Stephanie Ruhle, host of MS NOW’s “Money, Power, Politics,” stated that her heart was shattered by the Senate hearing featuring former health adviser and director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Anthony Fauci, who refused to answer senators’ questions by invoking the Fifth Amendment over a hundred times.
The vast majority of the questions centered around the COVID-19 pandemic and the actions that were both recommended and taken by Fauci. Network reporter Vaughn Hillyard commented on the hearing, saying, “You can’t revise that history that everybody lived through. And, you know, my grandma, she was in a nursing home at the time. She made it through one round, ended up passing after getting COVID a later time.”
“And there’s a reality that more than a million people died. You can’t revise history for people in that way. And so there’s a certain level of arrogance on the part of some of these Republicans that are asking doctor Fauci these questions, because people in their own families and their own communities had a lived experience that runs counter to what they are trying to hold him seemingly accountable for now,” Hillyard continued.
Ruhle, addressing another panelist, said, “Doctor Gupta, thank you so much. Just seeing your face this morning, Vin, it takes me back. It breaks my heart. I can’t believe we’re back here. I can’t believe we’re relitigating this in the way that we are. I’m grateful that you’re here with us today. I’m thankful you were with us for all of those days during COVID. Thank you so much.”
Republicans on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee used their time to rip into Fauci’s recommendations during the pandemic, accusing him of providing advice that turned out to be harmful, such as advising lockdowns and not being forthright about the true origins of the coronavirus, a report from NBC News said.
Unsurprisingly, radical left-wing Democrats rushed to the former NIAID director’s defense, attempting to craft a narrative that Republicans were trying to entrap Fauci into committing perjury. Democrats used the remainder of their time to shred President Donald Trump’s healthcare policies. After going on to invoke the Fifth Amendment a staggering 100 times, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) revealed that there would be a vote next week to hold the doctor in contempt of Congress.
“There’s no risk to perjury if you tell the truth,” Paul went on to say during the hearing. “In fact, he can even admit to not telling the truth in the past. He can admit destroying records. He can admit to, you know, not adequately presenting both sides of equations, which isn’t really a crime. He can admit to anything. The only thing he can’t do is lie again.”
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Fauci delivered an opening statement at the start of the hearing, referring to Paul’s attempts to uncover the truth about COVID-19 and the pandemic as an “obvious obsession with calling for my prosecution.” He then said that Paul’s comments about him are “slanderous.” He also expressed his unhappiness with Paul’s decision to release his personal journal to the public.
Featured Image: screenshot from embedded video