students like my two sons in public schools and our business owners. And to completely blame these policies on you, Dr. Fauci, is absolutely ridiculous. I'd like to make the record clear on something. The decision to suspend in-person learning, dining, and other activities, that was not a decision that you were somehow solely responsible for, including in your role as NIAA director. Is that correct? In fact, these decisions were actually made at the state and local level in communities across the country like my home state of Hawaii, which was particularly aggressive, in part as a response to the Trump administration's early failure to contain the initial outbreak of the virus.
Is
that not correct?
I'm sorry. I didn't... Ma'am, I'm not really hearing you very well. Could you just put your...
We'll put it a little bit closer. But to be clear that the decisions were actually made at the state and local levels in communities across the country.
That is correct.
Okay. Thank you. Now, I'd like to shift topics and turn to the allegation
that
you sought to suppress opposing viewpoints about the pandemic response over the past 15 months, majority members of this subcommittee have levied
the
allegation that federal health officials censored proposals like the Great Barrington Declaration, which were inconsistent with the overwhelming consensus of the scientific and medical community. Much attention has been paid to an email Dr. Francis Collins sent you regarding the Great Barrington Declaration, where he called for a quick and devastating published takedown of its premises. To be clear, this was not Dr. Collins suggesting that you suppress or censor the Great Barrington Declaration. Rather, he was suggesting that the points you just explained be memorialized to substantively refute the scientific premises of the Great Barrington Declaration. Is that correct?
Yes. And
there was good reason for Dr. Collins to have substantive concerns. The Great Barrington Declaration
proposed
lifting mitigation measures for the vast majority of society and preserving them only for certain populations, including the elderly and people with underlying health conditions. This was months before a vaccination was available and public health systems were already being overwhelmed and thousands of Americans were dying daily. Dr. Fauci, what percentage of the population did we estimate needed to be infected with COVID before we would achieve so-called herd
immunity? Chord immunity was very elusive with COVID and the Great Barrington Declaration was flawed both conceptually and in practice. Conceptually that you could shield vulnerable people as if the only vulnerable people are those in nursing homes. We have tens and tens of millions of vulnerable people that you couldn't possibly shield. People with underlying conditions, the elderly, those would be the individuals. So it would be conceptually impossible to do that. Herd immunity, as we know, means if you have a virus that doesn't change and a virus in which when you get infected or vaccinated, you have highly durable perhaps lifelong immunity. That's not the case with COVID. We know immunity wanes and we have multiple variants. So in practical purposes, the Great Barrington Declaration was invalid, both conceptually and practically.
Thank you, Dr. Fauci. You've answered a few of my other questions in terms of the fact that for many of us that live in multi-generational communities, thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions more lives would have been impacted by this so-called approach. And given the fact that the virus is rapid evolution that we have seen since 2020, herd immunity approaches would be absolutely ineffective against COVID. If you would answer one more question, considering the mortality rates at the time, how many more deaths might we have seen? Just briefly.
I mean, if we had done that, just let it rip, there very likely would have been another million people would have died, I
would imagine. Thank you, Dr. Fauci. So it wasn't the federal government suppressing the Great Barrington Declaration, rather it was about protecting and saving millions of American lives. The COVID-19 pandemic wasn't some academic exercise. It was in real time, it was about saving lives in real time. Theories like herd immunity may seem plausible on paper, but we have to remember that it is based upon the assumption that enough people would have to be infected. And that would likely have meant that our family members, our friends, our neighbors, our constituents, especially those in our most marginalized, multi-generational rural communities would have died. So thank you, Dr. Fauci. I want to thank you, not blame you. Thank you for your science. Thank you for your science that have saved millions of American lives, kept us safe, including my children, many of our families right here on this dais, and thank you for clarifying these points for the record and for all of your efforts to keep us safe during the pandemic and so many other health crises we have faced over the decades that you have served. Mahalo, Mr. Chair,
and I yield back. Now recognize Dr. McCormick for five minutes of questions. Thank you, Dr.
Wentztrup, Chairman. It's been insinuated that politicians, only politicians, only bloggers, only conspiracy theorists are disagreeing with you. I want to point out that I'm probably the only member of Congress that actually treated patients during the pandemic from the very beginning to the very end of the pandemic during night shifts in the ER, thousands of patients during that time. And in 2020, I was censored. My medical license was threatened because I disagreed with bureaucrats, literally taking out the internet as a person who is treating patients with leading edge technologies, developing theories, but doing my very best, but being censored by the United States government for the first time, stepping in and taking the place of medical professionals as the experts in healthcare. Any dissent surrounding COVID-19 treatments, mass mandates, and any public policy surrounding the pandemic was immediately labeled as anti-science. I watched as public health officials and politicians told my patients what treatment options were best for them, regardless of their comorbidities or their medical history. Despite my education and my training and my experience, my opinions were relegated to conspiracy and misinformation by so-called healthcare experts who had never treated a patient throughout the entire pandemic. This has been a black eye on the medicine and has highlighted why government should never, or insert itself in between patients and their healthcare providers. The American people deserve to make medical decisions through conversations with their physicians rather than politically motivated mandates. Dr. Fauci, did you ever treat a patient for COVID
during the
pandemic?
I was part of a team that was at the NIH that took care, we didn't take care of many of them. Okay, so not hands on.
Got it.
