Dr. Anthony Fauci’s 100-plus refusals to answer Senate questions gave Ted Cruz the opening to demand contempt charges, a perjury prosecution and jail time.
The Texas Republican called for punishment after Fauci spent Wednesday’s Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing invoking the Fifth Amendment instead of answering Chairman Rand Paul’s questions.
“Years from now, they’ll look back and say, ‘What collective madness overtook this country?’” Cruz warned Fox News.
Paul had already announced that he would seek contempt charges after Fauci refused to answer questions throughout the hearing, invoking his right against self-incrimination again and again.
Cruz said Fauci’s silence should become the lasting image of his career.
@foxnews “He should be prosecuted for perjury, and he should go to jail.” Sen. Ted Cruz blasted Dr. Anthony Fauci following his Senate testimony, calling him “the most damaging bureaucrat in American history” and arguing Fauci should face criminal prosecution. Cruz accused Fauci of misleading the public during the COVID-19 pandemic and said Americans deserve accountability for the government’s handling of the crisis.
“Dr. Fauci ought to think about what it says about the end of his career, that what he will be remembered for the most is pleading the Fifth more than 100 times,” Cruz argued. “He’s been the most damaging bureaucrat in the history of America.”
Fauci came into the hearing accusing Paul of trying to trap him into a criminal case.
“The only conclusion I can reach is that the sole reason he is calling me before this committee is to get me to say something, anything that could vindicate his repeated public pledges that I end up, in his words, ‘behind bars,’” Fauci claimed.
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Fauci said he was invoking the Fifth Amendment on his attorneys’ advice.
“Any reasonable person who has followed his unhinged obsession with me would readily come to the same conclusion,” Fauci continued.
“Therefore, although it pains me to do so because of the respect I have for the legislative branch of government and my decades-long record of cooperating with Congress under the advice of my attorneys, I will invoke my right under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution to refrain from answering your questions.”
No answers, just the same script… 111 times.
Dr. Anthony Fauci stonewalled the Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee by repeatedly invoking the Fifth Amendment during today's hearing on COVID-19 and the former NIAID director's conduct throughout the… pic.twitter.com/LyeR4hBta8
— Fox News (@FoxNews) July 29, 2026
Paul’s questioning centered on gain-of-function research and his allegation that a lab leak caused the COVID-19 pandemic. Fauci refused each question.
“The chairman has denied your assertion of privilege and directed you to answer. He nonetheless refuses and stands on privilege,” Paul noted.
Paul warned that refusing to testify after being directed to answer could trigger action from the committee.
“The committee will have to consider at this hearing what appropriate action should be taken against you for failure to testify after being directed to do so. It’s against the law to obstruct an investigation of Congress,” Paul cautioned.
Paul also warned there would be “repercussions” for Fauci’s refusal.
When David Schertler, one of Fauci’s attorneys, tried to defend the Fifth Amendment invocation, Paul shut him down.
“You’re not recognized. If you are unruly, you will be removed from the proceeding,” Paul declared.
🚨 JUST NOW: Sen. Paul informs Anthony Fauci that he's BREAKING THE LAW for by REFUSING to answer questions in this hearing
PAUL: "In the red folder on your table is a copy of Section 192 of Title II of the US Code… That section makes it a CRIME for a witness appearing under… https://t.co/JVItFvy6u0 pic.twitter.com/Sd6DNMY19z
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) July 29, 2026
“You were told not to sit at the table. You insist on sitting at the table, and we told you you would not be recognized. You are not invited here for testimony, sir. You are being disruptive.”
Cruz pointed to the Fauci diary entries Paul released days earlier, covering 2019 through 2022.
“I think Anthony Fauci has had contempt for Congress and contempt for the American people for decades,” Cruz argued.
“His diary shows that he deliberately lied to the American people over and over and over again.”
One target was Fauci’s private writing on COVID’s origins. Cruz accused him of saying one thing in private and another on television.
“In his diary, he wrote early on that it was clear that the COVID virus did not come from the wet market in Wuhan, and then he turned around and said exactly the opposite thing on national television,” Cruz said.
The released diaries show Fauci considered possibilities about the virus’s origin that he later downplayed in public.
He wrote that scientists considered the possibility of a deliberately inserted laboratory origin worthy of further expert review, while his later statements suggested the opposite to the public.
Cruz also pointed to school closures, accusing Fauci of privately taking credit for shutdowns while publicly denying responsibility.
“In his diary, he brags about convincing Democrats in New York and California to shut schools down, and yet he goes on TV and says, ‘Oh, I wasn’t for shutdowns,’” Cruz said.
Fauci wrote in his diary that he convinced New York and California government officials to lock down their state school systems.
Publicly, he said multiple times in interviews and testified to the House Oversight Committee that he “did not close the schools.”
Cruz called the school closures one of the most damaging policy decisions in decades.
“They will still be suffering the consequences of Anthony Fauci’s corrupt and dishonest shutdowns,” Cruz continued.
Cruz said the alleged lies should bring criminal consequences.
“The fact that he knew he was lying to the American people — he should be held in contempt, he should be prosecuted for perjury, and he should go to jail,” Cruz concluded.
On “The Will Cain Show,” Paul questioned whether Fauci’s pardon undercut his Fifth Amendment claim.
“The legal question is, if you’re pardoned, can you really claim the Fifth?” Paul asked. “The Fifth Amendment is to claim immunity from self-incrimination. But if you’ve already been given immunity, you can’t self-incriminate unless you lie.
“I don’t know how you plead the Fifth Amendment to something you’ve already been granted immunity for.”
Paul told Fox News he plans to prepare a brief arguing that a pardon changes the Fifth Amendment question.
“That’s why I think it needs to be pursued in court whether or not, (with) a pardon, you can continue to claim the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination when you’ve been given immunity. So, I think there are some really important legal questions here,” Paul remarked.
Paul said he expected an apology and was “disappointed” by the hearing. He also criticized Democrats for defending the government instead of pressing whether federal funding helped cause a pandemic that killed more than 1 million Americans.
“They don’t seem to care about the truth. I think they want to defend the government more than they want get to the truth of: Did your government actually fund something that led to a pandemic that killed a million Americans?” Paul charged.
.@POTUS: "I inherited Fauci. He was here from the 1980s, so I had him for a period of time, and I disagreed with him on a lot. I would've had to close down the whole country if I listened to him. I went the federalist way, which is basically let the governors decide it." pic.twitter.com/kvJWOw3wIr
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) July 29, 2026
President Donald Trump said he watched the whole hearing and disagreed with Fauci often during his first term.
“Well, I watched the whole thing today, but more importantly… I inherited Fauci. He was here from the 1980s, so I had him for a period of time, and I disagreed with him a lot. I would have had to close down the whole country if I listened to him,” Trump recalled.
Trump said Fauci “wasn’t a big factor” for him, but “was a very big factor for Biden.”
Cruz got his soundbyte but nothing will be done to Fauci. No arrest, no jail, no revocation of his pension. Nothing