Former Fox News weathercaster Janice Dean has called Dr. Anthony Fauci a “coward” for pleading the Fifth Amendment during his recent COVID-19 hearing on Capitol Hill.
On Wednesday, July 29, the 85-year-old medical professional refused to testify at his hearing before the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, repeatedly invoking the Fifth Amendment over 100 times.
Fauci, who led the U.S. government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
Fauci, who has been honored with the Stearne Medal for “contribution to medicine in Ireland,” cited what he described as the Republican chairman, Senator Rand Paul’s “obvious obsession with calling for my prosecution” as his reason for invoking the right not to answer questions.
Dean immediately responded to the development.
“It was extremely difficult for me to watch the hearings today to witness a man who, like our former disgraced governor Andrew Cuomo, used a pandemic to enrich himself, lie to the public and decide that fame was more important than the lives of millions of Americans,” Dean told The Post.
Dean, a Canadian-born meteorologist, has been vocal about pandemic policies since losing both her in-laws to COVID-19 in New York nursing homes.
Dean, who lost both her mother-in-law and father-in-law to COVID-19, claimed that Fauci “wanted to be the hero of the COVID 19 pandemic, but instead showed the world what a coward he truly is.”
She elaborated on the impact of his silence.
“His reliance on the Fifth Amendment was another slap in the face of family members who lost loved ones because of failed leadership and his deadly decisions.”
Dean voiced her despair about accountability.
“I fear that there will never be justice for the thousands of parents and grandparents who died alone.”
Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rand Paul released more than a thousand pages of Fauci’s pandemic-era diary days before the committee hearing.
Paul said the diary was filled with a strange “fame fixation.”
Dean was far from the only prominent voice reacting to Fauci’s decision.
When asked about preparing for his final NFL season, Aaron Rodgers said he would “plead the Fifth” and fired back, “I’m going to plead the Fifth. Like that absolute coward, Tony Fauci.”
Sports analyst Stephen A. Smith also weighed in on the controversy.
“As it strictly pertains to the coronavirus pandemic, my attitude is, with you being the face that you have been, you can’t show up on Capitol Hill and plead the Fifth 111 times,” he told NewsNation.
Fauci offered a brief yet blistering opening statement before invoking his Fifth Amendment rights, arguing that Paul’s “obvious obsession with calling for my prosecution” justified his refusal to speak, saying “The sole reason he is calling me before this committee is to get me to say something that could vindicate his repeated public pledges that I end up, in his words, ‘behind bars.'”
The legal and constitutional questions swirled around his decision.
Former President Joe Biden issued Fauci a preemptive pardon for his actions as a public health official between 2014 and 2025, including his role in the federal government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, because Republicans had repeatedly threatened to prosecute or punish Fauci.
Republicans argued that Fauci did not have the right to invoke the Fifth Amendment, citing a preemptive pardon former President Joe Biden issued Fauci.
In the viral moment at the July 29 hearing, Fauci sat before lawmakers and within minutes delivered his prepared statement.
He then went on to invoke the Fifth Amendment to every question he was asked, including questions about what day of the week it was and what color tie he was wearing.
Paul directed Capitol Police to remove Fauci’s lawyer, David Schertler, after he tried to speak without being recognised by the committee.
The hearing lasted roughly three hours as frustrated Republican senators continued peppering him with questions he refused to answer.
The Senate Homeland Security Committee voted to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress along party lines in an 8-5 vote after he declined to answer lawmakers’ questions at a fiery hearing on the origins of the Covid pandemic.