Haisten Willis writes for the Washington Examiner about the political impact of Dr. Anthony Fauci’s return to the public spotlight.
Fauci, who for many was the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, retired in late 2022, but he has been dragged into a scandal involving his former aide David Morens, who bragged in subpoenaed emails about skirting open records laws for information related to the virus’s origins.
House Republicans, and some Democrats, will grill the doctor before the cameras on June 3 as they seek his phone and email records, but the renewed interest in Fauci may be bring back unpleasant memories for both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., for example, used an appearance at last weekend’s Libertarian National Convention to attack Trump’s pandemic response.
“He was initially very reluctant to impose lockdowns, but then he got rolled by his bureaucrats,” Kennedy said. “He caved in, and many of our most fundamental rights disappeared practically overnight.”
Trump campaign press secretary Karoline Leavitt snapped back, calling Kennedy a “radical leftist and environmental whack job” who loves electric vehicle mandates and hates the National Rifle Association. Meanwhile, Trump is working to distance himself from Fauci.
“Fauci wasn’t a big player in my administration like he was after I left,” Trump told podcaster Tim Pool. “Biden made him the king of everything.”
The Trump campaign may have to field more Fauci-related questions amid his testimony to Congress and his book On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service, which will be released on June 18 and likely provide Fauci with a new round of press interviews.
Biden won the 2020 race largely on his pandemic messaging, and he’s reminding voters of that fact this year.
“[Trump] recently asked the infamous question: Are you better off today than you were four years ago? Well, Donald, I’m glad you asked the question,” Biden said during a New York fundraiser on March 29. “I hope everyone in this country takes a moment to think back to where you were in March of 2020. And, you know, COVID came to America. Trump was president. He tried to downplay the whole virus. … He told Americans to inject bleach.”
