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July 29, 2026 ~ Fox News Correspondent and WJR Contributor Jeff Monosso joins Kevin Dietz with the latest from Washington as Dr. Anthony Fauci testifies on the origins of COVID-19 and lawmakers continue to examine how the pandemic began.
WASHINGTON D.C. ~ In a dramatic Senate hearing Wednesday morning, Anthony Fauci, the former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, invoked his Fifth Amendment right to refuse to answer questions about the COVID-19 pandemic.
Fauci, who oversaw the country’s response to the pandemic that began in 2020, has been in a heated feud with Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) over his response to the pandemic and the origin of the COVID-19 virus, which escalated over the past week after Paul released over 1,000 pages from Paul’s personal diary he wrote during the pandemic. Paul continued to ask Fauci questions at the Senate Homeland Security panel hearing, despite his refusal to answer questions, even removing his lawyer from the hearing room.
“The only conclusion I can reach is that the sole reason he is calling me before this committee is to get me to say something, anything that could vindicate his repeated public pledges that I end up, in his words, ‘behind bars,’” Fauci said. “Any reasonable person who has followed his unhinged obsession with me would readily come to the same conclusion. Therefore, although it pains me to do so because of the respect I have for the legislative branch of government and my decades-long record of cooperating with Congress under the advice of my attorneys, I will invoke my right under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution to refrain from answering your questions.”
Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI) blasted Paul at the hearing for “relitigating the past” with Fauci, and warned that the attacks on the former health leader will deter scientists from joining public health institutions in the future.
Paul later told NewsNation he was surprised that Fauci wouldn’t answer his questions at the hearing due to a pre-emptive pardon he received from former President Joe Biden. The former president pardoned Fauci on his final day in office to excuse him for any potential federal offenses between Jan. 1, 2014, and Jan. 19, 2025.