Thank
you. Why would I be criticized by a bureaucrat for doing my very best as a healthcare? This is a rhetorical question, but why? Why would the government, who has never treated a patient for COVID, you can read all the things you want, but you're not there, you're not seeing patients, you're not watching people die, intubating patients right there with that disease in your face, watching it happen, watching the development of this disease and actually learning from it, but I'm being told by bureaucrats, what's right and wrong. And what's funny is everything I was censored on, I was proven to be right. Pretty crazy, isn't it? You said in an interview that you gave as part of an audio book written by Michael Spector that you believed an institutional should make it hard for people to live their lives so they'd feel pressured to get vaccinated. Could we run the audio clip on that,
please? You think can be done about it. I have to say that I don't see a big solution other than some sort of mandatory vaccination. I know federal officials don't like
to use that term. Once people feel empowered and protected legally, you are going to have schools, universities and colleges are going to say, "You want to come to this college, buddy? You're going to get vaccinated. Lady, you're going to get vaccinated." Yeah. Big corporations like Amazon and Facebook and all of those others are going to say, "You want to work for us to get vaccinated." And it's been proven that when you make it difficult for people in their lives, they lose their ideological bullshit and they get
vaccinated. Thank you. Are all objections to COVID vaccinations ideological bullshit, Dr. Pouchy? No, they're
not, and that's
not
what I was referring
to. But in reference to making it hard for people to get education, traveling, working, I'd say it very much was in context, and I take great offense to this. Ms. Allison Williams testified before this committee about losing her job because she sought an exemption for ESPN's vaccine mandate, which came from recommendation from bureaucrats like yourself. She and her husband were actively working with a fertility expert, a physician, on how to get pregnant, and agreed with the premise that she was young, healthy, wanted to get pregnant, and shouldn't get the vaccination for medical purposes. But she was fired because you made it hard, just like you said in your statement, because you didn't want to make sure that the ideological bullshit got in the way of her working, of living her life, of making a medical decision with her healthcare professional. I think Americans should take great offense to this. It's exactly what you meant when you said making it hard for people to live without getting a vaccination. You affected people's ability to work, travel, be educated, to actually flourish in American science, to self-determine, as we're all given God-given rights. Shame on you. Dr. Fauci, you've become a doctor of fear. Americans do not hate science. I don't hate science. The American people hate having their freedoms taken from them. You inspired and created fear through mass mandates, school closures, vaccine mandates that have destroyed the American people's trust in our public health institutions. This fear you created will continue to have ripple effects over generations to come. You have already seen its effects in education, in the economy, and everything else. Quite frankly, you said, "If you disagree with me, you disagree with science." Dr. Fauci, I disagree with you because I disagree with fear, and with that, I
yield. I now recognize Mr. Moskowitz from Florida for five minutes of
questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Dr. Fauci, good to be with you here today. I was not here, but I saw a member of this committee questioned whether or not you represent science and tried to make that in some offensive way. I just want you to know most Americans don't think she represents Congress. One of the things I've
learned ... I
hear now you're double, double Fauci. I don't want you to be offended by that. I actually, similar to Representative McCormick, who was serving in the field as a doctor during COVID, I was running the logistics operation and the Florida response as the director of emergency management for the state of Florida for Governor DeSantis. I was deploying masks and gowns and gloves. We were setting up field hospitals. We were setting up testing sites. We were setting up vaccine sites throughout the pandemic. The one thing that became clear to me as a country is we were not prepared. In fact, we actually had many preparations for a pandemic, but both the states collectively and the federal government threw that out and was just making it up as we go. One of the things I wanted to ask you, and I understand you're not in the response field, but do you feel, since you've left, that we are better prepared today than we were several years ago when COVID
hit? In some respects, we are, but in others, I'm still disappointed. I think one of the things that was really a problem with the response was the degree of divisiveness that we had in the country about a lack of a coherent response where we were having people for reasons that had nothing to do with public health or science refusing to adhere to public health intervention measures. What I think that we will do better, hopefully, is that the CDC, I believe, has now recognized some of the failings of the lack of communication and interaction between the federal response and the local public health officials. One of the weaknesses that we had in the United States that other countries didn't have was a disconnect between the health care system and the public health system. Whereas the CDC can't demand information from local public health individuals. They have to volunteer to give it to them, and it isn't given to them in real time. So we were at a disadvantage. Oh, no
question. I saw that. I saw how the lack of investment in technology, right, we had states trying to share information with the federal government using, you know, Windows 2000. Or fax machines. Fax machines. Right. Exactly. Yeah. And so, you know, we spent $7 trillion in two packages and two administrations. And one of my concerns is that I feel that, especially in supply chain, I feel like we're not that much better off than we were before COVID. Am I wrong in that assessment?
Yeah, I don't think you're wrong, but I hope that the CDC has made it very clear that they are trying to change that and correct that deficit of a separation between the local and the federal CDC so that we can get information in real time. It was very frustrating for us that often we had to go to the UK or South Africa or Israel to get real time information because they had a connection between what was going on in the ground and their public health system.
So
they knew right away what was happening. We didn't.
Dr. Fauci, you talked about how, you know, we live in partisan times, a lot of misinformation. And you know, colleagues on this body said, you know, you should be charged and found guilty. Of course, the only one that's happened to is your former boss. But you know, the question I have is when you saw a lot of that disinformation, whether it was, you know, we can use a disinfectant to do like a cleaning or do light in the body or that, you know, China is working super hard. President Xi's got it contained. All of this stuff that was being put out. Were you concerned? You know, what was your feeling at that time working in the administration, seeing that come from the podium? Well, I
was very frustrated by that. It was very clear. I was put in a very difficult position that I didn't like of having to contradict publicly the president of the United States. I took no great pleasure in that, but I felt it was my responsibility to. He must
have thought you did a great job. He gave you a commendation right before he
left. Well, I felt it was my responsibility, you know, as to preserve my own personal integrity and my major responsibility to the American public to tell them the truth. And if I could just take this opportunity when I was saying that if you attack me, you attack science, I didn't mean that I am science. What I meant was that when the data show that hydroxychloroquine does not work and there are people saying, oh, it does, I'll give it to people and we know it can be hurtful to them. Then when you're attacking what I'm saying that the science shows it doesn't work and the science shows that bleach doesn't work, that when you attack that, you really are attacking science because science has shown that it doesn't work. That's what I meant when you attacking me, you're attacking science. Thank
you, doctor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back. Young Times expired. Now recognize Mr. Jordan from Ohio for five minutes.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Doctor, why was it so important that the virus not have started
in a lab? We don't know where it started and that's the reason why I keep an open mind. So I don't know what you mean by why was it
so
important? It wasn't
important. You still don't know where it started? The guys you gave money to figured out in three days. No, no, no. Mr. Anderson said on January 31st, 2020, a virus looks engineered virus not consistent with evolutionary theory. The very next day, Dr. Gary said, I don't know how this happens in nature would be easy to do in a lab. And then three days later, Shazam, they switched and say it didn't, it has to be nature. So they figured out in three days, but you still don't know.
No, in fact, if you look at what they were saying, Congressman Jordan, they were saying that it was not a manufactured virus. It still could have evolved out of a lab. Let me read something here. They're not incompatible in our
study on the censorship of the Biden administration working with big tech. I want to read you a WhatsApp message from Mark Zuckerberg. Can we include at the White House put pressure on us to censor the lab leak theory? So this is a communication on July 16th, 2021. Nick Clegg, Joel Kaplan, Sheryl Sandberg, Mark Zuckerberg. They're certainly feeling the pressure to downplay any lab leak theory and go with the natural
origin theory. Is there a question there?
It's coming there. One's coming. Here's another email to Mark Zuckerberg. It says subject line, COVID misinformation, Wuhan lab leak theory in response to continued public pressure and tense conversations with the new administration. We started removing five COVID claims, including a lab leak theory. Mr. Zuckerberg responds. This seems like a good reminder that when we compromise our standards due to pressure from an administration in either direction, we often later regret it. Why was it so important the virus not have started in a
lab? Wasn't so important that the virus not. We don't know. We
know. What was important to someone in the Biden administration, so much so that the top people at meta, the top people at Facebook are asking why are we getting all this pressure to downplay the lab leak theory and we have an email from June of the same year, June 4th, 2021, saying the same thing. It was certainly important to somebody. Well,
what does that got to do with me?
I'm asking you because you're the expert on the coronavirus. I'm saying why was the administration, why was the administration so pushing not to have the lab leak theory as something that was viable?
I can answer that. I've kept an open mind throughout the entire process. You
kept
an open
mind, Dr. Fauci open mind. That is correct. What happened in those three days? Why did Dr. Anderson and, uh, excuse me, Mr. Anderson and Dr. Gary, why did they change their mind in 180 degrees? Because what Christian Anderson says three days later, after he said virus looks engineered, virus not consistent with evolutionary theory, three days later, he says the main crackpot theories going around at the moment relate to this virus being somehow engineered. And that is demonstrably false. How did they, how did they figure all that out in three days, Dr. Fauci? You can do that. You still have
an open mind. What they did is that, you know, they testified before this committee what they did. They went back and looked at the sequences and realized that their initial concern was unfounded about that. And it did not look at all like it was manufactured, but as they said in their paper, even though they feel it was more likely three days,
that's exactly,
you could do that
in
three days. You can scan sequences
in
a day. You don't need three
days. Okay. Uh, who's Robert Redfield? The former director of the CDC. Dr. Redfield, right. And he was, uh, and he was also in the coronavirus task force. Is that accurate? He was a member of the coronavirus task force. Here's what he said to this committee. He said Redfield said that Fauci and Collins left him out because Redfield suspected that coronavirus had leaked from the Chinese lab. Is that accurate?
Well,
he said
that, but
that's not true. That
is incorrect, Congressman.
Dr. Redfield's lying to the committee when he sat right where you
sat. When he said that I kept him out. That is an incorrect statement. The, the, the, the roster who was on the phone was Dr.
Redfield in that conference call on February 1st when you had Mr. Anderson and Dr. Gary on that call.
He was not. And the conference call was put together by Jeremy for raw. So no one kept him out. He said he was kept out because he felt,
did us tax dollars want me to
answer the question?
Yeah. I would just wonder why it wasn't on the call.
It
seems to me the head of CDC, part of the coronavirus task force, which was formed two days prior to that call would have been on the call. Well the call was arranged by Jeremy for raw. You should ask him. Okay. Did us tax dollars flow through a grant recipient to the lab in China? I'm sorry. What was the US tax dollars flow through a grant recipient to the lab in China?
Yes, of course. It was a sub award to the one
who
approved that
award. Excuse me. And who approved that award? What agency approved that
award? National Institute of Allergy and
Infectious Disease. Your agency approved that, right?
Yes, it did.
Does that have anything to do with this downplaying of the lab leak theory? No. Nothing to do
with
it? Nothing. Do you agree that there was a push to downplay the lab leak
theory? Not on my
part. Really? Really. Wow. I think most of the country would find that amazing. I still got 11 seconds.
Well, look at the facts. I've kept an open mind throughout the entire process. All right. I yield back. I now
recognize the majority staff for no longer than 30 minutes of
questions.
Dr. Fauci, it's
good to see you again. I want to ask a couple questions about some of the members' questions and then get into some follow ups. The issue of the CIA trip was brought up. That was brought to us by a whistleblower. That was not an allegation made by the committee. It was an allegation made by the whistleblower. You testified at a transcribed interview back in early January. Do you recall me asking you about that allegation?
About going to the CIA?
Yes. Yes. And do you recall, and you denied it then as well, and you denied it here today, do you recall the subcommittee publishing
that you denied it? I don't recall.
We did. Okay. We put it out in a press release afterwards that you denied the whistleblower's allegation. And then today, during the course of the last couple hours, have any members on the majority side of the dais asked you about a trip to the
CIA? Yeah.
