Samuel Case, FISM News
In the fiercest clash yet; Dr. Anthony Fauci and Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) accused one another of lying in a heated exchange.
“Dr. Fauci, as you are aware, it is a crime to lie to Congress,” Paul said in the opening exchange with Fauci. The senator noted that during their previous exchange Fauci had contended that “the NIH (National Institutes of Health) has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.” Paul then referenced a paper by a researcher at the Wuhan Virology Lab that said NIH funded coronavirus research. He then offered Fauci a retraction.
“I have never lied before the Congress, and I do not retract that statement,” Dr. Fauci fired back, saying that the research in that paper did not amount to gain-of-function. “Senator Paul, you do not know what you are talking about, quite frankly, and I want to say that officially. You do not know what you are talking about!”
Paul disputed Fauci’s claim that it was not gain-of-function research, as it dealt with increasing animal viruses’ transmissibility to humans.
Fauci, becoming increasingly angry, called it a lie that NIH funding resulted in the COVID-19 pandemic. “You are implying that what we did was responsible for the deaths of individuals. I totally resent that.”
Senator Paul denied he was implying that NIH funded research into the coronavirus responsible for the pandemic, but instead that “the evidence is pointing that it came from the lab, and there will be responsibility for those who funded the lab, including yourself.”
The exchange ended with Fauci saying “If anybody is lying here, senator, it is you.”
Watch the full exchange: