OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Dr. Anthony Fauci has been triggered by Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan who said he is “building a case” to possibly prosecute him for allegedly lying to Congress.
He spoke to CNN anchor Jim Acosta on Sunday about the Republican representative’s comments as well as comments from others that called for his prosecution.
“What’s your response to that?” the host said.
“Well, I mean, there’s no response to that craziness, Jim,” Fauci said. “I mean, prosecute me for what? What what are they talking about? I mean, I wish I could figure out what the heck they were talking about.”
“I think they’re just going off the deep end. That’s the answer to your first question,” the doctor said. “It doesn’t make any sense to say something like that, and it actually is irresponsible.”
He went on to say that the attacks on him from Republicans have caused he and his family to receive death threats.
“Of course, it’s going to have a difficult effect and a deleterious effect on my family. I mean, they don’t like to have me getting death threats all the time,” Fauci said.
“Every time somebody gets up and spouts some nonsense that’s misinformation, disinformation, and outright lies, somebody somewhere decides they want to do harm to me and or my family,” he said.
“So that’s the part about it that is really unfortunate. The rest of it is just insanity, the things they’re saying.
“But it does have a negative effect when people take it seriously and take it out on you and your family, which is the reason why I still have to have protection, which is really unfortunate,” he said.
Acosta: You've been vilified on the far right. We’ve seen Elon Musk tweet that his pronouns are prosecute Fauci.
Fauci: There's no response to that craziness. Prosecute me for what? What are they talking about? pic.twitter.com/88q7AFDJ9n— Acyn (@Acyn) March 11, 2023
Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, the head of the House Judiciary Committee has a bomb that is set to be dropped on Dr. Anthony Fauci and it sounds like he is going to need an attorney.
The representative is said to be “building a case” against the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
“So, specifically before your committee, and also before Rand Paul over in the Senate, Dr. Fauci has, of course, absolved himself of all funding of gain-of-function,” conservative podcaster Benny Johnson said in an interview with Jordan. “He said he doesn’t know anything about it. It is verifiable and demonstrable that he lied. Now, there are codes in Congress. I have a code right here, 18 U.S. Code 1001.”
“1001,” Jordan responded, according to Trending Politics.
“Statements — false statements to Congress,” Johnson noted. “Says you can be imprisoned, says you can be imprisoned for eight years if you lie to Congress. It seems like there has never been a more clear-cut case of some individual lying to Congress.”
“Yeah, we can do — there could be a referral, but you would refer to the Biden Justice Department,” Jordan responded. “I don’t know that — they’re going to pursue that, but you can definitely do that. You could, have to have one of the committees, the Senate Judiciary Committee could do a referral. I doubt they will with the Democrats in charge.”
“We could do a referral potentially,” the Ohio Republican continued. “I would, frankly, prefer just to have Dr. Fauci come back in and take another round of questions here, but we’re building the case. You know, like, we had Dr. Redfield testify last week, Chairman Wenstrup did. I thought he was — I thought he was great. As were the other witnesses that were brought in.”
🚨BREAKING: Rep. @Jim_Jordan on Dr. Fauci’s lies before Congress: "We’re building the case" for criminal referrals.
SUBSCRIBE to The Benny Show: https://t.co/eFopXPngL4 pic.twitter.com/UNyxSqOuU8
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) March 10, 2023
“So, again, laying that foundation,” he continued. “I do think Dr. Fauci and the CDC changed the definition of gain-of-function research, so that Fauci has, like, this wiggle room, but they were juicing up this virus, no doubt about it, juicing up this virus, making it more — I don’t know the technical, but making it juiced up and more deadly, I guess, maybe the correct word.”
“Yes,” Johnson responded.
“So, they were doing that in this lab and I think that’s clear,” Jordan said. “So, we’ll just have to see as we move through this investigation.”
