Tony's Diary — Fauci's Private Diary vs. Public Statements (Sen. Rand Paul / HSGAC release) (Part 1 of 10)

670while being filmed.   Also, Jenny was worried about the anxiety this might cause Megan.
It all worked out well as they were individually interviewed by Janet 1-on-1.  Janet was
terrific.
I am starting to collect Cacti in my home office.
Dec. 30, 2019 – Over the years I have helped Dionne Warwick to find physicians for
herself and her colleagues.   I have done this sometimes through as intermediary, Guy
Draper, who is well-known sould song wsriter and agent for many groups .   Guy
called me up today and asked for a referral for a peripheral vascular physician at Hopkins
for one of Dionne’s friends.   I recommended in Medicine Dr. Elizabeth Virginia
Ratchford and in Surgery Dr. James Hamilton Black.   Also, Guy wanted me to put on
my calendar for June 13, 2020 a ceremony at Bowie State University where they are
dedicating a building to Dionne.   They want me there as their guest.
Also, Jon laPook was interviewed on CBS Morning News and mentioned me several
times since he e-mail me over the weekend to prep him for his interview on Universal Flu
vaccine and HIV vaccines.
Jan. 2, 2020 – Met in my office with Dr. Olivier Tshiani who was and is a main player
in our PALM trial in DRC.   Also present were Cliff lane, Rick Davey and Lori Dodd.
Olivier was right there on site when the Mai Mai burned the ETUs at Katwa and
Butembo and his car was stoned as he was travelling at night from the ETU to his
compound where he was living in Butembo.   He related stories of the very difficult
security issues while doing the PALM study.   He is a real hero.   He had also previously
spent 5 years in Nancy Sullivan’s lab. Here at VRC.
Did TV interview with Cox TV this year’s influenza situation.   Interviewed by
Samantha Manning
Jan. 3, 2020 – Influenza is heavy in the media.   Did an interview with Elizabeth Cohen
of CNN for her Blog.   Also, did a live radio interview with John Catsimatidis for his
“Cats Roundtable” from NYC.
Also, yesterday the US via a precise drone strike in Iraq outside of Baghdad airport
killed the leader of the Iranian Quds Force General Quassim Souleimani.   There has
been over the past few days attacks on the US Embassy by Iranian backed Iraqi militia as
a result of the fact that the US armed forces attacked and killed 25 Iranian backed Iraqi
militia who had killed a USA contractor and wounded several USA soldiers in Iraq.  This
will certainly lead to major escalation of tension and even retaliation from Iran.
Also 44 unusual cases of pneumonia in Wuhan, China opver the past couple of days.
Etiology still unknown.   Said to be a “viral pneumonia’ of unknown etiology.   Flu ruled
out.   Cases linked to a seafood market.  No human-to-human transmission documented at
this time.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
671Jan. 6, 2020 – Chris and I went to a book party for our friend Ruth Marcus
(Washington Post columnist), fo her book “Supreme Ambition” about Justice Brett
Kavanaugh.   Party at the home of David and Katherine Bradley at 2211 30th Street, NW.
Elegant home.   Super A list at party: Senator Mark Warner, Kellyanne Conway, Andrea
Mitchell, David Ignatius, David Frum, Zeke Emanuel, etc., etc.  Rafe Sagalyn is Ruth’s
agent and was there.   Also, ran into Sylvia Burwell.   Really great to see her. Realized
how much I miss working with her.  Nice evening.
Jan. 7, 2020 -   Just because of the sudden preduction of 1-3 inches of snow, OPM shut
down the USG at 1:00 PM and everyone rushed to get off campus at the same time that
Walter Reed personnel are trying to leave.   This has created a total nightmare traffic jam
on campus.   It is taking almost 1 hour to get off campus from time you get in your car.
Did TV interview with Canadian TV (CTV) on the viral outbreak in Wuhan, China.
Did interview (print) with HealthDay on the influenza season
Jan. 10, 2020  (Friday)– Infleunza is hot and heavy.   Vaccine match is OK for H1N1,
but not so good for B and H3N2.   Did WUSA local TV on flu as well as interview with
Elizabeth Cohen of CNN that went on her blog with multiple references to our
conversation.
Appeared on Voice of America to discuss the new Wuhan virus documented to be a
novel coronavirus.  Interesting that ovewr the past several years we have had 3 emerging
novel coronaviruses that have caused serious disease in humans: SARS, MERS, and now
the Wuhan virus.

Chinese publish sequence of the virus on public data base
Jan. 11, 2020 (Saturday) – Barney Graham ordersd the constructs using credit
cards.
Jan. 13, 2020 – Went to a function at the National Cathedral where David Rubenstein
was interview in the naïve (similar to my interview a few years ago) by the Dean of the
Cathedral in association with David’s book – “The American Story”.  David was his
usual hilarious self.
Jan. 14, 2020 –  Barney Graham’s team starts work on GMP vaccine in
collaboration with Moderna
 Did taped interview for the Islam Radio Breakfast Show about anti-vaxx movement.
Very good interview.
Also, did another interview with Eileen Reilly of Axios
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672Apparently, CDC is upset because I am saying that this is on a course to be as bad a year
as 2017-2018 and 2014-2015.  In fact, the flu infection “numbers” are exactly on tract
with those years.   However, there are less total deaths and hospitalizations.   This is due
to the fact that Influenza B has predominated early that this hits kids more severely.
Since the elderly account for most of the deaths and hospitalizations, the total of these are
down; however for this time compared to other years, the number of pediatric deaths is
way up.   And so it depends what you mean by a ‘bad’ season.  I say it is a bad season
and CDC says no. There was a discussion between Azar and Nancy Messonnier of CDC
about this and about my statements, but no one thought of getting me on the conference
call.   Not good.   Typical CDC!
Jan. 15, 2020 -  Did interview on WTOP Radio on the number of pediatric flu deaths.
I explained the issue of predominance of Influenza B and children and the poor match of
the vaccine to circulating virus with Influenza B Victoria.
Jan. 16, 2020 – The situation in Wuhan, China continues.   Now have 2 deaths and 2
cases in Thailand and 1 in Japan.   Was in on a PCC meeting via the NIH SCIF with the
NSC chaired by Anthony Ruggiero.  CDC and DHS have decided to do entry screening at
3 USA airport in people coming directly and indirectly from Wuhan: Kennedy in NYC,
LAX, and SFO.   Tomorrow night at 10:00 PM a 747 from Wuhan will arrive at Kennedy
and will be the first to get screened.
nCoV_PCC_SOC_FIN
AL.docx
I appeared this evening on a PBS NewsHour segment on Ebola with considerable
exposure in the piece.
Jan. 17, 2020 – appeared on radio with NPR “Here and Now” on the pediatric
Influenza B situation.   Influenza B predominating yet the Victoria B in the vaccine is
only a 58% match and so children are getting a double whammy with B
predominating early in the year and continuing and the vaccine is not well matched.   In
this regard, there are more pediatric deaths (39) thus far at this point in the season
compared to most other years.   The infection slope is high for all infections yet the total
deaths and hospitalization are not that high, likely because there is little H3N2 and that is
the virus that affects the elderly the most and the elderly accound for most of the
hospitalizations and deaths.
Jennifer Ashton of ABC World News Tonight called me in a panic about 15 minutes
before she is to go on the air about the Wuhan virus (2019nCoV).   She wanted to get my
take on the airport screening and the potential seriousness of the situation.   I emphasized
that we need to take this seriously and the airport screening is entirely appropriate.
We are now doing entry screening at JFK, LAX and SFO of flights from Wuhan.   There
are a couple of direct flights per week from Wuhan to JFK and SFO
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673Jan. 18, 2020 – Situation starting toheaten up re: 2019nCoV.  There are now 17 more
cases in Wuhan and the LSTMH has estimated that there may actually be several
hundreds of cases that have not yet been recognized.   It is starting to look like there is
some low grade close contact transmission person to person.   I appeared on CNN
Newsroom with Fredricka Whitfield to discuss the 2019 nCoV situation and the recent
screening at 3 airports.
Jan. 19, 2020 – Things evolving rapidly with the 2019 nCoV.   Now there are 198
confirmed cases, all in China except for 2 in Thailand and 1 in Japan.  Cases now in
Guangdong Province with suspected cases in Beijing and Shanghai.
