Anthony Fauci Says Trump Used To Scold Him For Not Being ‘More Positive’ About COVID-19

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s high infectious illness skilled, stated then-President Donald Trump used to scold him for not being “more positive” about COVID-19 because the pandemic spiraled uncontrolled nationwide.

In a brand new interview with The New York Times, Fauci spoke considerably candidly about his expertise working for Trump and their publicly tumultuous relationship. Trump floated the thought of firing Fauci, then a member of his White House coronavirus activity pressure, throughout one in all his marketing campaign rallies in November. 

Fauci, who was sworn in as President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser on Wednesday, incessantly contradicted Trump’s baseless claims about COVID-19. In his interview with the Times, he recalled Trump’s repeated claims that the virus would merely “go away.” 

“It isn’t like I took any pleasure in contradicting the president of the United States,” Fauci stated. “I have a great deal of respect for the office. But I made a decision that I just had to. Otherwise I would be compromising my own integrity, and be giving a false message to the world. If I didn’t speak up, it would be almost tacit approval that what he was saying was OK.”

“There were a couple of times where I would make a statement that was a pessimistic viewpoint about what direction we were going,” Fauci stated, “and the president would call me up and say, ‘Hey, why aren’t you more positive? You’ve got to take a positive attitude. Why are you so negativistic? Be more positive.’”

“He would get on the phone and express disappointment in me that I was not being more positive,” Fauci added. He stated Trump didn’t clarify why he was upset that Fauci didn’t have a extra upbeat perspective in regards to the lethal pandemic.

As of Sunday, the U.S. continued to steer the world in reported COVID-19 circumstances and deaths with greater than 25 million infections and at the least 418,000 fatalities.

In his interview with the Times, Fauci stated he’s obtained quite a few dying threats within the final 12 months stemming from “right-wing craziness.”

“It was the harassment of my wife, and particularly my children, that upset me more than anything else,” he stated. “They knew where my kids work, where they live. The threats would come directly to my children’s phones, directly to my children’s homes. How the hell did whoever these assholes were get that information?”

In one alarming incident, Fauci stated he opened a letter he had obtained and a “puff of powder” exploded onto his face and chest.

“That was very, very disturbing to me and my wife because it was in my office,” he stated. “So I just looked at it all over me and said, ‘What do I do?’ The security detail was there, and they’re very experienced in that. They said, ‘Don’t move, stay in the room.’ And they got the hazmat people. So they came, they sprayed me down and all that.”

The powder was examined and the outcomes confirmed it was “a benign nothing,” Fauci advised the Times.

“But it was frightening,” he stated. “My wife and my children were more disturbed than I was. I looked at it somewhat fatalistically. It had to be one of three things: A hoax. Or anthrax, which meant I’d have to go on Cipro for a month. Or if it was ricin, I was dead, so bye-bye.”

Dr. Deborah Birx, who was accountable for the Trump administration COVID-19 response, stated she “always” thought-about resigning from her place amid backlash she obtained from each Trump supporters and anti-Trump activists. (Some accused Birx of failing to push again laborious sufficient towards Trump’s COVID-19 misinformation; others accused her of pushing again too laborious on the president.)

“I had to ask myself every morning: Is there something that I think I can do that would be helpful in responding to this pandemic?” Birx advised CBS’s “Face the Nation” in an interview that aired Sunday. “And it’s something I asked myself every night.”

Fauci, then again, advised the Times that he “never” thought-about stepping down throughout Trump’s presidency.

“When people just see you standing up there, they sometimes think you’re being complicit in the distortions emanating from the stage,” he stated. “But I felt that if I stepped down, that would leave a void. Someone’s got to not be afraid to speak out the truth.”

Head over to The New York Times to read the full interview.