Missouri’s Hawley misses target in blaming Dr. Fauci for US pandemic response

For Trump acolytes, Dr. Fauci is a proxy for all of those who took the threat of the pandemic seriously from the beginning. Trump, too, knew early on that the virus was airborne and deadly, but chose to downplay it in hopes it wouldn't derail his reelection bid.

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June 9, 2021 - 9:03 AM

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, at a coronavirus task force briefing on April 8, 2020. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images/TNS) Photo by (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images/TNS)

Josh Hawley is calling for the head of the man he claims is responsible for the United States’ tragically inept response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Friday, Missouri’s junior senator joined the chorus of GOP voices insisting that Dr. Anthony Fauci must step down as director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “The time has come for Fauci to resign and for a full congressional investigation into the origins of #COVID19 — and into any and all efforts to prevent a full accounting,” he tweeted.

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo. (Tom Williams/Pool/Getty Images/TNS)Photo by (Tom Williams/Pool/Getty Images/TNS)

The anti-Fauci crusade is coming to a crescendo in the conservative alternative media ecosystem. The doctor’s fiercest congressional adversary, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, tweeted “#firefauci” last week after BuzzFeed News and The Washington Post published more than 3,200 pages of emails Fauci sent and received about the government’s coronavirus response. Proof, said his critics, that he misled the American people about the origins of COVID-19.

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