FNC’s Carlson: ‘Will Fauci Face Any Consequences?’

During Friday’s broadcast of FNC’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” host Tucker Carlson questioned if National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Dr. Anthony Fauci would ever be held accountable for what appears to be ties to gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

As Carlson pointed out, the Biden administration appears not to be interested in discussing Fauci.

Transcript as follows:

CARLSON: Funny thing about the corona pandemic, for so long we knew very little. Now we know an awful lot.

It’s now clear that in the earliest days of the coronavirus pandemic public health officials in Washington were panicked. At the time, as you remember, it was not clear what the mortality rate from the virus would turn out to be. But that was not their main concern.

Officials in Washington were terrified for themselves, they were afraid of being exposed. They had used American tax dollars to fund reckless experiments in China that in the end likely created COVID-19. If that fact would have become public, it would be over. They’d be shamed and ridiculed, possibly even indicted. Their professional lives would be done.

So they immediately set to work hiding it on a cover up.

Last winter, a group of well-known scientists publicly dismissed the lab leak theory in a letter to The Lancet as absurd and categorically untrue. And yet, at the same time, they wrote emails to each other conceding that actually the virus did look engineered, by human hands, in a lab.

Meanwhile, Tony Fauci worked on censorship. Fauci made certain that the self-appointed fact checkers who control the flow of information in this country shut down anyone who dared challenge the official story, which again, we now know, was a lie.

In the final days of the last administration, the State Department finally began a serious investigation into the origins of COVID, into what was happening at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

But almost immediately after the election, Joe Biden shut it down.

So in all, the line went on unimpeded for a year and a half, and we’re just learning now how deep it went. The Informed Consent Action Network, a group that advocates for transparency in vaccines has just obtained thousands of new emails to and from Tony Fauci. They show among other things that Fauci knew perfectly well that his own directives often had no basis in science.

For example, in February of last year, Tony Fauci told us in public that the COVID outbreak could go one of two ways. It would either be a catastrophic pandemic — that’s what we were all worried about — or it could very well turn out to be just an unusually bad flu season. Those were the options.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: If it continues to evolve into what we hope it doesn’t, namely a pandemic flu, it will be very much like a really, really bad flu season or a moderately bad pandemic season.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So it could be a pandemic or just a bad flu, which one would it turn out to be? At least one reporter asked him that in an email. He is a man called Jon LaPook, the chief medical correspondent at CBS News.

On February 16 of last year, LaPook asked Fauci just how dangerous COVID- 19 was. What were the numbers on it? At that time, you’ll remember, Fauci was telling the public not to wear masks. He was telling reporters it was fine to attend political rallies. Public gatherings were okay.

Fauci responded to LaPook by outlining the conditions that would make him change his mind and demand lockdowns, quote: “The current mortality of COVID-19 is about 2%. However, there are several folds more cases that are coming to the official attention of health authorities.” In other words, asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic infections. “If you count these, the case fatality rate could drop to 1% or even half a percent or less. If that is the case, then this would be a very severe flu season, 0.2 to 0.4%. Regular flu season was 0.1%, or a typical pandemic like 1957 or 1968, 0.5% to 0.9%. We’re not sure where this is going to land.”

So it’s interesting to note that Tony Fauci used the term “case fatality rate” in the email. That means the number of deaths divided by confirmed COVID-19 cases, confirmed meaning people who have gone to the doctor usually died in a hospital.

But then Fauci starts talking about the infection fatality rate. That includes the total estimated amount of COVID-19 infections in the country, including ones with no symptoms. That is a far more meaningful number, particularly if you’re trying to make health policy for the entire country.

You should calculate how many people who have the virus are dying from it. So what is that number? What is the actual death rate from COVID?

Well, at the height of the outbreak in late May, the CDC’s best estimate for the fatality rate for people with COVID-19 symptoms, just the ones with symptoms was 0.4%. That estimate was contained in the CDC document called “COVID-19 Pandemic Planning Scenarios.” It was intended for hospitals, it was not in the public press release, “Reason” Magazine got a copy of it.

