Return to Transcripts main page
CNN News Central
Live Coverage of Contempt Vote for Anthony Fauci. Aired 8:30-9a ET
Aired August 06, 2026 - 08:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[08:31:46]
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, you're looking at live pictures of the Senate Homeland Security Committee voting any minute now on whether to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress. Fauci appeared before that committee. He refused to answer questions from them last week, taking the Fifth Amendment. Of course, there was a legal issue about whether or not he can take the Fifth Amendment because he is under a pardon from President Biden.
Let's listen in.
SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY): Consequence. More than a million Americans died from Covid. Many of them died alone. Workers were forced to choose between a mandate and a job they needed. Businesses closed and never reopened. Children lost years of school they will never get back. Americans lost the freedom to work, to worship, and to decide what went into their own bodies. Nothing we do today can undo those losses, but silence does not honor them either.
This committee and the American people have a right to know why Dr. Fauci's agency funded dangerous research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and what role he played in approving and overseeing it, why he told his colleagues to delete emails, why he told them to delete emails and then delete the deleted file, what was he told in January 2020, what was said on those calls, what his agency did with and for the intelligence community and whether knowing what he knows now, he still believes that the risks were worth taking.
Documents tell only part of the story. Many of these questions can be answered only by Dr. Fauci. He under -- he answered none of them.
There will be another pandemic. The time to determine which legislative reforms are necessary to ensure that the mistakes of the past are not repeated is now, not later. This committee passed the bipartisan Risky Research Review Act to strengthen oversight of dangerous life sciences research funded by the federal government to address failures exposed by the Covid-19 pandemic. But Congress cannot determine what additional reforms are necessary until it fully understands what remains unanswered.
Holding a witness in contempt is a serious thing, and it should be rare. But the contempt power exists for precisely this circumstance. Oversight is not a courtesy this committee extends or a favor a former official grants us. It is a constitutional obligation. And when voluntary cooperation ends, Congress must be able to compel compliance with its lawful demands. That is Congress' compulsory instrument.
A subpoena is not an invitation. A subpoena with no consequence is not a subpoena, it's a suggestion. Seeking the truth is not a witch hunt. Accountability is not vengeance. Accountability is what stands between the American people and a repeat of the mistakes and the very real consequences of the past.
Senator Peters, you're recognized.
SEN. GARY PETERS (D-MI): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee has a long and very proud history of conducting serious bipartisan oversight on behalf of the American people. Democrats and Republicans have worked together to follow the facts, compel information, and hold both Democratic and Republican administrations alike accountable.
[08:35:09]
That work depends on the credibility of this committee. It depends on the legitimacy of our investigations and a recognition by witnesses, courts and the public that Congress is exercising its powers dutifully.
The contempt resolution before us today puts all of that at risk. Following a one-sided investigation, and a rushed process that has repeatedly excluded the minority and other members of this committee, the chairman is now asking the committee to take a vote that could harm our ability to conduct future investigations and disregards constitutional protections long recognized by the U.S. Senate. All without making a reliable case that there is a legal basis for holding Dr. Fauci in contempt.
Let's be clear, this resolution will not provide the committee with any additional information or compel Dr. Fauci to provide answers to our inquiries. Criminal contempt is punitive. It does not compel a witness to answer questions or produce the documents we'd all like to see. What it will do is create a damaging precedent that future witnesses will use to resist legitimate constitutional -- or, excuse me, congressional oversight and weaken this committee's ability to compel testimony.
For decades, the Senate has maintained that a witness must appear before a committee even when that witness intends to invoke the Fifth Amendment. Senate committees have been able to defend that position in the courts because both Democratic and Republican chairs have considerably -- have consistently recognized and respected the constitutional rights of witnesses when they appear. And when a witness refuses to voluntarily appear, that principle leaves the Senate on very strong ground to compel their appearance and, where necessary, in rare instances, make referrals for criminal contempt.
If this committee now seeks to punish a witness for asserting their constitutional protected Fifth Amendment rights, future witnesses will argue that appearing before Congress exposes them to punishment, regardless of they -- whether they comply with the subpoena and invoke a constitutional protection. They will point directly to this vote, this vote, as a justification for refusing to appear at all. That would make it harder for this committee and every committee in Congress to compel testimony in future investigations.
