In a searing letter, several Republican attorneys general made the case that President Trump could hold Dr. Anthony Fauci responsible for his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, with statewide prosecutors from South Carolina, Texas, and several other states asking Congress to help them investigate, and potentially prosecute, Fauci.
For context, in a letter addressed to Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), more than a dozen Republican attorneys general asked for cooperation from Congress in investigating “violations of state law or breaches of public trust” associated with Anthony Fauci’s response to COVID-19, seeking to counteract a presidential pardon granted to Fauci by Biden, which protects the former NIH director from being prosecuted.
Furthermore, the letter, which was sent on February 5, 2025, points to several specific instances that could be grounds for an investigation into Fauci and other NIH personnel, including the possibility that “high-ranking medical officials may have misled the public about COVID-19’s origins in at least two ways.” The letter went on to suggest that while working as head of the NIH, Dr. Fauci “‘prompted’ a ‘Proximal Origin’ theory of COVID-19’s origins, which was meant to disprove a ‘lab leak theory.'”
Continuing, the attorneys general contended that Dr. Fauci had arguably misled the general public, saying, “The weight of the evidence increasingly supports a lab leak hypothesis, and Dr. Fauci’s potential involvement in attempting to discredit that hypothesis is troubling.” In addition, the attorneys general argued that Dr. Fauci had also possibly misled Congress “about the National Institutes of Health’s funding of gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”
Building on this point, the attorneys general pointed out that Dr. Fauci told Congress that while being questioned by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), “denied that such funding was occurring three times,” but that members of a House subcommittee had disproved Dr. Fauci’s statements by confirming “that such research was indeed funded through the EcoHealth Alliance, directly contradicting Dr. Fauci’s statements.” The attorneys general added, “The possibility of perjury or at least a significant lack of transparency demands attention.”
Moreover, the attorneys general pointed to Dr. Fauci’s “oversight failures” while acting as head of the NIH, citing “a significant lapse in the oversight of NIH grants, particularly those awarded to the EcoHealth Alliance,” while Dr. Fauci was in charge. The letter argued that the lack of oversight pointed to “mismanagement or negligence” on Dr. Fauci’s part, adding, “Indeed, multitudes of findings from Congress show that American tax dollars went directly to this research without proper scrutiny from the NIH.
Concluding their letter, the attorneys general made a case for an investigation into Dr. Fauci, criticizing former President Biden for issuing “a sweeping full and unconditional pardon for Dr. Fauci for ‘any offenses which he may have committed or taken part in during the period of time from January 1, 2024, through the date’ of the pardon.”
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The letter was signed by Attorneys General Alan Wilson of South Carolina, Jonathan Skrmetti of Tennessee, John Guard of Florida, Liz Murrill of Lousiana, Ken Paxton of Texas, Steve Marshall of Alabama, Raul Labrador of Idaho, Drew Wrigley of North Dakota, Derek E. Brown of Utah, and eight other attorneys general from additional red states.
Watch AG Wilson comment on Biden’s pardoning of Fauci:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video