JPMorgan looked at the data and came to pretty much the same conclusion. Infection fatality rates in the spring of 2020 at the height of the pandemic, were 0.06% in Santa Clara, California. They were the same in Los Angeles. They were point 0.18% in Miami Dade County.

In other words, by Tony Fauci’s own definition, what we are experiencing was effectively a severe flu season, at the worst. But that’s not what Fauci said under oath when he testified at the House Oversight hearing in March of last year.

In that hearing, Fauci claimed the COVID-19 infection mortality rate was around one%, which Fauci explained means it is, quote: ” … 10 times more lethal than the seasonal flu.” That’s untrue. That’s a lie it turns out.

It is hard to think of a more misleading use of numbers. In fact, survival rates for COVID-19 for anyone under the age of 70 turned out to be north of 99.5%. Fauci knew that.

On March 16, someone had a related question for Fauci that a FOX News anchor, Steve Hilton, had asked on the air. Here it is, quote: “Given the relative safety of all but the elderly and those whose immune systems are compromised, why not quarantine only them?” Fauci’s response, “Stay tuned.” Period.

So we did, and the next few weeks, Fauci said, shut the country down.

He encouraged closing down schools, even though as he wrote in one February email, quote: “Children have a very low rate of infection.” He knew that, but he pushed to close schools anyway.

Then he told everyone in the country to wear masks, even though he knew they didn’t work. As he explained at another February e-mail, which we’re just now getting, quote: “The typical mask you buy in the drugstore is not really effective in keeping out virus, which is small enough to pass through the material,” end quote. Those drugstore masks don’t work. But Fauci continued to demand that you wear those drugstore masks. He continued to demand that the lockdown continue.

Why did he do that when he knew and we know for certain, now we can prove it because we have the emails — he knew those were not recommendations grounded in science, but he pushed them anyway. Why? We can’t say for certain.

We do know the effect of these recommendations was a kind of medical martial law. The country was so miserable, and so off balance for so long that no one really thought to ask, where did this virus come from? But Fauci knew where it came from.

Here he is in 2018, celebrating the end of the Federal moratorium on American taxpayer funding of gain-of-function research.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FAUCI: NIH lifts funding pause on gain-of-function research. So let me explain this a little because whenever this comes out, there’s always the pushing back and forth from the press. So like NIH now is going to do dangerous research. No, as a matter of fact, it’s exactly the opposite.

So a framework has been now established to guide funding decisions on proposed research that might be anticipated to create, transfer, or use enhanced potential pandemic pathogens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: I’m going to speak slowly now for those of you who are not scientifically literate, for the dumb people in the audience which is everyone, but me, the NIH is not going to conduct dangerous experiments. There’s a framework.

That was Fauci’s promise and in fact, it was half true. NIH did not conduct dangerous experiments. The NIH and Tony Fauci paid for the Chinese to conduct dangerous experiments, and they did.

There is no debate about that now. It happened.

So what are the consequences going to be? What happens if you do something like this and wreck the country? Will Fauci face any consequences?

The White House answered that question today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Well, I think we’ve spoken to this pretty extensively from here.

Let me just say on Dr. Fauci and his emails. He has also spoken to this many, many times over the last — over the course of the last few days, and we’ll let him speak for himself and he has been an undeniable asset in our country’s pandemic response.

But it is obviously not that advantageous for me to re-litigate the substance of emails from 17 months ago.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: He could speak for himself. He’s always got a place on Nicolle Wallace’s show where she’ll tell him what a great man he is, really kind of a hero. He can speak for himself on MSNBC.

So nothing is going to happen with Tony Fauci. He is not even going to lose his job — ever. As Biden’s flak explained today, he will never be fired. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETER DOOCY, FOX NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Just since he mentioned Dr. Fauci again, can you imagine any circumstance where President Biden would ever fire him?

PSAKI: No. Go ahead.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: No. No. And not only is he never going to be fired, held to account for this, forced to explain, he is also never going to apologize because it’s your fault.

Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor