On Wednesday, July 29th, 2026, during a Senate Homeland Security and Government Committee hearing, Anthony Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right to avoid answering questions regarding gain-of-function research funded by his former agency, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), in Wuhan, China, and its possible connection to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Fauci, who was subpoenaed to testify before the committee chaired by Senator Paul, stated, "I believed in and respect the value of legitimate congressional oversight," but refused to answer questions citing Senator Paul's "obvious obsession with calling for my prosecution, his repeated slanderous comments about me, and recently his publicly releasing my unredacted personal diary aimed at embarrassing and intimidating me."

Despite Senator Paul directing Fauci to respond—highlighting that Fauci had received a pardon from President Joe Biden covering conduct dating back to 2014 when the U.S. government paused gain-of-function research funding—Fauci maintained his refusal.

When Fauci's attorney attempted to speak on his behalf, Senator Paul declared the attorney was not a recognized witness and ordered him removed from the hearing room.

Fauci emphatically stated in a May 2021 hearing that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) "has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research" at the Wuhan Institute. He also dismissed claims about NIAID's support for a paper co-authored by Chinese virologist Zheng-Li Shi describing novel coronaviruses engineered in the Wuhan lab, telling Senator Paul in July 2021, "You do not know what you are talking about."

However, Fauci's diary entry from January 31, 2020, reveals he was contacted by researchers who believed SARS-CoV-2 might have been engineered due to the virus's furin cleavage site on its spike protein, which facilitates binding to human cell receptors.

Proximal Origin co-author Kristian Andersen, a Danish researcher at Scripps Research, expressed in a Slack message to co-authors that their paper was "pretty strong in saying 'there's no way' [the virus was engineered], but I have less confidence in that statement at this stage."

This hearing highlights ongoing debates and inconsistencies regarding the origins of the COVID-19 virus and the role of U.S.-funded research in Wuhan.

Sources