Republican Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky fired back Sunday against Dr. Anthony Fauci’s “I represent science” assertion made during an interview with CBS.
Fauci gave an interview Sunday to CBS’s “Face the Nation,” where he addressed the efforts of Republican lawmakers aimed at prosecuting him for allegedly lying to Congress about National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding gain-of-function research.
“That’s okay. I’m just gonna do my job. And I’m gonna be saving lives, and they’re gonna be lying,” Fauci said, accusing his opponents of launching attacks that had a “distinct anti-science flavor.”
“They’re really criticizing science because I represent science. That’s dangerous,” he claimed. (RELATED: ‘If He’s Going To Be Dishonest, He Ought To Be Challenged’: Rand Paul Fires Back After He’s Scolded For Interrupting Fauci)
Lawmakers like Sens. Rand Paul and Ted Cruz have called for Dr. Fauci to step down and be prosecuted over the course of COVID-19. Fauci scoffs at such threats, calling it “noise.”
“They’re really criticizing science because I represent science. That’s dangerous.” pic.twitter.com/zLzceD2DHe
— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) November 28, 2021
Paul pushed back against the White House chief medical advisor’s assertions, saying that the “public health bureaucrat” could not represent science, as he had “worked so hard to ignore the science of natural immunity.”
“The absolute hubris of someone claiming THEY represent science,” Paul wrote in the Sunday tweet. “It’s astounding and alarming that a public health bureaucrat would even think to claim such a thing.”
The absolute hubris of someone claiming THEY represent science. It’s astounding and alarming that a public health bureaucrat would even think to claim such a thing, especially one who has worked so hard to ignore the science of natural immunity. https://t.co/rcDezphVRR
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) November 28, 2021
Cruz similarly slammed Fauci’s claim, noting that this type of self-adulatory attitude was praised in the “liberal world” where he lived.
“Fauci is an unelected technocrat who has distorted science and facts in order to exercise authoritarian control over millions of Americans,” Cruz tweeted Sunday.
Fauci is an unelected technocrat who has distorted science and facts in order to exercise authoritarian control over millions of Americans.
He lives in a liberal world where his smug “I REPRESENT science” attitude is praised.
Here are the facts:
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) November 28, 2021
The Texas senator then posted a thread of tweets, explaining the reasoning behind his calls for prosecution of the public health official.
Cruz reiterated that Fauci’s early May testimony in Congress ran contrary to the October letter by NIH Principal Deputy Director Lawrence Tabak, in which he admitted that his agency funded gain-of-function research in China.
“Fauci’s statement and the NIH’s October 20 letter cannot both be true. The statements are directly contradictory,” he wrote. “18 USC 1001 makes it felony, punishable by up to 5 years in prison, to lie to Congress.”