Did TV interview (pre-taped) for CNN International at 10:00 PM to be shown
internationally through the night and tomorrow,
Jan. 20, 2020 – Now there are >220 cases of n-CoV with a travel case in South Korea
and 14 transmissions to health care providers.  Clearly, this is a rapidly expanding
situation with no question about person-to-person transmission.
Did print interview for Caixin Media Company, which is the most influential political
and business news organization in China.
Also did interview for CBS Evening News and for FOX 5 Local TV
Also, conversation with Elizabeth Cohen of CNN.  Problem with her is that she tends to
dramatize things, which can get me in trouble not matter how many caveats I give her.
Jan. 21, 2020 – n-CoV situation continues to evolve.   Now 298 cases with 6 deaths.
Very fluid.
Did ointerview with Eileen O’Reilly for Axios
Interview with Chinese Radio Free Asia
CDC announced today that the first case of n-CoV has been identified in Seattle.   A
35 year old otherwise healthy Chinese man visited Wuhan, came to USA on January 15
(before airport screening), developed sxs on Jan. 16, tested on Jan. 19, test sent to CDC
and positive on Jan. 20.   He walked into a clinical with fever and respiratory sxs and was
smart enough to mention that he just came from Wuhan.
Other press today – VOA News; WSJ with Betsy MacKay; WCBS Radio; TV
NewsMAX; TV FOX Business with Lou Dodd; Biocentury with Steve Usdin;
Bloomberg Law with Jeannie Baumann; Washington Times; Time Magazine (Alice
Park)
We are having daily PCCs with Anthony Ruggierro.   He is his usual prickly self.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
674Jan. 22, 2020 – Now 400 cases and 9 deaths.  Chicago ORD and Atl airports added to
entry screening with JFK, LAX, and SFO.   Soon to funnel all flights with people from
Wuhan (indirect) through these 5 airports.
Another PCC with Anthony being hostile that the orgs (CDC, DHS, CBP) have not
worked out how to get 100% of people coming from Wuhan screened.  We are in Phase 1
(Screening at JFK, LAX, SFO).   We are almost fully ready for Phase 2 (add ORD and
ATL).  Phase 3 is to funnel people who originate at Wuhan and want to go to USA
through one of the 5 airports.  Phase 4 is to screen individuals coming from many cities in
China.   Big argument between CDC (Redfield) and CBP/DHS regarding have 5 versus
12 USA airports do the screening.   Marty Cetron was trying to explain how difficult
doing 12 USA airports would be since CDC does not have staff in a few of these cities.
To complicate it all, while we were in the PCC, China announced that it is cutting off all
public transportation  (air, ferries, train, buses, out of Wuhan City)  Essentially a
quarantine of the entire city of 11 million people except for absolute emergencies.   This
complicates the USA airport screening strategy since people will not be able to get out of
Wuhan and to the USA easily. May try other means.   Some confusion about what the
best way to prevent establishment of infection in the USA.   Anthony (with his attitude) is
making matters worse.
Phase I—Current Posture
•Description: Foreign nationals who have been in China within 14 days prior to their
actual or attempted entry into the United States are ineligible for admission under
Section 212 (f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).  Departments and
agencies may exercise certain exemptions.  Any person, but specifically U.S.
citizens and legal permanent residents (LPRs) who have been: (1) in Hubei
province within the past 14 days may be subject to 14 day mandatory quarantine;
and (2) in China (outside Hubei province) within the past 14 days may be subject
to screening and self-isolation for 14 days.  All direct and indirect flights from
China are funneled to 11 airports with enhanced CDC medical screening.  CDC is
coordinating with state and local health care clinicians to identify domestic cases,
isolate cases, and conduct appropriate contact tracing.
oTriggers: Already being implemented.
•Objectives: (1) Contain the outbreak at its source, (2) minimize domestic
importation of additional cases, (3) limit potential for domestic epidemic, and (4)
prepare the domestic response mechanisms.
•Messaging: Daily HHS and CDC briefings and on camera task force briefings as
appropriate.
On the interview below (FOX Business with David Asman) one of the panel asked me to
comment of a clip he played where Trump said that everything is under control.   Xi
Jinping told him everything is under control.   I had to answer that we are taking this very
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
675seriously and that Americans should not be frightened or worry, but we are taking it
seriously.   Let us see if this pits me against the POTUS.
552 cases – 17 Deaths   Cases now in Hong Kong and Macao
WTOP Radio on Seattle case;  The Morning Goods (local radio talk show); TRT
World Turkish TV; Reuters TV; Fox Business (Cavuto); Bloomberg print; FOX
Business with David Asman; Italian TV (Mediaset);  Taped CNN in the VRC
talking about the vaccine; Hong Kong Phoenix TV; Univision TV (Spanish-
American TV); Bloomberg TV Asia; 24 NEWS Israeli TV over the phone
Jan. 23, 2020 – China shuts down public transportation in 3 additional smaller cities –
Huanggang, Ezhou and Chibi.
After 2nd Advisory Committee meeting WHO still does not declare PHEIC.   Very
controversial decision.   They are getting some criticism about this.   On several of the
media that I did (see below) I was asked my opinion of this.   I said I did not want to
outguess the WHO and demurred.
Press still heavy.   Did FOX Business TV (Varney and Company); FOX News
(Sandra Smith); CBS Radio;Shanghai Media TV via Skype; Politico (Sarah
Owermohle); Shanghai Media TV; Science News print; CNN Newsroom (clip shown
by Sanjay Gupta); FOX News Rundown (Radio); COX Media TV; John
Catsimatidis Radio Show – Cats Roundtable; CNBC Asia Squawk Box; BBC radio;
FOX Business News (Lou Dobbs);Canadian Broadcasting System (Kelly Crowe).
Jan. 24, 2020 – More cities shut down by the Chinese.   Now >800 cases and 26 deaths.
State Department issued Level 4 (no travel at all) for Wuhan.
Had meeting at EEOB381 (Anthony’s office) to discuss the evolving siautaion with
2019-nCoV.  Derek Kan (Deputy Director, OMB) was there with other OMB folks to
determine what the budgetary needs would be for our response.   I will put together some
budget numbers.  I was supposed to be on this coming weekend (it is now Friday) This
Week With George Stephanopoulos and Face the Nation; however, these were bumped
because of impeachment trial that is onging.
Call from Lena Sun (Washington Post) trying to verify (I said I knew nothing of this)
that people in the USG were saying that the Chinese got to Tedros to convince him not to
declare a PHEIC since it would harm their reputation.   I told her that was nonsense and I
probably stopped her from writing the story.   She said since I am in all the important
meetings that I would know.
CNBC Squawk Box; CBS Radio New York;  Massive press interactions prior to and
after my briefing of the Senators;  Clip of me on CBS This Morning from the
briefing
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
676Jan. 25, 2020 – now more than1400 cases and 42 deaths.   President Xi Jinping
essentially sutting down the entire country.   Schools closing in Beijing.   Suspicion that
the Chinese are telling us everything that is going on in China.   Why are the Chinese
reacting so dramatically by essentially shutting down the entire country?
State Department evacuating all USA personnel from consulate in WUHAN
New York Times interview; CNN International
Jan. 26, 2020 – GAME ON!!!   Things are changing rapidly.  Dr. Ma Xiaowei, the
Chinese Minister of Health gave a press statement saying that the incubationperiod of
nCoV is 1 to 14 days and that the virus is being transmitted when people are
asymptomatic!   This has enormous implications for how we handle people from Wuhan
(like our diplomats who are now on the way back from WUHAN, having been ordered to
evaculate).   Should we quarantine them.   I am very skeptical about the Chinese
interprepation of their data.  I spoke with Mike Ryan (WHO) from Geneva and he and
Tedros are going to Wuhan soon.   Mike is very skeptical that aymptomatic spread is
present or at worst is a major driver of spread.   Mike Osterholm also feels this way.
    I spoke with Nancy Messonnier and Bob Redfield this AM to coordinate our
responses.   Bob and I feel (and I told Elizabeth Cohen this) that we should be allowed to
send our CDC epidemiologists to China to work with them so that we see the data first
hand since we will base important response activities and strategies based on whether this
is true.   It would require our quarantining for a period of time even asymptomatic people
who arrive from Wuhan.
It now appears using epi data and genomic data that the first infection was in early
December and was not connected to the market.   The infections spread among people
weeks before the Chinese reported that they were dealing with a new infection and that
gave the virus time to establish itself in multigenerational (sustained) spread.
