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Dr. Anthony Fauci, former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), lied to Congress about using his personal email for official business, news commentator Kim Iversen alleged Tuesday on “The Kim Iversen Show.”
This controversy, stemming from the “Beaglegate” scandal — which erupted in October 2021 — comes amid renewed scrutiny of government-funded experiments conducted on animals.
Iversen highlighted newly obtained records, obtained by the White Coat Waste Project through a Freedom of Information Act request and shared with the New York Post, that include an email dated Oct. 29, 2021, in which Fauci told a Washington Post reporter, “I will send you an e-mail via my gmail account.”
The email, Iversen said, contradicts Fauci’s June 2024 testimony to Congress, during which he explicitly said, “Let me state for the record that to the best of my knowledge, I have never conducted official business using my personal email.”
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“Let me state for the record that to the best of my knowledge, I have never conducted official business using my personal email.”
If this is true, it’s only because he used burner phones and… pic.twitter.com/2n1Zna6sQh
— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) June 3, 2024
Iversen noted that Fauci’s attorneys attempted to justify this discrepancy by claiming that his communication with the Washington Post reporter was a personal matter.
But according to Iversen, “Nobody cares about Anthony Fauci’s personal life.” She claimed that all public interest in Fauci stems from his role during the COVID-19 pandemic and his involvement in controversial research funding decisions.
Iversen also pointed out that Fauci’s precise wording in his testimony — “to the best of my knowledge” — could provide him with a defense against accusations of lying.
“He would be able to go back and say, ‘Well, I didn’t remember. I’m 83 years old. I didn’t remember that I actually did tell a reporter to use my private email.’”
Iversen said she doubts Fauci will face any serious repercussions over the allegation because his status as part of the establishment protects him from consequences faced by others.
“Anthony Fauci is the establishment, and it’s on both sides of the aisle,” Iversen said. “Both sides of the aisle love Anthony Fauci.”
FDA ‘does not mandate human drugs be studied in dogs’
The “Beaglegate” controversy refers to NIAID-funded experiments on beagle puppies.
The experiments, according to other documents obtained by the White Coat Waste Project, involved injecting and force-feeding 44 beagle puppies between 6 and 8 months old with an experimental drug before euthanizing them, The Epoch Times reported in December 2022.
Last week, a bipartisan group of 25 lawmakers demanded answers from the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) about a $949,108 contract for toxicology testing using beagles, according to a July 29 report in the Washington Examiner.
In a letter dated July 26 and addressed to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Reps. Young Kim (R-Calif.), Don Davis (D-N.C.) and other congressional members expressed concern over the use of taxpayer dollars for what they termed “inhumane dog experiments for human drugs.”
The experiments, according to documents obtained by the White Coat Waste Project and published in May, involved beagles being “repeatedly force-fed massive doses of an experimental drug to allegedly gain FDA [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] approval.”
The lawmakers questioned the necessity of the testing, citing a 2021 statement from the FDA that it “does not mandate human drugs be studied in dogs.”
Iversen highlighted the bipartisan nature of the issue, noting that 23 other Republican and Democratic co-signers joined Kim and Davis in their letter to Austin.
Pentagon toxicology testing on beagles draws fire @RepYoungKim ‘Animals should be treated with care, not cruelty.’@JustinRGoodman ‘We’ve defunded and eliminated dog and cat testing at VA and now the DOD needs to follow suit.’https://t.co/Nc6cSwJiNV via @dcexaminer pic.twitter.com/LefotgLewJ
— Paul Bedard (@SecretsBedard) July 29, 2024
‘It’s people versus the machine’
The current scrutiny of animal testing practices has roots in earlier controversies, notably the October 2021 Beaglegate incident involving the NIAID, then under Fauci’s direction.
That year, a bipartisan group of lawmakers wrote to Fauci expressing “grave concerns” about reports that NIAID funded experiments on beagle puppies.
The controversy intensified when it was alleged that the researchers had “de-barked” the puppies, surgically removing their vocal cords to prevent them from barking during the experiments.
In December 2021, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) introduced the Preventing Animal Abuse and Waste (PAAW) Act of 2021 to defund dog testing at NIAID, but the bill was never passed.
However, the backlash from the Beaglegate revelations led to broader scrutiny of government-funded animal testing.
In June 2022, a major supplier of research animals to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) closed its Cumberland, Virginia, beagle breeding facility after being cited for over 70 animal welfare violations.
That month, Fauci canceled $1.8 million in research funding with dogs, turning instead to rodents for drug development.
Iversen argued that the issue of government transparency transcends partisan politics. “We’ve got to understand that it’s not left and right. It’s establishment versus anti-establishment. It’s people versus the machine. And the machine is on both sides of the aisle.”
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Fauci: Beaglegate is ‘lies’ and ‘lunacy’
In his recent book, “On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service,” Fauci addressed the “Beaglegate” controversy, dismissing the backlash over NIAID-funded beagle experiments as “lies” and “lunacy” from the “far-right,” according to a June 20 New York Post article.
“You really cannot make this stuff up! Though, of course, they did,” Fauci wrote in his book, referring to the reports about the experiments allowing sand flies to attack the heads of sedated, food-deprived dogs.
Fauci went on to state, “NIH-funded research that involves animals is conducted under strict guidelines for the use and care of laboratory animals, and I am a passionate animal lover, especially of dogs.”
However, the New York Post reported that Fauci’s stance in his book appears to contradict his June 3, 2024, testimony to Congress, where he acknowledged approving the studies, stating, “I signed off on them because they were approved by a peer review.”
The Washington Post fact-checked the matter and noted that NIAID removed the project from its grant database without explanation following press inquiries in late 2021.
Anthony Bellotti, founder of the White Coat Waste Project, told the New York Post, “Beaglegate is Fauci’s Achilles’ heel, which is why in his new book he’s still frantically fibbing about it.”
Watch ‘The Kim Iversen Show’ here:
