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Washington — Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky has released more than a thousand pages of journal entries from Dr. Anthony Fauci, teeing up what is likely to be a contentious hearing with the nation’s former top infectious disease expert on Wednesday about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Paul, who heads the Senate Homeland Security Committee, subpoenaed Fauci to appear before the committee as part of the panel’s investigation into the origins of the coronavirus. Paul, who has pushed the theory that the virus emerged from a leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China rather than spilling over from animals to humans naturally, has long accused Fauci and other government officials of misleading the public and Congress about the source of the outbreak.
The journal entries date from December 2019, in the days leading up to the U.S. declaring a public health emergency, until December 2022, when Fauci stepped down as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a position he held for nearly four decades.
Fauci declined to comment to CBS News about the release.
Paul’s office did not respond to a request for comment about how they obtained Fauci’s journal. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told Fox News the entries were retrieved from government computer servers in recent months.
COVID origins controversy
Many scientists believe the evidence suggests that the virus emerged naturally from infected bats before it circulated to other species and spread to humans who were handling those animals at a market in Wuhan, where the first human cases appeared in late 2019. But the FBI has assessed the coronavirus “most likely” emerged in a “lab incident in Wuhan.” In January 2025, the CIA issued a new assessment that favored the “lab leak” hypothesis, though it said the finding was made with “low confidence.”
Some of Fauci’s diary entries reflect early uncertainty about the source of the pandemic. In January 2020, he wrote that “we know the market was not the source, it was the amplifier,” though he added that “somewhere the virus jumped from animals to humans.” About a week later, he referenced a conference call in which several top infectious disease experts thought the coronavirus might not have originated in nature.
Paul on Monday accused Fauci of saying one thing to “Dear Diary” while telling the public “it’s implausible that it came from the lab, and we’re really convinced it came from these wild animals in the marketplace. But that level of dishonesty is really astounding.”
In an entry dated May 26, 2021, Fauci wrote, “The situation continues to get ‘out of control’ with regard to the press reports concerning my ‘flip flopping’ concerning the theory of the origin of the virus. I had always said that the very highly likelihood is that the virus originated naturally from an animal reservoir jumping to a human. However, over the past couple of days given the amount of speculation about the possibility of a lab leak I have been saying that no one is 100% certain of the origin including me and so I am calling for a thorough investigation.”
Fame and media coverage
Many of Fauci’s diary entries note his interviews with the media, as well as his interactions with President Trump and other officials. At certain points, Fauci sounded bemused or bewildered by the sudden rush of attention and the “cult hero”-style fandom that he drew in some quarters near the start of the pandemic.
“The situation with my national and international fame is explosive and really unimaginable. It is not hyoperbole [sic] to say that today I am the most famous and talked about person in the country and one of the most recognizable peson [sic] in the world,” Fauci wrote in a May 21, 2020, entry. “POTUS seems to be enamored of me even though I am taking the spotlight away from him. We are developing a very unique and interesting relationship.”
He tracked favorable media coverage, including author Sally Quinn telling Fauci she based a handsome character off of him, Brat Pitt playing him on “Saturday Night Live,” a Billy Crystal spoof, and an email from Barbara Streisand. He posted pictures and downloads of Fauci masks, murals, portraits and bobbleheads. But some diary entries expressed embarrassment and discomfort with his newfound fame.
Fauci also expressed concern about what his heightened public profile could mean for his personal security.
Relationship with Trump
Fauci described some positive interactions between himself and the president in the pandemic’s early months, and appeared uncomfortable with press coverage that suggested he and Mr. Trump were feuding. He wrote that a viral image that made it look like he was facepalming while Mr. Trump spoke to the press was “not my intention.”
At other points, he vented about Mr. Trump’s “painfully rambling” and “laborious” news conferences, or described arguments in which Mr. Trump accused Fauci of undermining him.
Ahead of a May 2020 event to announce the Operation Warp Speed vaccine initiative, Fauci wrote that Mr. Trump pulled him aside and said: “Tony, you are losing me trillions of f***ing dollars,” before later saying “you and I are OK” and confirming that he respected Fauci. Mr. Trump then argued officials shouldn’t wear masks at the event, saying it “sends the wrong signal,” but Fauci pushed back.
“Tony, we are good, right?” the president asked Fauci after the conversation, according to Fauci’s notes.
He said he replied: “We are good Mr. President.”
By August 2020, as the president’s public stance toward Fauci grew more adversarial, Fauci wrote that Mr. Trump was acting “erratically” and expressed frustration about the president’s public criticisms, even referring to Mr. Trump as an “idiot” for posting inaccurate figures on COVID-19 deaths.
CBS News has reached out to the White House for comment.
COVID-19 restrictions
As the federal government’s top infectious disease expert, Fauci didn’t have any direct power to impose COVID-19 restrictions, but his words carried a lot of weight with the federal, state and local officials charged with deciding whether to close schools and businesses or require masks.
In mid-March 2020, Fauci describes a conversation with New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio in which he “convinced him … to close the NYC schools” — a decision Fauci said de Blasio had already made based on Fauci’s public statements. He said he “had a similar call” with an official in the office of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who planned to close schools and restaurants.
By August 2020, amid debates over when schools should reopen, Fauci wrote that “one size does not fit all and decisions should be based on the level of infection in the community.” He also said the “default position” should be an “intention to reopen schools.” At the same time, he chafed at some Trump administration officials who wanted all schools to reopen immediately.
The following year, Fauci expressed support for loosening COVID-19 guidelines. He wrote about his worries that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would lose credibility if it didn’t loosen up on its mask-wearing advice.
“I really do have a problem defending the ultra-conservative approach of the CDC regarding the wearing of masks outdoors,” he wrote on May 5, 2021. When the policy did change about a week later, he wrote, “The radical right-wing maniacs who blamed me for the rigidity of the CDC recommendations will probably not realize at all that it was me that triggered this change.”
History of conflict with Sen. Paul
Some of Fauci’s entries noted his combative relationship with Paul. On April 20, 2021, Fauci wrote that Paul was among those spreading conspiracy theories “to try and connect me with the virus from WUHAN.” Fauci added that one of his advisers, David Morens — who has since been indicted on federal charges alleging he conspired to hide his communications related to the pandemic research grants — “has heard that these people are trying to ‘bring me down.'”
A couple of months later, Fauci cited reporting on the release of his emails from the early days of the pandemic.
“They show that I never criticize president trump and that I am always very courteous and measured in my responses. Even with that the crazies such as senator Rand Paul are saying things like ‘I told you so,’ implying that my emails are validating what they have been saying about me. Total nut cakes!” he wrote.
In a July 20, 2021, entry, Fauci recounted his appearance before a Senate committee in which he clashed with Paul over whether the National Institutes of Health funded gain-of-function research at the lab. Paul accused Fauci of lying about it in previous congressional testimony. Fauci countered that the research Paul was referring to did not constitute gain of function.
“I finished by looking him in the eye and telling him that if anybody is lying here it is he,” Fauci wrote.
Fauci wrote an Oct. 12, 2021, entry that the senator “continues his assault on me.”
