Bernie Moreno

WASHINGTON - U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno delivered an expletive-laden tirade to former COVID czar Anthony Fauci at a Wednesday congressional hearing, telling him that outrage over pandemic-era restrictions spurred the Westlake Republican to seek public office and asking the retired immunologist “Who the (expletive) do you think you were” for imposing them.

Moreno’s outburst came during a Wednesday Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing where Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right instead of answering questions about the origins of the COVID-19 virus and his handling of the pandemic. Committee members including Moreno used their time to make political points.

Moreno began by asking Fauci about his attorney David Schertler, who committee chair Rand Paul ejected from the hearing for attempting to speak on Fauci’s behalf. Moreno described him as a “high-profile criminal attorney” who has represented other high-profile clients facing federal charges.

Citing an article that said “if you’re in deep (expletive), that’s who you call,” Moreno asked Fauci: “Do you feel like you’re in deep (expletive)?”

Fauci dutifully answered: “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution.”

“Clearly, what you think today is that somehow you’re above reproach,” Moreno responded. “Somehow you feel like you don’t need to be treated like a normal American.”

He then asked members of the audience, who included Fox News host Laura Ingraham, to stand up if they “were called a racist for calling the virus a Wuhan virus or the China virus,” or thought they shouldn’t take the vaccine, that “the six foot rule was total crap,” and “closing schools was catastrophically stupid, and that you thought that during these times saying these things made you somehow a lesser human being.”

Fauci rejected Moreno’s entreaty to “just turn around and look at the people behind you.”

He then recalled the case of a woman in Marietta, Ohio who was arrested for refusing to wear a mask at a youth football game, because of policies put in place “because you had moronic politicians that listened to the words of a man who was more interested in having met a Kardashian than the suffering of the American people, and that is you.”

He said the arrest made him decide to run for public office.

“Here I am sitting in front of you six years later, saying, “Who the (expletive) do you think you were for doing that? It is a total disgrace what you did” before asking Fauci to “apologize to the people who you harmed through your actions.”

Fauci again declined to answer.

“James Madison lived in this town,” said Moreno, referring to the author of the U.S. Constitution. “I could only wonder what he would think of somebody like you invoking his writings to shield culpability for the actions that you took. It’s no secret why you have to hire the biggest dirtbag attorney on the planet, paying him well. And I hope that one way or the other, somewhere, sometime, you answer for your crimes.”

Before he declined to answer the committee’s questions, Fauci delivered a statement that said he’d testified before Congress well over 200 times during his 38 years as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. He said much of that testimony included providing on-the-record answers to questions about the COVID-19 pandemic.

Paul, a Kentucky Republican, has repeatedly argued Fauci should be jailed, and said on social media that a pardon President Joe Biden gave Fauci before he left office to prevent vengeful prosecution by the Trump administration wouldn’t shield him from criminal charges if lies to Congress now.

“Given Senator Paul’s obvious obsession with calling for my prosecution, his repeated slanderous comments about me, and recently, his publicly releasing my unredacted diary aimed at embarrassing and intimidating me, 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,’” said Fauci.

“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 of the Constitution to refrain from answering your questions,” Fauci told the committee.

The committee’s top Democrat, Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, called the hearing “a culmination of months of biased and selected efforts by the majority” designed “to basically legitimize a predetermined conclusion that was reached years ago.” He said “one-sided investigations designed to validate predetermined conclusions do not serve the American people” and predicted the hearing “will not... make Americans safer.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, called the hearing another page in the Trump administration’s effort “to rewrite this history” of the pandemic. He called it “shameful that in a country like ours, a dedicated public servant like Dr. Fauci has experienced persistent threats to his life since the pandemic because of the lies that are told about him,” and called the proceeding “an insult to the memory of more than 1 million Americans who died from COVID-19.”

Paul opened by arguing Fauci bears direct responsibility for pandemic-era lockdowns, even though he never personally signed a single order.

“Presidents, governors, mayors, school boards, corporations, and Congress all bear responsibility for the decisions they made,” Paul said. “The COVID lockdown, however, could never have been inflicted without you aiding and abetting the crime.”

He cited Fauci’s own diary entries showing he pushed New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio to close schools and that California Governor Gavin Newsom’s chief of staff told Fauci the governor shut down schools, bars and restaurants after watching him on television.

“While you did not impose every restriction, you used your public authority to justify them,” Paul said.

Paul dismissed Biden’s pardon, saying it “may protect a person from criminal prosecution” but “doesn’t rewrite history” and “does not convert a misleading statement into a truthful one.”

Paul closed the hearing by describing it as “the capstone to 40 years of abuse of power at NIH,” and hypothesized that “Fauci believes he got away with it.”

He asked if Fauci even wondered if his actions “led to the largest man-made plague in human history.”

Paul argued history will “paint a sordid tale of dishonesty, misjudgment, and ultimately a hubris the likes of which the world has rarely seen.”