The chairman has also suggested he may attempt to refer this matter to the Department of Justice without approval of the full Senate. That would be even more dangerous and widely unprecedented move. No individual senator and no committee speaks for the entire Senate as a whole. The Senate's institutional powers belong to the full body. Allowing one chairman to unilaterally assert those powers would invite future chairs, in both parties, to bypass the Senate whenever they cannot secure the support of their colleagues.
This investigation has been one-sided from the beginning. The minority has excluded -- been -- has been excluded from witness interviews and full access to committee records and information has been selectively released to support conclusions that the chairman reached years ago. A process that lacks bipartisan participation and seeks to confirm predetermined conclusions. It does not strengthen congressional oversight. It makes our work to conduct oversight more challenging and less likely to withstand scrutiny.
This committee should not damage its future investigative authority to advance the chairman's year's long campaign against a single individual. It is not just what we investigate that matters. And that really matters what we investigate, but it's also how we conduct those investigations. That matters too.
So, I urge my colleagues to protect this committee, protect the Senate's institutional powers and oppose this resolution.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: Despite minority's statements to the contrary, this investigation has been conducted with unparalleled transparency. Thousands and thousands of documents have been put up for review from the minority. You have to request a password. They've been informed of that. Not one Democrat has requested a password to look at any of the documents. So, there is transparency. They're just not interested in reviewing the documents.
SEN. MARGARET HASSAN (D-NH): Mr. Chair. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt.
PAUL: Senator Hassan.
[08:40:01]
HASSAN: I just also want to take a moment to address today's contempt resolution vote.
There is a real need for a serious bipartisan examination into what went well and what went wrong during our country's response to the pandemic. But that's not what we saw last week in this committee. Instead, my colleagues in the majority held a hearing openly designed to target a single doctor and dedicated public servant who has testified before Congress many times before, and they wanted to blame him for everything that went wrong during the pandemic. The goal was clear, and I want to emphasize this, the goal was to wait for Dr. Fauci to make any kind of misstatement and then have a weaponized Department of Justice file criminal charges for that new statement that would not have been covered by the pardon, leaving Dr. Fauci little choice but to invoke his constitutional right to not walk directly into a trap.
So, who's helped by this political theater? It's certainly not this committee, which now goes without answers to the important questions about our pandemic response that would help us prepare for future pandemics. It's certainly not parents who are not seeing any action to reverse the devastating cuts to the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid that kicked them off their health insurance. It's certainly not our children who are seeing no pushback or hearings in this committee on the baseless attacks on science and vaccines coming from Senator Robert F Kennedy Jr. and his administration.
Sadly, this is gamesmanship, and it represents everything wrong with Congress, which under this majority is clearly not focused on the priorities of the American people.
SEN. RON JOHNSON (R-WI): Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: Let's be clear. All that was required from Anthony Fauci last week was to tell the truth. He had no liability if he told the truth.
Senator Johnson.
JOHNSON: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First of all, I want to associate myself with and second year opening comments. And I also want to strongly rebut the comments from our Democrat colleagues here. You know, particularly when Ranking Member Peters says this has been one sided and rushed. Rushed? When I was chairman of this committee back in 2020, I started conducting oversight. I held hearings. There was no cooperation in those hearings.
As a matter of fact, I remember one when we held a hearing with Dr. Pierre Kory (ph), when he came in with the -- all kinds of evidence on the effectiveness of ivermectin, the ranking member then denigrated him. Back then, Dr. Kory was a Democrat. He was shocked at the treatment he was given by the ranking member. How many people died because they lacked early treatment with safe, effective generic drugs? Well, that hearing laid out the truth that this could be something that could help people. We had a ranking member that did everything that he could to denigrate that truth.
My current experience as the chairman of PSI, we've been holding hearings after hearings. My ranking member, Blumenthal, in those hearings. We had one called "Voice of the Vaccine Injured." We had parents come in and tell their heart-wrenching stories. We had parents coming in and telling the truth. And the ranking member, a few hours before that hearing, held a press conference, said, hope the press doesn't cover it because there's nothing credible about this hearing.
If these investigations are one-sided, it's because one side simply doesn't want to look at the truth. They want to bury the truth. They want to memory hole it. They don't want to look at the Fauci diaries and take a look at how contradictory what he wrote to himself, how contradictory it was to what he actually told the public
I think one of the revelations of those diaries, I think probably the most significant one that's being overlooked was early on in the pandemic he wrote in his diaries, he thought Covid would be maybe twice a bad flu season.