Remember, early on the Chinese were saying that there is no human to human
transmission and all the original 27 cases were from the market.   Now we know the
market was not the source, it was the amplifier.   Having said that, somewhere the virus
jumped from animals to humans.
There is complete chaos in China now with president Xi Jinping declaring an emergency
situation.   The Chinese are building within days 1000 and 1300 bed hospitals and flying
in hundreds of medical personnel from military.  They have shut down travel within most
of the country and have called off many Lunar New Year events.   Schools closed at least
until mid-February.   Running out of supplies such as PPE.
Had 8:00 PM call with Anthony Ruggiero, Phil Ferro, and Bob Redfield about the
evolving situation.  The deputiers and White House are pushing to close the borders for
any traffic from China.   Bob and I are against that.   Anthony said that he heard that I wa
in favor of that.   Will have 11:00 AM meeting tomorrow from SCIF with Deputy
National Security Advisor Matthew Pottinger regarding possibly closing borders from
China entry.
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677CNN phone interview with Elizabeth Cohen; CBC Canadian TV; CNN with
Fredricka Whitfield (cancelled because of tragic accidental death of Kob Bryant in
helicopter crash in LA); NewsHour from UK
Jan. 27, 2020 – Packed day today.  Council and multiple important non-corona-virus
meetings.
Busy day – two meeting with White House via SCIF.   First at 11:00 AM led by Deputy
Director NSC Matt Pottinger who still wants to stop all incoming from China.   Bob
Redfield, Phil Ferro, Mart Cetron, Peter Marks etc.
Second White House meeting via SCIF was on same subject withMick Mulvaney
Chairing and visit to meeting by VP Pence. Still discussing the pros and cons of shutting
off China.   I tried to squeeze in my opinion, but it was touch since I was remote.   I
briefed Azar beforehand by phone as to the down side (historically) in shutting out a
country.  Also at the meeting were Joe Grogan, Matt Pottinger, Alex Azar, DHS
Multiple print media including Washington Post,  Maggie Fox, Los Angeles; NPR
Morning Edition with Rachel Martin; WTOP radio; John LaPook with CBS –
taped interview to run with face to face interview tomorrow with Norah O’Donnell;
VOA; CNN International; Bret Baier FOX; WTOP again; Sean Hannity (FOX);
Jan. 28, 2019 – Big day at White House.   Major discussions at Deputies on how to
handle the 200 US Citizens (diplomats and families and  others) who are being air-
evaculted form Wuhan.   They are on a plane from China to Alaska to California.
Concern about whethernor not to quarantine them for 14 days when we did not and do
not quarantine Chinese who pass screening on entry.   Marty Cetron had argued that the
American were very recently in the “hot zone” whereas the chines who are coming in
now are not really coming from Wuhan since Wuhan has been shut down by the Chinese.
Also, political concern of what it looks like to quarantine or “imprision” US citizen
versus what happens if we let them in and they start infecting people.   Finally decide to
do a sft verion of bringin them in to a military airbase – the March Air reserve Base in
Riverside County. CA, and consider them all not a low risk.   They are either medium or
high risk based on their exposure.   They all will be tested (nasal swab PCR) and detained
at the base for up to 72 hours until the tests come back and then released.   The “high”
risk people majr get more intense investigation Discussed for hours in the Situation
Room.  The meeting was chaired by Mick Mulvaney and most Deputies were present
together with Matt Pottinger, Kellyanne Conway, Ken Cucinelli, Dr. Navarro, Biegun,
Blair, Eisenberg, Szabat, Lidell, Foret (CBP)John Wilson, John Mark (?).
Chinese scientists are saying that the epidemic is much worse than is being reported.   Dr.
Yuan say that 50% of the infections are asymptomatic.   However, this is confusing
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678people since he does not say what percent of these are spreading while asymptomatic.   A
lot of confusion and misinformation while the outbreak accelerates.
Azar wanted the POTUS to be briefed by me in the Oval office after the Sit Room, but a
fluke prevented this.   Brian Harrison called me into a side room for a few questions and
Azar was looking for me and could not find me and so he and Redfield went to the Oval
without me.   Innocent screwup.