They have? No, they
have. I'm sorry. Mitch, I'm not hearing you so well. Mitch. I have a
point of order, Mr. Chairman.
What's the gentleman's
point of order? I have an inquiry about whether or not I'm hearing things, whether or not you just yielded 30 minutes of committee time to staff. That is correct. Both sides. And the question that the gentleman just raised was a question that I raised, so apparently he was not listening when I was questioning Dr. Fauci. Thank you for your point of order. You may
continue. What I asked was, we asked you about this in a transcript interview. You testified that you did not go to the CIA. We published that you refuted that allegation. And then today, no members of the Republican side of the dais have asked you that question. Is that accurate? Thank you. You've been asked a number of times about your former senior advisor, Dr. Morinz, and have said -- and I want to make sure I characterize it correctly because it goes a little back and forth -- that you didn't conduct official business over a personal email with Dr. Morinz -- has Dr. Morinz emailed your personal email before on non-official
purposes? As I mentioned, we wrote scientific papers together, so he very well may have used that question. That's the email I use when I write a scientific paper,
right? And that's because NIAID policy allows you to write on semi-official time, write papers, but you just have to put a disclaimer that this is not the -- In other
words, if you're doing something as official business, you shouldn't use your emails that are the official business. So in order to be compliant with the regulations, you would use a personal email.
I appreciate it. I want to ask about some of the public health policies enacted during the pandemic. Dr. Francis Collins, the former NIH director, recently said in an interview -- and I'm quoting -- "You attach an infinite value to stopping the disease and saving a life. You attach a zero value to whether this actually totally disrupts people's lives, ruins the economy, and has kept many kids out of school in a way that they never quite recovered." Understanding the COVID task force had a lot of voices at the table. Is that an accurate description of the public health advisors, and then you could fit in other advisors along the
way? Yeah, you know, Mitch, what I believe that Dr. Collins was saying was that we give advice based on pure public health issues. It's very, very clear now, retrospectively, looking at the potential collateral negative effects of things like mandating. It would be important for us now, since the purpose of, I believe, why we're here, is to how we can do better next time, is to consider the balance. I think things that we did in the beginning were in the context of horrible situation of 4,000 to 5,000 deaths per day. But that doesn't mean that you don't go back and look and say, "Did everything we do at that point and the duration for which we did it, was that appropriate, and do we need to re-examine?" I believe that's what Dr. Collins
was
referring to. And I agree with him on
that. And you got to my next question that we are here trying to figure out how to do better next time, lose fewer
lives
next time. Would that be a better thought process going forward of thinking about the possible unintended consequences of public health
measures?
Absolutely. And you've heard from both sides of the dais today, first weeks, months, novel virus, nobody knew what was going on, called for some drastic measures. I mean, once there was a better understanding of who the most affected demographics were, do you think it would be important to more narrowly craft public health measures to specifically favor those
demographics? The answer is yes, but you have to be careful, because if you have a certain group that is being predominantly afflicted, if you're really, really clear that another group is really quite protected, then you should fashion it demographically related. But what often happens with outbreaks is that they're a moving target, and you only hear about other vulnerabilities as you get further into the outbreak. So the answer to your question is you're partially correct that you need to do that, but you've got to be careful when you're dealing with a moving
target. And we can appreciate that. You've been asked a little bit again about the theories of natural immunity and herd immunity. Those are both real scientific theories in infectious disease, is that correct? Yes. And between infection acquired immunity and vaccinated acquired immunity, did the United States hit herd
immunity? The answer is no, and I've written a paper on that, is that when you're dealing -- and just let me take 30 seconds, I don't want to run out the clock on you, but I think it's important to make this point. When you talk about herd immunity, it's predicated on two principles, that you're dealing with a pathogen that's not changing. And number two, that when you either get infected or vaccinated, the duration of the immunity is measured in decades, if not a lifetime. So that if you have a pathogen that stays the same, like measles, doesn't change. So I was infected with measles when I was a child. It's the same measles that's infecting people in certain countries in the developing world. Number two, when you get either infected or vaccinated with measles, you have immunity that's durable, minimally in decades, and possibly for life. So if you get the same pathogen and you get a large percentage of the people who have either been infected or vaccinated, then you have herd immunity. We did not ever have that with
COVID. And you've also been asked a number of times about the vaccine and vaccine mandates. Were you the one that recommended to the president
to
mandate vaccines for certain individuals?
No.
Do you know who
did? No, it was more of a, it was a combination of a group and just saying that certain agencies like the labor department or what have you would feel that this would to be done. But it was not like I one day said, hey, we should mandate vaccines. That did not
happen. And I want to echo the comments of the chairman that we agreed the vaccine saved hundreds of thousands of lives. And we talked about this a little bit in January and I think you touched on it a little bit today. Could issuing these mandates and removing the notion of informed consent from some certain sex of the citizenry lead to vaccine hesitancy?
Yeah, I mentioned this and I believe in the TI that as a matter of fact, that's something that I think we need to go back now when we do an after the event evaluation about whether or not given the psyche of the country and the pushback that you get from those types of things. We need to reevaluate the cost benefit ratio of those types of
things. And then I won't belabor the point, but we talked about the six foot distance an awful lot today. Do you recall if it was ever suggested to be
10 feet? You know, I don't recall Mitch if it was ever suggested it was 10 feet, but when I made my explanation of what it was, I was saying that there was no trial that looked at 10 versus six versus three versus not even worrying about
it at all. And you said today that there were discussions at the White House about the six foot rule. You don't recall if it was discussions about whether or not it should be three or it should be 10 or you know, I
don't recall Mitch what the exact discussion was. But as I've said in response to multiple questions, what we had it was it came the CDC was said that on the basis of their evaluation, which was based on the droplet approach that six foot would be to go. And since there was no clinical trials going one way or the other, that's why it was accepted by the
group. And then it hasn't been a large topic today and we talked about kind of again, the many unknowns in early 2020 schools were closed through the semester. Some schools reopened in the in the for the fall semester. Some remained closed going through into 2021. Looking back, were there are there current academic ramifications of remote schooling or kids not being in school?
