Dr. Anthony Fauci privately discussed concerns about COVID-19 mRNA vaccines for pregnant women in January 2021, including a theoretical risk of miscarriage during the first trimester, according to newly released text messages on Monday by Sens. Ron Johnson and Rand Paul.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHhDgbiUx9M
The exchange involved Fauci, then-Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky and Dr. Vivek Murthy, who would later become former President Joe Biden’s surgeon general.
Fauci said, because many people experience significant cytokine-related symptoms and fever after a second dose, that reaction “theoretically could be associated with miscarriage in the 1st trimester,” according to the messages.
Walensky replied that it was “definitely a good point, esp after dose two.”
Murthy then wrote that he had been hearing concerns about mRNA causing mutations in a developing fetus and said Fauci’s point about a cytokine response after the second dose was “a really good point.”
The timing of the messages was significant.
The following day, after Murthy flagged a World Health Organization recommendation advising against use of Moderna’s vaccine in pregnant women because of limited data, Fauci emphasized that officials had to weigh the potential risks of vaccination against the risks posed by COVID-19 itself, noting that more than 10,000 pregnant women had already been vaccinated with “no issues” reported, that FDA, Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists guidance allowed pregnant women to choose vaccination, and that animal toxicology studies had not raised red flags.
Murthy responded that the WHO recommendation surprised him and warned that a strong recommendation against vaccination based on a lack of data could be “potentially quite damaging to public confidence among pregnant women,” while Walensky agreed and said she would flag the issue for an upcoming ACIP meeting.
That public pivot came quickly.
Days later,
Fauci received a pardon from President Joe Biden for conduct between 2014 and January 2025 — a pardon that the then-president described as “preemptive” given Republican scrutiny of Fauci.
In the days leading up to a July 29 hearing, Paul released more than 1,000 pages of Fauci’s private diary entries, pointing to them as evidence that he masked private uncertainty about what caused the pandemic.
Fauci refused to answer lawmakers’ questions in that hearing about the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, citing his Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination.
In an opening statement during that hearing, Fauci said that the committee’s chairman, Sen. Rand Paul, has “an unhinged obsession” with him and suggested the hearing was convened in an attempt to trick Fauci into lying under oath.
“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,” Fauci said, “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 he had answered many of their questions already during previous testimony.
An attorney for Fauci, David Schertler, said, “Today’s partisan committee vote is a crude political stunt intended to punish Dr. Fauci for exercising his constitutional rights.”
The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee has voted to hold Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress, with Thursday’s vote along party lines coming after Fauci refused to answer lawmakers’ questions in a hearing about the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, citing his Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination.
The texts were obtained as Republicans intensified their scrutiny.
Sen. Ron Johnson said a subcommittee has obtained the phone Fauci used during the pandemic — providing a potential new flood of revelations after the committee already released his diary.
The Department of Health and Human Services provided the phone to Johnson’s panel, the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, ahead of a planned vote to hold the retired scientist in contempt of Congress, with Johnson’s possession of a copy of the phone potentially boosting congressional Republicans’ efforts to probe and potentially attack Fauci and his actions during the Covid-19 pandemic.
In the viral moment that set up this chain of events,
Fauci, the United States’ leading infectious disease expert during the pandemic, has long sparred with Paul over the origins of the pandemic, with Paul indicating during the hearing that Fauci shouldn’t be concerned about testifying given his immunity from prosecution over pandemic-era conduct, stemming from a pardon that Fauci received from President Joe Biden.
Paul said Fauci had no reason to invoke his Fifth Amendment right not to answer questions from the Senate committee, since Biden had already pardoned him for actions during the time when he led the nation’s infectious disease efforts, telling lawmakers “Dr. Fauci faced no risk of federal prosecution. All he had to do was tell the truth.”
Paul released his contempt resolution against Fauci, accusing him of “obstruction of a congressional investigation,” saying “Dr. Fauci appeared under subpoena and invoked the Fifth Amendment to refuse answering questions,” and “During the hearing, I ruled that the Fifth Amendment did not apply because of the pardon, and that Fauci had waived any remaining privilege by giving opening testimony. I ordered him to answer and warned him about contempt, yet he still refused.”