Willie R. Tubbs, FISM News
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Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Biden medical adviser Anthony Fauci were at odds again Wednesday, extending their now years-long feud over Fauci and other health officials’ handling of the pandemic.
Based on what Paul promised in this latest showdown, the saga will only intensify if Republicans get their wish come November.
During a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing, one ostensibly about the federal government’s response to monkeypox, Paul turned what was meant to be a question directed toward Fauci into something more resembling a warning about what would happen to Fauci in a Republican-led Senate.
At issue was Fauci’s failure, in the opinion of the Republican senator, to sufficiently answer questions about potential conflicts of interest among members of national vaccine committees and the pharmaceutical companies who developed the nation’s COVID vaccines.
“We’ve been asking you and you refused to answer whether anybody on the vaccine committees gets royalties from the pharmaceutical companies,” Paul said.
I asked you last time, and what was your response? We don’t have to tell you. We’ve demanded them through the Freedom of Information Act. And what have you said? We’re not going to tell you. But I tell you this, when we get in charge, we’re going to change the rules and you will have to divulge where you get your royalties from, from what companies, and if anybody in the committee has a conflict of interest, we’re going to learn about it. I promise you that.
Fauci indicated his refusal to answer is due to the committees to which Paul refers being outside of his oversight. Specifically, Fauci said, the committees would fall under the purview of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration.
This response did not deter Paul, who complained that Fauci had not answered a direct question about whether he had entered into any royalty agreements with pharmaceutical companies.
“They are not my committees,” Fauci said.
Paul and Fauci have long clashed over the latter’s advocacy for lockdowns, vaccinations, and more as the nation sought to respond to COVID.
Paul also lodged complaints about Fauci and the CDC’s insistence on vaccinations against COVID even for people who have contracted and recovered from the disease. The senator from Kentucky played a video at the beginning of his line of questioning in an effort to point out Fauci has blindly pushed the vaccine regardless that it goes against his previous understanding of natural immunity.
In the video from 2004, Fauci responded to a question about whether an individual needed the flu vaccine, by saying, “She doesn’t need it because it’s the most important vaccination – is getting infected yourself.”
Fauci said he believed that natural immunity had value but that vaccinations give “an added extra boost” to people’s physiological response to COVID.
The full exchange can be viewed here:
Complete exchange between Sen. @RandPaul and Dr. Anthony Fauci at Monkeypox hearing.
Sen. Paul plays @cspanwj clip of Dr. Fauci.
Fauci: "That film that you showed was really taken out of context…Reuters fact-checked, looked at that…"
Paul: "Actually, words don't lie." pic.twitter.com/d9tvNtli87
— CSPAN (@cspan) September 14, 2022