I think there have been a number of not I think I know that there have been a number of studies to show that there are lasting effects. At least up to this point, they tend to attenuate over time, but there have been substantial negative effects on learning and on children when you keep them out of school for a prolonged period
of time. Have you seen any studies suggesting physical health ramifications?
I haven't seen physical health ramification mental health. I believe that there are some that show psychological issues that relate to keeping kids out of the environment of the social environment
of the school. I'm an apologize for bouncing around. We don't have 14 hours with you today. I've got 30 minutes. So I'm going to. Yeah,
I'm so sorry about that.
I'm going to
move
quickly. Yeah. Again, across the dais, both sides of the aisle, a lot of questions on the origins of COVID and finding out the origins and how that could better lead to both protecting against spillover and wildlife trade, but also increased biosafety standards. As you sit here today, is it possible that COVID-19 was the result of a laboratory related
accident? Oh, absolutely. And I keep, like I mentioned multiple times, I keep an open mind. I feel based on the data that I have seen that the more likely, not definitive, but the more likely explanation is a natural spillover from an animal reservoir. But since there has not been definitive proof one way or the other, we have to keep an open mind that it could be
either. And based on that answer, I think is the hypothesis that COVID-19 accidentally leaked from a lab a conspiracy theory? No, I
mentioned that several times. Conceptually, the concept of it is not a conspiracy
theory. We've talked a little bit about the proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2, the paper authored by Dr. Anderson. It came to two primary conclusions, and I'm quoting, our analysis clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus. And we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible. Do you disagree with those conclusions?
I think, Mitch, if I'm not mistaken, I don't have the paper in front of me, I think they also said the possibility of if you passaged it, you could have done that. And if you passage it, it's in a lab. So it is, I mean, that could
be. And they dispelled that at the end with the we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible. So I'm just asking again, is a laboratory-based scenario plausible? Well, I mean,
again, I don't want to speak for what they meant in that paper, but I have said multiple times, I keep an open mind that it could be either a laboratory leak, or it could be what I think the data is leaning towards mostly, which is a natural occurrence from an animal
reservoir. And this email was brought up, too, on April 16th, 2020, Dr. Collins wrote to you and said, wondering if there's something NIH can do to help put down this very destructive conspiracy referencing the lab leak. I hope the Nature Medicine article and the genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 would settle this, but probably didn't get much visibility, anything more we can do. The next day, you were at a White House press conference and cited proximal origin and said proximal origin established that COVID-19 "is totally consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to human." Did anyone tell you to cite proximal origin from
the
White
House
podium?
No, it was in response, I believe, to a question that might have been asked by a reporter, but I wasn't stimulated to say that at all. I was responding to a
question. That time back in April of 2020, was it also your belief that a lab leak was possible?
Yeah, I've always had an open mind about
it. And then I want to correct the record again a little bit on the drafting and publication of the proximal origin paper. Did Dr. Anderson send you drafts to review?
He sent drafts, but I'm going to jump ahead of you, if I might, dribble around. I did not edit it.
That was
mentioned by a few of the... It was. ...Congressmen. I did not edit the
paper. And I appreciate that. I wanted
to get
on the record. I want to talk about Dr. Morin's and what you wrote in your opening testimony and some of the answers that you gave today. And just for clarity, you were, in addition to being unaware of his use of personal email and potentially intentionally deleting federal records, were you also unaware of his actions to assist Dr. Daszak and
EcoHealth? I was aware of his friendship. I was not aware of his attempts to assist him to respond to an NIH inquiry.
So not aware of the editing of press releases or editing of letters? No. I was not. On November 11th, 2021, Dr. Morin's wrote in an email to Dr. Daszak that he attempted to discuss the EcoHealth grant with you. And you, quote, "got upset" and told him to have no more communications with Peter. Why did you tell Dr. Morin's to no longer communicate with Dr. Daszak?
I think it's inappropriate to do what he did. I mean, and your committee has called him out very definitively about that, and it was inappropriate to
do that. This is back in 2021. What did you know about what he was doing then?
I didn't know exactly what he was doing, but I don't think it's inappropriate for people to be communicating and helping a grantee and a response. I didn't know exactly what he was doing, but I didn't think
it was appropriate. When did you, you testified to Chairman Griffith, or excuse me, Chairman Comer, that you knew about the compliance issues later on
with
EcoHealth? When did you first become
aware? I became aware during briefings by my staff in preparation for congressional hearings well after the fact where the compliance issues actually happened. I didn't know, as I've mentioned to you in the TI, him or protect him, not
so. Did you ever have any conversations with Dr. Morin's about what Dr. Daszak was facing or about the termination
of the grant? He may have mentioned to me something like Dr. Daszak is going through terrible times, but I don't recall, it is conceivable that he would have mentioned that to me because, as he mentioned to you, that Dr. Daszak and he are very good friends, so it would not be surprising if sometime he had mentioned to me, boy, Dr. Daszak's going through some really tough times. Fine, that doesn't mean that I say you should help him.
No, absolutely doesn't, so that's why we want to ask the questions and
get
the answers. During your transcribed interview with us, you were asked about whether or not Dr. Daszak had a conflict of interest in reviewing the origins of COVID-19. And you testified, you know, I hesitate to speculate about what someone else should do. The only people that I am involved with is my own staff, who we've mentioned many times in this discussion, who don't have a conflict of interest. With the benefit of hindsight and the work of this committee, do you believe Dr. Morin's had a conflict of interest regarding ecohealth?