Press conference with Azar – multiple media reporting with several clips of me; Lou
Dobbs FOX; Marc Siegal FOX; CBS This Morning;
Jan. 29, 2020 -  Got a call this AM from Lou Dobbs who told me that President Trump
will be calling me.  Lou spoke with the POTUS andf told him that I was the “smartest
person” around  and he should speak with me.
Amazing day today!
Bob Kadlec, Bob Redfield, Karin King (State), Ken Cuccinelli (DHS), Jonathan Fritz
(State) briefed the House members led by Nancy Pelosi who was her usual self with me
(big hug, kiss and telling everyone how great I am -  little embarrassing.   Diane DeGette
did the same thing.
At the Deputies Meeting in the Situation Room (4:00 to 5:15 PM) – big surprise.   Mick
Mulvaney led the meeting and after about 1 hour the President came in and the first
thing he said as he looked at me was: “Anthony, you are really a famous guy.   My good
friend Lou Dobbs (see above) told me that you were the one of the smartest,
knowledgeable and outstanding persons he knows.   He then stayed for 20 minutes and
asked most of his questions of me.  I was surprised and very pleased and the Deputies
were clearly stunned and impressed.   When Trump finally left, he said: “Anthony, are we
OK?”   I said: “We are good”.   He smiled and as he walked out of the room, he said
“Thanks, again, Anthony.   We are counting on you”.
The arrival of the US passengers at March base was a total success.  They arrived on a
Kalitta Air Boeing 747.(NPR)   The passenegers were extatic to be home.   The real issue
now is how do we get out the 200,000 US citizens who are in China if they want to leave.
It will be a logistical challenge.
Cases 7700 with 170 deaths
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679Clips of HHS press conference showing on different TV networks; NPR “On Point”;
Jan. 30, 2020 – Another amazing and difficult day.  Briefed the House Energy and
Commerce Committee members in Rayburn 2123.   All my friends kept saying I was a
national hero and they “….felt safe in my arms (Eschoo)”.   Testifying with me were Bob
redfield, Bob Kadlec and denise Hinton (FDA).
The chaos:   We had 2 PCCS led by Ruggiero and one Deputies lead by Mick Mulvaney
with the usal cast of characters.   Case in point.  Mart Cetron who was listening in on the
WHO call said that the epidemic was accelerating that this is was clear that the
incubation period was shorter (2-5 days than was previously felt and that asymptomatic
transmission was occurring.   Thus, it was agreed to present to the POTUS a revised plan
for containment:   The 200 people at March Base would be quarantines for 15 days.
Anyone coming in from Wuhan would be quarantined for 15 days.   Anyone from any
part of China would be voluntarily isolated for 15 days with monitoring by public health
officials (State/Local).      Azar would declare a Public Health Emergency and the State
Department level alert would be level 4.
The number of cases today are: 9480 with 213 deaths.   It is increasing by about 25% per
day.   In 1 month it has surpassed SARS for 1 year (8000).
WHO Declares a PHEIC
Politico (Dan Diamond) is coming out with an article bashing badly Azar.   HHS COMS
had me speak to Dan and I greatly praised Azar.
The POTUS announced the Coronavirus Task Force today (see below):
Members of the President’s Coronavirus Task Force:
Secretary Alex Azar, Department of Health and Human Services
Robert O’Brien, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs
Dr. Robert Redfield, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
at the National Institutes of Health
Deputy Secretary Stephen Biegun, Department of State
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680Ken Cuccinelli, Acting Deputy Secretary, Department of Homeland Security
Joel Szabat, Acting Under Secretary for Policy, Department of Transportation
Matthew Pottinger, Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor
Rob Blair, Assistant to the President and Senior Advisor to the Chief of Staff
Joseph Grogan, Assistant to the President and Director of the Domestic Policy Council
Christopher Liddell, Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy
Coordination
Derek Kan, Executive Associate Director, Office of Management and Budget
PRESS: FOX – “Fox and Friends”; ABC TV local; NBC TV local; PBS NewsHour;
WTOP radio X2
Jan. 31, 2020 – Another truly amazing day.   Sequested in the White House essentially
all day working out a proposal to put before the POTUS that would restrict travel from
China.  The proposal was driven largely by CDC (Marty Cetron) who felt that given the
volume of people coning in from China by direct and even more importantly indirect
flights it would be logistically impossible to effectively screen people at many, many
airports and the diversion of people from their place of origin to selective airports would
further complicate things.   Also, the cases continue to sharply rise with 12000 cases and
259 deaths.   Also, a NEJM report from Germany indicated that a Chinese woman came
from Shanghai visited a colleague in Stockdorf Bavaria.  She infected him when she had
no sxs, returned to China and got sik on the plane.  The german man then got sick and
infected 2 other Germans.   This would have bn the first truly documented case of
transmission from an asymptomatic person, thus, adding to the concern about the
accuracy of screening at airports.  In addition, the WHO declared a PHEIC yesterday
prompting Azar to declare a Public Health Emergency here in the USA.   I disagreed with
the latter since there were only 7 infections (6 travel) at the time.   All this led to the
conclusion of travel restriction.   This was late in the afternoon  - around 1:30-2:00 PM.
The entire task force (above) plus Kellyanne Conway, Jessica Zitto (WH Coms) and a
variety oof senior WH officials gatherd in the Roosevelt Room to hammer out how we
would present this to the POTUS.   The policy decision was:  1) Ban travel to the USA of
all non-citizens who have been to China within the past 14 days.   If you were in China,
you need to go somewhere else (Paris, UK, etc.) until 14 days pass from the time you
were in China. 2) If you are a citizen and were in the Hubei Province (includes Wuhan)
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
681and you return to USA, you are institutionally quarantined for 14 days. 3) If you come
from any other part of China other than Hubei, you have voluntary isolation for 14 days.
We wanted to present this to the POTUS befor the Stock Market closed so that we do not
look like we held off to avoid bad effects.   We went into the Oval Office at about 3:00
PM.   We had been scheduled to go in at 2:30 PM but things backed up.  Presentation was
made to the POTUS by Azar, Bob Redfield and me.   Trump as he did a couple of ddays
ago posed many questions to me making sure that I thought it was a good idea.   I said
this was an imperfect process, but the best choice we have right now.   He questioned me
about what the difference was between this and flu.   He somewhat brashly suggested
even more stringent restrictions and was dyswaded by Kellyanne.   She clearly has
influence over the POTUS.
Potus agreed and we immediately went out to the WH Press Briefing room that was
packed.   Azar led the presentation, but many questions were ansered by me.   Interesting
that impeachment was going on and the senate did not get the 4 GOP votes to allow
witnesses to be called.   This also dominated the news.   We thought this would get us on
the Sunday Talk Shows, but impeachment bumped us.  White House is now fully
convinced that I be the science/health spokesperson for the USG.   Bob Redfield just does
not come across very weel.   He takes forever to say something and it is usually
wondering.   This drives the WH and HHS comms people crazy and so they are putting
me out on all the requests.
When I got back to my office, got call from Jeremy Farrar who sounded very concerned
and conferenced me in with Kristian Anderson, an evolutionary biologist from Scripps.
They had also been talking with Eddie Holmes, another evolutionary biologistfrom
Sidney Australia.   There have been conspiracy theories that the virus was given GOF by
inserted mutations and deliberately or accidentally released in Wuhan.   One theory was
written by Indian investigators that HIV sequences were inserted by a Chinese person in
Canada and released in Wuhan.   Everyone thinks that is crazy, but the Farrar phone call
was different.   The people on the phone felt that the mutations around the furine
cleavage site of the spike protein could not have occurred naturally since it would require
an evolutionary “jump that they found nowhere in bat isolates.   They bring up the
possibility that this could have been deliberately inserted and either accidentally released
or deliberately released by a crazy person in the lab, the former being the most likely.
Jeremy was calling me for advice.   I suggest that we get a larger group of qualified
evolutionary biologists/virologists together under the auspices of a convening body and
carefully look at this.  We agreed to convene by phone the next day.   I called Brian
Harrison and Garrett Grigsby who arranged for a call with Azar to decide what to do.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
682Azar did not like the idea of WHO as convener because he feels (somewhat unfairly, I
believe) that Tedros would immediately tell the Chinese and they would crush the
attempt and/or think we are attacking them.   We decided to have a 2-pronged approach
strongly suggested by Kadlec who felt we had security responsibilities to investigate this
ourselves.  He would do this through OSTP and NAS.   Meanwhile I would pursue a
multinational approach with Jeremy.   I decided to now bring in Francis.
