“I am happy to testify before Congress,” former Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci said in a 2022 CNN interview. Four years later, this sentiment did not hold true for the doctor when he sat in a Senate hearing, pleading the Fifth Amendment to every single question asked of him Wednesday. 

Fauci refused to answer at least 110 times, igniting a firestorm in the hearing room as well as on social media. The former Chief Medical Advisor to the president faced interrogation after his diary entries between December 2019 and December 2022 were retrieved from government servers and made public. In the entries, Fauci’s inner thoughts are not consistent with his public messaging at the time. GOP senators such as Rand Paul (R-Ky.) are accusing Fauci of being dishonest about the origin of COVID-19, as well as its fatality rate during the early months of the virus. 

At the start of the hearing, Paul called for one of Fauci’s attorneys to be removed from the room, for repeatedly speaking out of turn despite being asked to stop.

“His lawyers can give him advice. He’s got a half dozen here. They’re all allowed to talk to him, alright? But the attorneys are not recognized,” Paul declared. “In fact, the attorney was told not to sit at the table, and he’s not obeying that recommendation. There’s a row behind you, sir. That’s where you were told to sit, and you’re not. And now you’re disrupting the proceedings. This is the way Anthony Fauci wants to be remembered for a lawyer not listening to the rules. That’s the way you want to be remembered, and that’s what you’re going to do.”

Fauci accused Paul of seeking his downfall, saying the senator has an “obvious obsession with calling for my prosecution, his repeated slanderous comments about me.” 

During his final hours in office in 2025, former President Joe Biden pardoned Fauci.

“As I said a couple of days ago, the most likely outcome we would see today was Fauci pleading the [F]ifth a lot,” posted Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham on X. “He knows very well if he lies under oath today, his Biden pardon will not cover that. So suddenly he’s going to be a lot more careful.”

Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) did not waste any breath in addressing the disgraced doctor. “This isn’t about the law. This is about contempt, contempt for this body and contempt for the American people,” Hawley argued. “But I think I know why you’re doing it. It’s because you don’t want to answer questions. It’s because you did all kinds of terrible things. It’s because during the pandemic, you got rich… while people were dying.”

Senator John Fetterman (D-Pa.), famous for wearing a sweatshirt and gym shorts most of the time, wore a suit to the hearing. “Early on, there was the theory that the virus could have emerged from the lab. It became a right-wing kind of theory. ... I think we should really be willing to pursue truth no matter where that may have emerged,” he said. 

Media personality and conservative political commentator Isabel Brown took to X to share her feelings after watching the hearing, imparting a personal story. “In March of 2020, someone I was very close to experienced their father becoming suddenly severely ill with a rare autoimmune condition. He was immediately hospitalized, and his beautiful wife and kids were prohibited from remaining with him in the ICU… thanks to the advice of Dr. Fauci,” she posted. 

“… [T]he family was forced to say goodbye, forever, to their father through a Skype call. SKYPE. I held his daughter’s hand while she sobbed through the computer screen, sharing ‘I love you’s’ with her Daddy one last time… thanks to the advice of Dr. Fauci,” she continued. 

The pardon Fauci received cannot protect the former NIHAID director if he lies under oath, and it does not cover congressional investigations, according to Fox News. As Senator Paul warned during the proceedings, “It’s against the law to obstruct an investigation of Congress. There will be repercussions to your refusal to testify today.”

After the hearing, the frustrated Kentuckian told reporters that the chamber will hold the face of COVID responsible. “That’s a vote that will happen in committee next week. It will be in contempt of Congress.”