Former US Coronavirus czar Dr. Anthony Fauci was hauled before Congress on Wednesday to testify on the origins of Covid-19. Fauci repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment right to silence, but RT kept the receipts.

Fauci appeared before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, in a hearing orchestrated by Senator Rand Paul. A Kentucky Republican and vocal critic of Fauci’s handling of the pandemic, Paul released thousands of pages from Fauci’s personal diaries over the weekend, which suggested that the Covid chief knew the virus did not originate in a ‘wet market’ in Wuhan, China, but insisted in public that it did.

Former US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has also released documents suggesting that Fauci pushed the wet market theory in meetings with the intelligence community, before denying under oath that he ever held such discussions.

“I hope today Dr. Fauci will come clean, admit it was a mistake to fund dangerous research in China, admit that the risk of this dangerous research exceeded any possible benefits, ask forgiveness, and pledge to help our government devise safeguards so a manmade epidemic never happens again,” Paul said in his opening statement at Wednesday’s hearing.

Any hopes that Paul would get answers, however, were dashed when Fauci pleaded the Fifth more than 100 times during questioning from Paul and other Republicans on the committee.

Here’s what Fauci was asked, and what the record shows.

Fauci was asked multiple times whether Covid-19 originated in a laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology; whether he was aware that the virus bore the hallmarks of gene editing; and whether he knew that the lab had more than 100 man-made viruses in storage that could have been precursors to Covid-19.

Fauci, who led the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) from 1984 to 2022, gave the same answer to every question: “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution.”

Based on Fauci’s own diary, he believed in January 2020 that “the market was not the source, it was the amplifier.”After a call with a dozen government scientists on February 1, Fauci remarked that the group was split, with only two believing the wet market theory, and the rest believing that a lab leak was more likely. Fauci insisted on the wet market theory, and on April 17 publicly declared that the virus was “totally consistent” with a natural species jump. He reiterated this point in a National Geographic interview in May, stating “everything about the stepwise evolution over time strongly indicates that it evolved in nature and then jumped species.”

It has not been conclusively proven that Covid-19 was created at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, but the lab leak theory is now the official position of the White House.

Fauci shot down any questions concerning his own role in coronavirus research in Wuhan. He has previously testified under oath that the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the parent organization of Fauci’s NIAID, did not conduct “gain-of-function” research into bat-borne coronaviruses at the Wuhan lab.

However, documents released in 2021 and 2022 prove that the NIH paid a private firm, EcoHealth Alliance, to conduct this research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and that some of this money was doled out even after the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) rejected the proposal as overly risky.

In a 2020 email, Fauci stated that he knew gain-of-function research was being carried out at the lab. The NIH’s role in funding research on bate-borne coronaviruses specifically is described in publicly available grant information, although the words “gain-of-function” are not used in the grant proposal.

Gain-of-function research refers to the process of modifying animal viruses to make them more likely to infect humans, in order to weaponize them or develop vaccines against them.

Paul asked Fauci whether he was aware of gain-of-function research on the monkeypox virus at the NIAID’s ‘Integrated Research Facility’ in Fort Detrick, Maryland. Fauci stayed silent, but monkeypox has been studied at the facility for years.

In 2015, the facility – which also experiments with highly lethal pathogens like ebola – conducted research that boosted the transmissibility and virulence of monkeypox, although the NIAID never referred to this research as ‘gain-of-function’. After a worldwide outbreak of monkeypox in 2022 – which primarily affected gay men – research on the virus continued at Fort Detrick under the supervision of the US Army until the facility was shut down last April over repeated safety violations.

One week later, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order banning “dangerous gain-of-function research” in foreign labs, and pausing funding for such projects on US soil. In guidance released on Tuesday, the White House made the funding pause permanent, and issued new reporting requirements for all “projects that may increase the harmful consequences of biological agents.”

Paul asked Fauci whether the NIH had ever received funds from the CIA, and whether the NIH had ever conducted research “for or in coordination with” the CIA or Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI).

The CIA funded bioweapons research at Fort Detrick, under ‘Project MKNAOMI’, although the project was shut down in 1976, a decade before Fauci took over leadership of the NIAID. While the extent of the CIA’s subsequent involvement in gain-of-function research is unclear, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) – often characterized as a CIA cutout – did fund such research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. In testimony to Congress in 2024, however, former USAID Administrator Samantha Power refused to label the research ‘gain-of-function’.

Paul claimed on Wednesday that “the CIA transferred funds to NIAID through interagency agreement,”and submitted documents purportedly proving this claim. The documents have not been made public.

Fauci received a pardon from former President Joe Biden last January, shielding the former NIAID chief from prosecution over any offense committed between January 1, 2014 and January 20, 2025. Given the pardon, Republicans argued that Fauci had no grounds to plead the Fifth and shield himself from self-incrimination.

However, as the hearing took place after January 20, 2025, Fauci could have opened himself up to obstruction or contempt charges by giving false answers.

“It’s against the law to obstruct an investigation of Congress. There will be repercussions for your refusal to testify,” Paul told Fauci as the two-hour hearing wrapped up. Afterwards, Paul told reporters that the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will vote next week on whether to hold Fauci in contempt of Congress.

“We believe that with his… immunity from criminal liability, that he didn’t need to hide behind the Fifth Amendment and that maybe the Fifth Amendment doesn’t attach when you have a pardon in place,”Paul explained.

https://www.rt.com/news/643637-fauci-covid-hearing-rand-paul/

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Republican Senator Josh Hawley has grilled Anthony Fauci for nine straight minutes over allegations he enriched himself during the COVID-19 pandemic as the former NIAID director repeatedly pleaded the Fifth.

On Wednesday, Fauci faced a Senate hearing on COVID-19 and the virus’ origins and pleaded the Fifth Amendment over 100 times.

The Fifth Amendment of the US Constitution asserts nobody can be “compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself”.

Hawley alleged Fauci used federal employees and government resources to solicit and secure more than a million dollars in cash awards during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Among the awards cited was the Dan David Prize, with Hawley claiming Fauci turned his staff into a "full-time application machine" to pursue the honours.

"A million people dead, and you're getting rich," Hawley said. "A million people dead, you're using federal employees to get cash awards for you."

Fauci, whose net worth Hawley placed at over $US12 million, declined to answer virtually every question, instead invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

Hawley argued Fauci had no right to plead the Fifth, citing a prior presidential pardon and the Supreme Court case Brown v. Walker.

He called Fauci's repeated invocations "contempt for this body and contempt for the American people."

Hawley closed his nine minutes by delivering a final verdict on the former NIAID director, labelling him a "narcissist" and a "megalomaniac".