Now, I'm not downplaying a bad flu season. We have them oftentimes. They overwhelm hospitals. Something to take seriously. But a pandemic that's going to be twice that is that -- is that really worth destroying people's lives, shutting down businesses, destroying the economy? I argued back then that it wouldn't be.
It's been six years since the -- since the pandemic began. We have not had a reckoning of what happened.
[08:45:02]
Last Wednesday's hearing was an excellent hearing from a standpoint of legitimate questions being raised. Legitimate questions the American people want answers to. Legitimate questions that some of them only Anthony Fauci, saint Fauci, Mr. Science, could answer. And even though we have quotes of him saying, I'm not afraid of any oversight committee, I'm happy to talk to any oversight committee, I have nothing to hide, that's not the position he took last Wednesday.
What he displayed last Wednesday was contempt for Congress, contempt for this committee, contempt for our investigation. The same contempt that our ranking member, our ranking members have shown for the diligent oversight and the exposing of the truth that I've been undertaking for six years. There's nothing rushed. It's been one sided. But not because we haven't reached out. Not because we haven't involved the other side. The other side, like way too many Americans, have just closed their eyes, covered up their ears, and refused, refused to look at the truth.
I am definitely going to vote yes on contempt of Congress. And my investigation has just begun. We've invited Dr. Fauci for a transcribed interview. OK, he doesn't want to do it in front of the American public. Come in front of our front of our committee. We'll go through detail and detail. You say you have nothing to hide. Good. We'll do it behind closed doors. We'll transcribed it. That's only one of the interviews we'll be conducting.
So again, though, this -- the -- last week's hearing just began the accountability. There's a lot more accountability that's required.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: The committee will now proceed to consideration of an original resolution --
SEN. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL (D-CT): Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: We're going to continue the debate once we get on it. There's going to be time for everyone to speak.
The committee will now proceed to the consideration of an original resolution authorizing the president of the Senate to certify to the United States attorney, for the District of Columbia, the committee's report concerning Dr. Anthony Fauci's refusal to answer questions required by committee subpoena.
PETERS: Mr. Chairman, I move the motion is to be tabled.
PAUL: This motion to table is intended to avoid accountability. We only have one question, whether to hold a witness responsible for his contempt towards Congress. The witness had many chances to answer the questions pertinent to our investigation, and he made his decision 111 times. I will oppose this motion and urge my colleagues to do the same. The clerk will call the roll.
PETERS: Mr. -- I'd comment on the motion, Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: OK.
PETERS: Mr. Chairman, I move to table this resolution until the chairman commits to abiding by the Senate rules, practice and laws that address attempt of Congress. Under the Senate rules, long standing practice, as well as the U.S. code, following a committee vote, the full Senate must vote to determine whether to refer a resolution of contempt of Congress to the Department of Justice. The Senate, as a body, not an individual member, must make that decision.
Given that Chairman Paul has indicated he may attempt to bypass this process, which is required by Senate rules and precedent, members of this committee should move to table this resolution until we can be assured by the chairman that he will not take action that weaken the Senate's and this committee's ability to conduct oversight in the future.
PAUL: The clerk will call the roll.
PETERS: All right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Second, the motion.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Johnson.
JOHNSON: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Lankford.
SEN. JAMES LANKFORD (R-OK): No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Scott.
SEN. RICK SCOTT (R-FL): No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Hawley.
SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO): No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Moreno.
SEN. BERNIE MORENO (R-OH): No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Ernst.
SEN. JONI ERNST (R-IA): No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Moody.
SEN. ASHLEY MOODY (R-FL): No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Peters.
PETERS: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Hassan.
HASSAN: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Blumenthal.
BLUMENTHAL: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Fetterman.
SEN. JOHN FETTERMAN (D-PA): Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Kim.
SEN. ANDY KIM (D-NJ): Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Gallego.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, by proxy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Slotkin.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, by proxy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Paul.
PAUL: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Chairman, on the vote of those present, the yeas are five, the nays are eight. On the vote by proxy, the yeas are two, the nays are zero. On this vote, the yeas are seven, the nays are eight, and the motion is not agreed to.
HASSAN: Mr. Chair, I move --
PAUL: Senator Hassan.
HASSAN: I move to table consideration of this resolution until the chairman invites the views of legal experts who can speak to the constitutional questions and legal authorities Chairman Paul has raised in his contempt of Congress resolution.
[08:50:04]
This resolution should be tabled until our committee can hear from independent experts about the applicability of the Fifth Amendment and other constitutional considerations raised by the chairman's actions.
PAUL: This motion is intended to avoid accountability. I will oppose this motion and urge my colleagues to do the same.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Press the roll call.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator --
PAUL: Call the roll.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Johnson.
JOHNSON: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Lankford.
LANKFORD: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Scott.
SCOTT: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Hawley.
HAWLEY: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Moreno.
MORENO: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Ernst.
ERNST: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Moody.
MOODY: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Peters.
PETERS: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Hassan.
HASSAN: Yes. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Blumenthal.
BLUMENTHAL: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Fetterman.
FETTERMAN: Aye.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Kim.
KIM: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Gallego.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, by proxy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Slotkin.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, by proxy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Paul.
PAUL: No.
BLUMENTHAL: Mr. Chairman --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Chairman --
PAUL: Senator Blumenthal, let's hear the --
BLUMENTHAL: Thanks.
PAUL: Let's hear the vote first.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On the vote of those present, the yeas are five, the nays are eight. On the vote by proxy, the yeas are two, the nays are zero. On this vote, the yeas are seven, the nays are eight, and the motion is not agreed to.
BLUMENTHAL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: Senator Blumenthal.
BLUMENTHAL: I move to postpone consideration of this resolution until the committee has an opportunity to hear from Dr. Fauci's attorney, who was forcibly removed from the hearing last week.
I should point out that Dr. Fauci had a well-founded fear based on facts that he was in jeopardy of prosecution for perjury. In fact, the chairman and others on the committee have said the quiet part out loud. They've shouted it repeatedly that their objective in that proceeding was, in fact, to put Dr. Fauci behind bars. He was represented by counsel, who attempted to speak at this proceeding.
Even during the darkest days of the McCarthy hearings, counsel were allowed to speak. We denied that opportunity to Dr. Fauci, and we should hear from his counsel before we move on this motion so that we can hear his side of the legal argument here.
And I would simply predict, Mr. Chairman, based on the long history of assertion of self-incrimination rights, that there is virtually no chance that a court would actually approve any contempt because he had a well-founded fear of self-incrimination, which entitled him to invoke the Fifth Amendment. And we should hear from his counsel.
I ask for a roll call vote.
PAUL: Even when the Fifth Amendment is appropriately taken, where no pardon exists, the Fifth Amendment doesn't allow you to testify on the other side of a question. Basically you are -- you are allowed not to self-incriminate, but you're not allowed to say, oh, I'm not going to self-incriminate, but then I'm going to condemn the committee and the investigation.
So, he attempted to do that in his opening statement, which courts have looked poorly upon trying to have it both ways. And allowing the attorney to take the positive role of saying, this is what he would have said had he spoken, but he's not going to speak, also doesn't fit in with the history of the Fifth Amendment. So, I will move to table.
MORENO: Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: I will oppose tabling the tabling motion.
Yes.
MORENO: Mr. Chairman, just to clarify. What -- who -- what's the name of the attorney?
BLUMENTHAL: The attorney could be of Dr. Fauci's choice.
MORENO: No, no, the attorney that you're speaking of.
BLUMENTHAL: As I recall, his name -- his name was --
MORENO: But you said you want to hear from the attorney. What's the name of the attorney you want to hear from?
PAUL: I think it was David Schertler.
BLUMENTHAL: Mr. Schertler (ph).
MORENO: OK. Could we put it in the record that he is also the attorney for Senator Menendez in the bribery scandal. And also, are you asking that you think it was something he'd be prosecuted for, for answering Senator Hawley's questions about the color of the carpet?
BLUMENTHAL: We could hear, by the way, from Mr. Honorato (ph), who also represented --
MORENO: But you think there was jeopardy in answering questions, what's the color of your tie? What's the color of the -- of the floor? What's the color of the room? BLUMENTHAL: The format of the hearing and the responses and who would be there could be determined by the committee. All I'm asking is that we postpone this motion until we hear from an attorney of Dr. Fauci's choice representing his Fifth Amendment rights.
And to respond to Senator Paul, there is well established precedent that witnesses have their attorneys here, make statements before the committee, even during the McCarthy hearings. There is also well- established precedent for a witness providing a statement at the outset and then declining to answer questions afterward.
[08:55:03]
I think most of the prosecutors here know that if one of us, as a prosecutor, had said, I'm putting this witness behind bars, and then call him to a grand jury or any other proceeding, there's simply no way that a court would say, you can hold him in contempt because he's invoked his Fifth Amendment rights. I mean this is sort of black letter, basic constitutional rights, Senator Moreno. And I think all of us in this committee really have a stake in making sure those rights are respected because if we tear down the precedents and the principles of the Fifth Amendment, now, there is no telling where the decline will wind us up and we will all reap the windfall.
HAWLEY: Mr. Chairman.
PAUL: Yes.
HAWLEY: Not to, not to disagree with my fellow former attorney general Senator Blumenthal. The reason -- but since Senator Moreno mentioned it. The reason that I asked Dr. Fauci what color his tie was and what day of the week it was and what color the carpet is -- he looked, by the way. I thought he was going to answer that one. He looked very carefully at the carpet. Then he decided not to answer.
The reason I asked those questions was precisely to test the good faith nature of his invocation of the Fifth Amendment. Because as the lawyers in the room will know, the invocation of the Fifth Amendment, particularly in a context where immunity has already been obtained, Dr. Fauci has full immunity, he has a full and unconditional pardon for a period of some 11 years. In that context, the assertion of Fifth Amendment privilege only adheres to those instances where the witness has a reasonable fear of future prosecution, and it must be tailored to any such fear.
And the fact that he wouldn't answer questions about the tie he was wearing, or the color of the carpet, or the day of the week, Senator Paul asked him about, did he have a folder in front of him, he wouldn't answer that, betrays the fact that his invocation of the Fifth Amendment wasn't tailored to anything. It was a predetermined, premeditated design to evade this committee's questions on any subject, including emphatically those for which he has a pardon. And the United States Supreme Court has been clear for over a century, dating back to 1896, that when a witness has received immunity, he may not stand upon his privilege. And multiple courts of appeals from the United States, including the
United States Supreme Court in the Kastigar case, has says that -- I'm going to quote now, "a witness must reasonably believe that his statements could be used in criminal prosecution, or could lead to other evidence that might be so used." The court has also said that "the danger must be real and appreciable. It must not be one of imaginary and unsubstantial character."
All that to say that, I think it's pretty clear, given Dr. Fauci's 111 invocations of the Fifth Amendment, including the questions that he had -- could have no fear of prosecution on, he's not going to get prosecuted for the color of his tie, shows that he had no interest and no intention of answering any of our questions. And that is an abuse of the -- there's no privilege for any of that. And I think there was no good faith attempt to invoke --
BLUMENTHAL: Mr. Chairman, I really need to answer with your permission that point.
PAUL: Senator Blumenthal.
BLUMENTHAL: Whether he had a reasonable fear, I think, is beyond question. Not only the chairman of the committee, but three state attorneys general have said that they are conducting investigations of Dr. Fauci.
The color of his tie, the color of the carpet, maybe you were testing his good faith, but the standard is not the response to your questions, it is whether he had a reasonable fear. And it is to be liberally construed, as you know, under the Supreme Court cases that you cited, in favor of the potential defendant. President Trump invoked the Fifth Amendment 440 times in his deposition with the New York attorney general. Nobody held him in contempt for doing so.
This right is so fundamental that we ought to seriously consider, before we take this immensely historic step, and hear from his counsel as to what he feared, why and how. And my motion would simply postpone consideration of this contempt motion until we hear from him.
PAUL: The primary question of the hearing last week was to understand why Dr. Fauci made the decision to do this funding of this research in Wuhan. I can't understand how there could be any liability attached to a question of why. That's his opinion of why he funded it. That's not a crime in funding it. There's a judgment precedent --
BLUMENTHAL: And, Mr. Chairman, there is a --
PAUL: And that we got the Fifth Amendment. All he had to do was tell the truth.
[09:00:00]
The clerk will call the roll on the Blumenthal motion. I will vote no.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Johnson.
JOHNSON: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Lankford.
LANKFORD: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Scott.
SCOTT: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Hawley.
HAWLEY: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator Moreno.
