WASHINGTON--Republican U.S. Senator Rand Paul on Thursday asked the Justice Department to prosecute Dr. Anthony Fauci for refusing to answer questions about the COVID-19 pandemic after a Senate committee voted to hold the former top infectious disease official in contempt of Congress.
Paul sent the referral after the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which he chairs, approved a contempt resolution on a party-line vote with Republicans in favour and Democrats opposed. The resolution accuses Fauci, 85, of failing to obey a congressional subpoena.
The move followed a hearing last week where Fauci, who retired in 2022 as the head of the national infectious-disease agency and a presidential adviser, invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination more than 100 times.
Paul sent the referral, a formal request to consider criminal charges, after the contempt finding. But the Kentucky senator, a longtime Fauci antagonist, bypassed a referral vote by the full Senate.
He described a full Senate vote as unnecessary. Democrats said Paul was violating Senate rules by skipping the vote, which would likely fail to achieve the necessary 60-vote majority, and called the move dangerous and unprecedented.
A Justice Department spokesperson confirmed copies of the referral had been sent to the DOJ leadership and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, D.C. "We have received the document, we are reviewing it and will work with the Senate accordingly," the spokesperson said.
The development was the sharpest escalation yet in a broad Republican and Trump administration campaign to re-litigate the pandemic and assign blame for the toll of actions taken as part of the U.S. response. President Donald Trump said the Justice Department should potentially prosecute Fauci, comparing him to allies Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon, who both served four months in prison for contempt of Congress after defying subpoenas.
"Maybe he should. What he did was far more serious than a lot of crimes, frankly," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked if Fauci should be prosecuted.
Contempt of Congress, a federal misdemeanor, can be punished with a fine of up to $100,000 and up to 12 months in prison. Fauci's attorney, David Schertler, said Thursday's vote was "a crude political stunt intended to punish Dr. Fauci for exercising his constitutional rights."
"Dr. Fauci has committed no crime — and Senator Paul knows it," Schertler said, describing the resolution as a continuation of a "personal vendetta."
