Ernst Confronts Fauci Face-to-Face About His COVID-19 Cover-Ups and Shutdowns

WASHINGTON - Today, during a Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs hearing, U.S. Senator Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) questioned Dr. Anthony Fauci about how and if he was involved in the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus. She criticized his societal shutdown strategy and highlighted how the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) programs funded gain-of-function researchers in China, the Netherlands, and Wisconsin. Throughout the hearing, Fauci pleaded the Fifth.

Ahead of the hearing, Ernst awarded Dr. Anthony Fauci with her Squeal Award, arguing that Fauci's method is to deceive the public, discredit those who ask questions, destroy evidence, hide the truth, and accept a pardon to avoid accountability.

Watch Ernst's questioning here.

"Dr. Fauci, Americans haven't forgotten the tragic stories of people who lost loved ones during COVID, and those that were denied a chance to say goodbye to their family members that were in hospitals or residing in nursing homes because of the COVID-19 protocols. Americans haven't forgotten the mandates, the adverse reactions to vaccines, the government misinformation, social media censorship, hotlines to tattle on their neighbors, the forced school closures, the tragic rise in suicides or those businesses that were forced to close during lockdowns.," said Ernst.

Background:

Ernst has long fought to stop tax dollars from being sent overseas for risky research and to secure answers on the questionable circumstances surrounding the U.S. government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2021, Ernst requested the Health and Human Services (HHS) OIG investigation of EcoHealth Alliance's experiments at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which found the group's work with the Wuhan Institute resulted in enhanced coronaviruses and did not comply with federal reporting requirements. An Ernst-requested investigation also exposed how EcoHealth sent over $1 million U.S. taxpayer dollars to the Wuhan Institute of Virology for risky experiments on bat coronaviruses. These efforts also led to HHS defunding EcoHealth and permanently debarring the Wuhan Institute of Virology from receiving taxpayer dollars used for research of pandemic potential.

Ernst authored the provision in the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act directing the DoD OIG to conduct an audit of Pentagon funding of risky research in China and other foreign nations. She is demanding that the redacted findings of the investigation be made public. In her $2 trillion blueprint to slash waste in Washington, Ernst pointed to the millions being sent to China for secretive risky research.

In May 2026, Ernst put a longtime CIA employee, with firsthand knowledge of the intelligence community's response to the pandemic, on the record about government suppression of origin theories and bureaucratic flaws that enabled the coverup.

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