Joy Behar: Rand Paul should “thank” Fauci instead of attacking him

“The View” co-host Joy Behar firmly defended Dr.Anthony Fauci on Wednesday against criticism from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., Regarding the origins of the coronavirus and funding for research into gaining office at the ‘Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.

During a discussion of the clash between Fauci and Paul at a hearing Tuesday on Capitol Hill, Behar praised the experience of the first at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to help fight diseases of the past and said the latter should thank him instead of blaming him for deaths from the coronavirus.

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“Dr. Fauci… has been running the NIH for 36 years, okay?” Behar said incorrectly after co-host Whoopi Goldberg asked what she thought Paul hoped to get from her criticism. Fauci heads the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), one of the 27 institutes that make up the NIH.

“He helped us with HIV, SARS, bird flu, swine flu, Zika and Ebola, okay? she added. “Rand Paul is a third-rate hacker who by the way caught Covid, is lucky to be alive, and then refused to take the vaccine afterwards.”

“If anyone is responsible for all of the deaths since the start of Covid, it was more those lying party hackers like Rand Paul who demonized the masks and then demonized the vaccines,” Behar said. “He should be thanking Fauci instead of accusing him of murder. My God… This is what people watch on TV, talking to the brightest scientist… who basically helped us for 36 years under, I think, four. or five presidents. ”

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Paul and Fauci both made headlines after their heated exchange. During the meeting, Paul suggested that Fauci could have lied to Congress to “hide responsibility” for funding the lab that potentially disclosed the coronavirus. Fauci has firmly denied that the United States funded any research on gain-of-function at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Fauci told Paul he didn’t know what he was talking about when he asked Fauci if he wanted to withdraw the claims.

However, that sparked some setback, with Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin saying Tuesday Fauci was “wrong.” Rogin criticized reporters who blindly accepted the idea that the lab leak theory was debunked and that Fauci’s treatment was flawless.

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Paul said on Wednesday he would send a letter to the Justice Department calling for a criminal investigation into Fauci for lying to Congress “to cover his tracks and cover up his links to the Wuhan lab.”