Well, from what we know now, he definitely had a conflict because he was communicating with a grantee of helping him in response to an NIH issue, which is a conflict of interest. I did not know that at the time when I made your statement.
And I appreciate that. Sticking with ecohealth, in April 2020, NIH terminated and then subsequently reinstated and then suspended the ecohealth grant that had the Wuhan Institute as a sub-grantee. Do you recall that decision?
Yes.
Were you involved at all in that decision? No. You previously testified to House Energy and Commerce that you were in essence told to cancel the grant. Do you recall who
told you? We got it from a number of -- now retrospectively we found out how it was. It was the White House told the department to tell the
NIH to cancel the grant. Did you agree with the cancellation?
What is that? Do we need to listen to that?
He was escorted out.
Yeah.
Okay. Good. I'm sorry. Repeat the question, Mitch. Did you agree with
the cancellation? You know, it wasn't a question of agreeing or disagreeing. It was like, can we really do that? I don't think that you can do that. And as it turned out, I was right because the general counsel of HHS said, by the way, you can't do that. You've got to restore the
grant. And that's why they restored it and then suspended it pending the compliance
review.
Not to keep reading Dr. Maren's emails, but on June 24, 2020, Dr. Maren's wrote an email. He, referencing you, made some additional comments to the effect that this came from the White House and he was totally opposed to it. You weren't totally opposed to
it? Well, see, that's his -- you know, he's doing a lot of interpretation, Mitch. His interpretation, I was totally opposed to it. It was more of, can we really legally do that? And the answer turned out, I was right. No, you
can't. Do you recall the -- did the department ask you first or Dr. Collins first to terminate? I think it
went directly to Building 10 -- excuse me, Building 1, the director's office.
Is that the NIH director's office?
Yeah, yeah. I think it went from the department to
NIH to us. Okay. Were you, prior to your retirement in December of 2022, were you involved in any of the compliance actions NIH took against EcoHealth?
I don't believe so. I think the actual -- and again, I'm a little unclear about the time, but I think most of the disciplinary actions actually occurred after I left, if I'm not
mistaken. Yes, the actual suspension and debarment occurred after you left, but there were a number of letters requesting lab notebooks
or
further information while you were still
there. What happened, Mitch, and it's important to point this out. Once it was clear that there was compliance issues while I was still there, we were told that NIAID stay out of it. Compliance is going to be handled by Building 1, i.e., the NIH director and Mike Lauer. So the compliance was said, "Don't touch it. Don't go near it. Just we'll take care of
it." When you just brought this up, since the original termination, then suspension, NIH found numerous major violations of grant policies, has since debarred the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and suspended and proposed for debarment both EcoHealth as an institution and Dr. Daszak individually. Are you aware of
those? Yes,
I am. During previous TIs and hearings, when asked if they supported every one of these actions and supported the suspension and debarment, both Dr. Collins and Dr. Tabak said yes. Sitting here today, do you support
the
suspension and debarment
of EcoHealth? Yes. I want to
move on to the kind of like known unknowns of COVID origins to quote Dr. Lipkin's paper from early 2020. On October 20th, 2021, Dr. Tabak sent a letter to then-ranking member Mr. Comer that said the bat coronaviruses studied under the EcoHealth Alliance grant could not have been the source of SARS-CoV-2 and the COVID-19 pandemic you've testified similarly both back in January and today. Some of the things that I believe Chairman Griffith brought up was just kind of that statement results on some things, arrests on some things that we just can't know. In your experience, Dr. Fauci, do researchers publish every virus that
they sequence? No, I mean, I think researchers don't always publish every single thing
they do. Do they routinely publish every experiment
that they conduct? I'm sure there are people who don't publish every single experiment that they
do. And then is there a lag time between the sampling, the analysis, and the publication?
Yeah, I mean, publications often take months before they come
out. Is it possible, if not plausible, that EcoHealth and the Wuhan Institute of Virology have samples from between 2020 when they originally published a paper or, excuse me, 2015 when they originally published a paper with all of their samples and now that are
unpublished? Sure it's possible, but Mitch, I might just throw in there. You can't get away from the fact that the viruses that were studied, that the NIH gave them a grant to study, don't pull back on the fact that no matter what you did with those viruses, they were phylogenetically so different they could not possibly be the precursor of SARS-CoV-2.
And I agree with that. I guess my only point is that you don't know all the viruses they were working with.
Yeah, and let's make that clear because Griffith, Congressman Griffith, asked it, and I answered you quite honestly, that none of us can know everything that's going on in China or in Wuhan or what have you. And that's the reason why I say today and I've said at the TI, I keep an open mind as to what the origin
is. The last thing, the last topic I want to touch on is gain of function. We touched on it in January. You touched on it a little bit today. I know the pandemic has resulted, as I'm sure you're aware, with a rather large debate, and including with the NSABB updating their dangerous research policies surrounding gain of function P3CO and dual use research of concern. At the -- prior to October of 2021, the NIH website listed gain of function as a type of research that modifies a biological agent so that it confers new or enhanced activity to that agent, and the P3CO framework that the U.S. government uses to further regulate a subpart of that research that is more dangerous, specifically that could cause widespread and uncontrolled death or disease in humans. Putting aside what's regulatory, I agree with you, the P3CO definition is regulatory. Are there types of research that could fall under the broad definition but not the P3CO definition?
Well, I believe members on the minority side have mentioned that. Influenza is a gain of function to a virus to make it grow better in eggs. Making an E. coli manufacture insulin is telling the E. coli to do something it wasn't able to do before by mutations. Of course that's the
case. So in kind of the Venn diagram of this research, something could fall under gain of function without falling under further
regulation. I know where you're going and you're not going to
get there, but go ahead. According to EcoHealth's Year 5 Progress Report, they facilitated an experiment in Wuhan that had seven mice infected with Wuhan Insutivorology, one as the backbone, five survived, then eight mice were infected with a chimera of with one and the spike from another virus, and two survived in EcoHealth's own words. These results suggest that the pathogenicity of that full length chimera is higher than others. Right. You were asked today, and it was read back to you a little bit, but on May 16th, just a few weeks ago, Ms. Lesko asked Dr. Tabak, "Did NIH fund gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology through EcoHealth?" And Dr. Tabak answered, "If you're speaking about the generic term, yes, we did." On May 11th, you were asked a similar question, and you answered, "The NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology." I'm going to ask it, and you can answer it how you want to answer it. According to the broad definition of gain of function research and the definition Dr. Tabak was testifying pursuant to, did NIAID fund gain of function research via EcoHealth in
Wuhan? The broad definition of gain of function, in my mind, is not applicable here and does nothing but confuse the situation, and that is the reason why after three years of deliberation by the bodies, including the NSABB, as well as the national academies, it was decided to make an operative and regulatory definition. If you harken back to the original broad definition, it does nothing but confuse people. And that's the why every time I have mentioned gain of function at the Senate hearing with Senator Paul and the TI and today, the definition that I use is not my personal definition, it's a codified, regulatory, and operative definition made by a body that has nothing to do with
me. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. I now recognize the minority staff for not longer than
30 minutes.
Dr.
Fauci, nice to see you. We've covered many different topics today. We just want to make sure that you have the opportunity to provide your full perspective on any and all of them. Is there anything you'd like to add, clarify, or say about any of the topics we've discussed here
today? We've covered just about everything, but if you come up with something you want to ask me, I'd be happy to try to fill it in, but I think we've been rather extensive today.
I think that's great, and I think we agree, and so with that, we'll yield back to the remainder of
our time. I'd like to yield to the Ranking Member Ruiz for a closing statement, if he would like one.
Dr. Fauci, I'd like to thank you for your testimony today, and I would like to thank you for your decades of service to our nation, especially with the HIV epidemic that our nation suffered through, the pandemic flu, Ebola, Zika, and COVID-19, and your years of research and investment that led to the rapid development of the COVID-19 vaccine that saved millions of lives. Thank you. And over the past four years, you have been personally targeted by extreme narratives about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic and the US government's response to it. They began in force in retaliation to wisdom you offered that contradicted the reckless and dangerous therapeutic recommendations by President Trump, and have remained part of House Republicans' political playbook. These extreme narratives have been the bedrock of the select subcommittees' Republican-led probe and the untenable inferences they've somehow drawn despite the overwhelming evidence that it is inconvenient to those narratives. I want to be clear, the evidence uncovered from more than 425,000 pages of documents and 20 closed-door interviews of current and former federal officials has undermined the extreme narratives behind Republicans' own probe. As I alluded to at the beginning of this hearing, my Democratic colleagues and I are committed to speaking objectively and truthfully about what the evidence shows, and this is what it shows. Dr. Fauci did not fund research through the EchoHealth Alliance grant that caused the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Fauci did not lie about gain-and-function research in Wuhan, China. Dr. Fauci did not orchestrate a campaign to suppress the lab leak theory. These findings are apparent from the evidence. In fact, this much was clear by the time of Dr. Fauci's two-day transcribed interview this past January. In the five months since, the select subcommittee has conducted several more closed-door interviews and reviewed several thousand more pages of documents. This additional evidence, Dr. Fauci's testimony today, has only made Republicans' claims less plausible and more preposterous. And when I was named ranking member of the select subcommittee, I made a commitment to follow the facts in objectively analyzing the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. The select subcommittee is to meaningfully improve our nation's preparedness for future pandemics, then we must take an objective approach to the factual and scientific evidence available to us. The origins of the COVID-19 pandemic remain uncertain. I would like to remind my Republican colleagues that that uncertainty is not an opportunity for them to author fiction for partisan gain. It could have been a lab leak and it could have been an animal transmission. And at the cost of meaningfully advancing our understanding of COVID-19's origins, Republicans have levied extreme allegations of creating SARS-CoV-2 against Dr. Fauci. The result is that Republican's own probe has failed to shed any additional light on a central question for our select subcommittee. In fact, we're actually entering the fourth quarter of this Congress and this select subcommittee on Corona's pandemic. And what have we focused on? It's not an objective investigation on the origin as either a lab leak or animal transmission. We have spent the vast majority of time like in this hearing with Republicans trying to prove that Dr. Fauci and Collins funded research through Echo Health that created the SARS-CoV-2 virus and in order for that to be true, it is dependent on proving the lab leak theory to be true. So it has not been an objective investigation as to whether or not the virus came from a lab or an animal transmission in order to prevent and prepare for the next pandemic. It has been to push this narrative. And this hearing is their climax, their star witness to finally prove their narrative. And they did not do so. Instead of focusing on solutions like fortifying our public health workforce and infrastructure, securing domestic supply chain of vital public health equipment and medications or equipping schools, churches, synagogues, mosques, businesses to safely stay open during the next deadly novel viral pandemic. Instead they focused on accusations without evidence and it seemed like even though the evidence was there that the accusations were false, it did not matter. They still accused him on a cover-up suppressing the truth that he initiated, prompted or edited the proximal origins paper that he funded a gain of research that created the SARS-CoV-2 virus even that he received royalties. You know, his answers today and his transcribed interviews and his countless emails refuted all of this. They always have. And his testimony today did again. But I guess that doesn't matter for the majority. The truth is that there is no evidence to prove this narrative that we spent so much time addressing. Their accusations are without evidence, but it doesn't matter to them. Actually misleading the public is propagating disinformation and it's wrong and dangerous not only because it manufactures distrust in our public health leaders and our public health agencies, but also because it targets Dr. Fauci and other public health officials for violent death threats. Dr. Fauci just said that any time anybody alludes to the false accusation that he created the COVID-19 pandemic, his death threats go up. But irresponsibly and recklessly members on this subcommittee continued to accuse him of that. So for the remaining months of the select subcommittee, I reaffirm my commitment to take a serious, balanced look at the question and the possibilities of whether the novel coronavirus emerged from a lab or from nature. And I emphasize to my colleagues that any uncertainty about those origins is an opportunity for us to work constructively together on forward-looking measures to improve our nation's readiness for future public health threats. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I yield
back. Thank you again, Dr. Fauci. I want to thank you for coming here today. I again, truly appreciate your willingness to come voluntarily before this select committee for both your transcribed interview and hearing today. You know, this hearing was an opportunity to learn about our COVID-19 response and how we can improve and do better. And we did some good things during that, and I'll cite Operation Warp Speed as one of them. It's also an opportunity to more closely examine the office in which you served because there seemed to mean some significant wrongdoings that took place. And I believe that we can make changes and prevent that from happening in the future. That's my goal. It's an opportunity to take a close look about the processes and the procedures in place in our health institutions in the United States. That's our job, is oversight in Congress. That's what we're supposed to do. I don't know what playbook some are talking about because it's been my goal as chairman, and I think you've seen the staff in the same way, to take a hard look at the facts so that we can do better in the future. I know that at the end of the transcribed interview, not only during the interview we talked about other types of vaccines, we may be able to create mucosal vaccines, maybe inhibitors of furin, if there's a furin cleavage site as part of the vaccine. I appreciated that conversation so very much. And at the end, you thanked me for the fairness, and we had the opportunity to share a lot that day. I think what I'm most concerned about as we go forward as a country and from our agencies is that we can be trusted and that we are better in our messaging and talk about clarity. Dr. McCormick today talked about what it was like actually treating COVID patients day in and day out. I had recommended early on that America needed to hear more from doctors that were treating COVID patients, what they were seeing, what was working, what was not working. I compared it to General Schwarzkopf during the Gulf War, everyone tuned in every night to hear what General Schwarzkopf had to say, not the politician, but what the general in charge had to say, and I think that was important, the one who was in the trenches. But look, you know, we've gone back and forth on the definition of gain of function. I think it's been pretty clear what you said was on your mind, and there were two different definitions if you will, a generic definition and an operative regulatory definition. But so, you know, when we go through this, what America hears is that you say NIH did not fund and Dr. Tabak said NIH did fund, clarity matters. I think it would have helped when you were in front of Dr. Paul, Dr. Paul in the Senate if you were clear about what you meant. Even people had never heard of gain of function until this came about. Clarity matters. You know, when we conducted great trials on the vaccines, I thought they were phenomenal. Normally you have 8,000 to 10,000 people. We had about 40,000 people in each one of the trials. And what we knew from the trials is that, one, it saved a lot of lives. That's one thing. We also knew that if you got vaccinated, you could still get COVID. We didn't make that clear to the American people in my mind, and that you could still get sick. And so if someone stands up, not you, but if someone stands up and says if you get vaccinated, you're never going to go to the ICU and you're not going to die, well, that was still happening. So where was the messaging? I wish you would have corrected that right then and there. You know, the president says, oh, maybe we just inject bleach. Well, some people maybe thought that was serious. We made it clear it was not. And that was important. But here we have Operation Warp Speed, which I know firsthand you were working on and you were kind enough to work with the doctors caucus to explain what was going on with Operation Warp Speed. And we have a presidential candidate who says, well, if that's developed, I'm not taking it. And I'm paraphrasing. And then takes it. The American public deserve a lot better from their government. And what should have been a 9/11 moment for this country, this pandemic, was turned into a political nightmare. We need to do better. These are agnostic issues, not political. And I think from what we have learned from you and the TI and here today, there's a lot of things that we can do better. And the grant process being one of them. I mean, if you -- look, when I sign a prescription, I'm responsible for it. Somebody needs to be responsible. And if you're signing for grants but not responsible for it, you just sign it, then you're not responsible for the dollars that are going out. And then maybe it's the advisory committee that needs to be signing the grant so that there's some level of responsibility and responsibility for compliance. I think that's one of the biggest lessons learned through all this. We can do better. America is a great country. We can fix our problems. But we have to take a good hard look at what we did, what we didn't do, be honest with ourselves, be better in our messaging to the American people, especially when it comes to health. And that's why I felt it was very important that we don't do things like mandates, but let patients have a conversation with the doctor that they know and trust, and make sure that we're getting the doctors all the information and data that they need. Some adverse effects of the vaccine, which we've always done, adverse effects of the vaccine to what the vaccine can and can't do, whether you're at risk or not at risk. What are your risks? Those are personal conversations that need to take place. And I look forward to trying to establish a system that does a better job at that. I'm going to conclude and just say thank you once again, Dr. Fauci. As a matter of fact, I'd be glad to have more off-the-record conversations about things we can do in the future, drugs we may be able to develop, treatments we may be able to provide, and vaccines we may be able to produce. And so if you're amenable, I might reach out to you for that, and other scientists as well that may have varying opinions. So again, thank you again for being the witness today. With that and without objection, all members will have five legislative days within which to submit materials and to submit additional written questions for the witnesses, which will be forwarded to the witnesses for their response. If there's no further business without objection, this LEX subcommittee stands adjourned.
Thank you, Mr. President, Dr. Fauci, as well as everyone involved in
the program. [SIDE CONVERSATION]