The Senate Homeland Security Committee voted along party lines to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress after the former top infectious disease official invoked the Fifth Amendment more than 100 times, refusing to answer questions about decisions made during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to NPR.
The resolution, brought by Sen. Rand Paul, would direct Vice President Vance to certify the contempt finding to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, a step required before any prosecution could proceed, per NBC News.
Committee Republicans backed the measure while Democrats opposed it, splitting along the same lines that have defined much of the years-long partisan fight over the origins of the pandemic and the government's response to it. Fauci's repeated invocation of his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination during questioning became the immediate trigger for the contempt push.
Any further action faces significant obstacles. The full Senate would need 60 votes to advance the matter, a threshold Republicans cannot reach without Democratic support that has so far not materialized. Complicating the path to prosecution further, President Biden issued a pardon covering Fauci before leaving office, a factor that legal observers say would weigh heavily against any charges tied to his conduct during the period in question.
The committee vote nonetheless keeps Fauci at the center of Republican efforts to hold pandemic-era officials accountable. Paul's committee has spent months pressing Fauci and other former officials for testimony on the origins of the virus and the government's handling of masking, lockdowns and vaccine guidance, with the contempt resolution marking the most aggressive step yet in that push.
Democrats on the panel have argued the effort amounts to a political exercise rather than a genuine accountability measure, pointing to Fauci's constitutional right to decline to answer questions that could expose him to legal jeopardy. Republicans counter that the scale of his refusals — more than 100 separate invocations — warranted formal escalation.
What happens next will depend on whether the full Senate takes up the resolution and whether the Vance certification, if it moves forward, prompts any response from prosecutors in Washington, given the pardon already on the books.