US Senate Panel Votes to Hold Fauci in Contempt of Congress

A US Senate panel has voted along party lines to hold Dr Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress, after the 85-year-old career government scientist declined to answer questions from Republican senators.

On the advice of his lawyers, Fauci last week invoked his constitutional right to stay silent to prevent self-incrimination under antagonistic questioning, as senators probed him over unsubstantiated claims that the origins of the pandemic were covered up.

The move stems from an initiative by Republican senator Rand Paul, who had subpoenaed the now-retired Fauci to testify before the Senate Homeland Security Committee. Before the hearing, Paul released thousands of pages of the immunologist's personal diary.

Fauci indicated his lawyers believed Paul intended to entrap him in a slip-up that could result in perjury charges, so he opted to invoke his Fifth Amendment right not to answer.

Paul, the committee's chairman, has signalled he intends to send the panel's recommendation straight to the justice department, which can decide whether to take the case. Contempt resolutions generally go through the full Senate, and bypassing that route would bring fresh scrutiny on accusations that President Donald Trump's administration aims to persecute its perceived political foes.

Democrats on the panel voiced disdain over the vote, with senator Gary Peters accusing Paul of a "rushed investigation". He said the vote could "harm our ability to conduct future investigations and disregards constitutional protections long recognized by the US Senate, all without making a reliable case that there is a legal basis for holding Dr Fauci in contempt".

Paul has charged that under Fauci's watch at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, US-funded "gain-of-function" research in China triggered the spread of Covid-19, and that Fauci lied about it to Congress — an allegation Fauci has repeatedly denied. Fauci has maintained the virus had natural origins, while saying he is open to the idea of a lab leak.

Paul now says Fauci is ineligible for Fifth Amendment protection because former president Joe Biden granted him an unconditional pardon for public service actions from 2014 through Jan 19, 2025. Republicans say the pardon already protected him from perjury, but legal scholars are split, opening a murky legal maze pitting the reach of a presidential pardon against the scope of the Fifth Amendment.

Law professor Tracey Maclin of the University of Florida told AFP that if the panel had truly wanted Fauci to speak frankly, it would have offered him immunity. Several Democrats unsuccessfully pushed to delay the vote to hear from legal experts.

Two Trump advisers from his first term, Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, served prison time for failing to comply with congressional subpoenas — though they refused to appear rather than plead the Fifth.