May 12, 2020

Rand Paul Just Picked a Fight With Anthony Fauci. It Didn’t Go Well.

Win McNamee/AP

The coronavirus is a rapidly developing news story, so some of the content in this article might be out of date. Check out our most recent coverage of the coronavirus crisis, and subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily newsletter.

During a hearing before the Senate health committee on Tuesday, Dr. Anthony Fauci—the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases—had a heated exchange with Sen. Rand Paul. The back-and-forth came when the Kentucky Republican argued that it would be a “huge mistake” not to reopen the schools in the fall and pointedly criticized Fauci. “As much as I respect you, Dr. Fauci, I don’t think you’re the end-all,” Paul said. “I don’t think you’re the one person that gets to make a decision.” Paul also downplayed the dangers of reopening the US economy and blasted scientists for making “wrong prediction, after wrong prediction, after wrong prediction.”

“We’re opening up a lot of economies around the US, and I hope that people who are predicting doom and gloom, and saying, ‘Oh, we can’t do this, there’s going to be a surge,’ will admit that they were wrong if there isn’t a surge,” Paul said. “Because I think that’s what’s going to happen.” He added that “outside of New England, we’ve had a relatively benign course for this virus nationwide.”

Paul noted that death rates from COVID-19 among children have been extremely low and went on to argue that local authorities should decide on a case-by-case basis whether to open schools in the fall. “If we keep kids out of school for another year, what’s going to happen is that poor and underprivileged kids who don’t have a parent that’s able to teach them at home are not going to learn for a full year…I think it’s a huge mistake if we don’t open the schools in the fall.”

In his response to Paul, Fauci—who had not actually asserted that schools should not open in the fall—said, “I have never made myself out to be the ‘end-all’ and only voice in this. I’m a scientist, a physician, and a public health official. I give advice according to the best scientific evidence…I don’t give advice about economic things. I don’t give advice about anything other than public health.”

Fauci also addressed Paul’s assertions about the risks to children. “We don’t know everything about this virus,” he said. “And we really better be very careful, particularly when it comes to children. Because the more and more we learn, we’re seeing things about what this virus can do that we didn’t see from the studies in China or Europe.” For instance, a small number of children have shown symptoms of a mysterious inflammatory syndrome thought to be linked to COVID-19.

“You’re right in the numbers that children, in general, do much, much better than adults and the elderly and particularly those with underlying conditions,” Fauci concluded. “But I am very careful, and hopefully, humble in knowing that I don’t know everything about this disease.”

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate