WASHINGTON, D.C. – In a Thursday appearance on “Fox & Friends,” Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) continued airing his grievances against National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Dr. Anthony Fauci, accusing him of funding the Wuhan, China lab that allegedly created COVID-19 and even holding Fauci potentially responsible for the entire pandemic itself.
Paul has repeatedly bashed Fauci’s role in approving a grant for EcoHealth, a private U.S. research company, which then provided a sub-grant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) to conduct research on bat coronavirus.
While on “Fox & Friends,” Paul alleged that Fauci “knows his group gave money, but he’s saying, ‘Oh, it wasn’t for juicing up these super viruses. We gave it for other research.’”
“It’s sort of like the Planned Parenthood argument, ‘Yes, we give taxpayer money to Planned Parenthood, but it’s not for abortion,’” Paul said. “Dr. Fauci is arguing, ‘Yeah, the NIH and my group specifically gave it to the Wuhan lab, but they weren’t supposed to be juicing up viruses.’”
Paul alleges that the Wuhan sub-grant funded “gain of function” research, which involves making pathogens mutate and become more deadly in an attempt to get a head-start on future pandemics, something that Fauci has repeatedly denied.
However, Paul said that if Fauci – even indirectly via a sub-grant – had provided funding to the Chinese lab that allegedly created and possibly “leaked” COVID-19, then he deserved the lion’s share of the blame for the resulting pandemic.
“So [Fauci] gave the money to EcoHealth. The head of EcoHealth – they got him to investigate whether Wuhan was doing anything inappropriate in their lab. But if they were then wouldn’t he be culpable?” Paul asked. “Ultimately here’s the rub. I don’t know whether it came from the lab. But who could be culpable? Dr. Fauci could be culpable for the entire pandemic!”
Paul and Fauci have had a combative relationship for some time; most recently, the two came to verbal blows at this past Tuesday’s Senate hearing.
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