PRESS: The Today Show NBC; Lou Dobbs Fox; many print
Feb. 1, 2020 -  Conference call at 2:00 PM with Jeremy, Francis and several other
scientists gathered by Jeremy (see below).
Participants in the Feb., 2020 call included:
•Francis Collins, Director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, U.S.;
•Anthony Fauci, Director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases, U.S.;
•Jeremy Farrar, Director of the Wellcome Trust;
•Patrick Vallance, U.K. Chief Scientific Adviser and Head of the Government
Science and Engineering;
•Kristian Anderson, Director of Infectious Disease Genomics, Scripps Research
Translational Institute, CA, U.S.;
•Christian Drosten, Director of Human Virology at the German Center for
Infection Research at Charité – Universitätsmedizin, Germany;
•Edward Holmes, Professor of Viral Evolution at University of Sydney;
•Andrew Rambaut, Professor of Molecular Evolution, University of Edinburgh’s
Institute of Evolutionary Biology, U.K.;
•Ron Fouchier, Deputy Head of Department of Viroscience, Erasmus Medical
Center, NL;
•Robert Garry, Professor of Virology, Tulane University School of Medicine,
Louisana, U.S. ;
•Mike Ferguson, Professor of Life Sciences at University of Dundee, U.K.; and
•M.P.G. Koopmans, Head of Department of ViroScience, Erasmus Medical
Center, NL.
There was not total agreement about the likelihood of deliberate insertion.   Ron Fouchier
said he was sure that this could occur naturally and we should not waste our time and
divert effort to pursue this.   This is expected of him since he was the original GOF
person with Yoshi Kawaoka.   Also, Christian Drosten was with Ron; the rest felt that
deliberate insertion was possible and given the fact that Dr. Zheng-Li Shi  at the
University of Wuhan has been working for years in GOF in coronaviruses to allow
adaptation of the spike protein to bind to the human ACE2 receptor, we could not let this
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
683go.  We decided to have Jeremy with Francis to contact Tedros with Stewart Simonson’s
help (I arranged this) to see if Tedros would convene experts.
Meanwhile, the DHS and DOT and FAA are working hard on the logistics of diverting
plans to selected airports that are associated with the capability of screening with
questions and quarantining or moving to voluntary isolation.
Airports are: LAX, SFO, Seattle, ATL, ORD, Hawaii, Newark, IAD, Detroit, DFW
JFK, and Seattle
PRESS:  CNN (truck came to my house since I was so busy with wall-to-wall
conference calls and hundreds of e-mails.;
Feb. 2, 2020 – Call from Sylvia Burwell asking for clarification of the new policy
regarding AU students who are returning fom China.   Apparently, the policy is not up on
the CDC website.
Had daily Task Force call.  Discussed the difficult logistics of airport funneling and
quarantine/isolation at land crossings with Canada and Mexico.
Cases now 14,551 and 304 deaths
Now 3 aditional cases in USA = 11
Kansas City Chiefs beat SF  49ers – Patrick Mahomes stars abd comes back from 10
point deficit in the 4th quarter.
PRESS:  MSNBC; Fox Local TV; NBC Nightly News; CNN with Anna Cabrera
Feb. 3, 2019 – Task Force meeting daily.    Repatriated people from Wuhan 150 tested
negative; no positives thus far.  Cases = 17,205 with 361 deaths; 26 countries have 180
international cases and within that there are 20 human to human transmission
transmissions with no sustained transmission yet.
Complicated issue with border crossings of Chinese at Canada and Mexico. Many come
over, but screening capabilities are not like we have at airport.
Travis AFB, Miramar, Lackland AFB are landing destinations for US Citizens coming
from Wuhan so that we can implememnt institutional quarantines and medical care if
needed.
Spoke with George Gao tonight in China.   George is the Director General of the Chinese
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.   He confirmed that infected people can be
asymptomatic and that asymptomatic people can transmit.   This is important since the
recent NEJM paper that said that a Chinese woman who went from Shanghai to Germany
and infected a business associate while she was asymptomatic was in fact mildly
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
684symptomatic and so the NEJM paper is incorrect.   However, the fact is still true.   Also,
George was very sensitive and understandably defensive since he was the one who said
early on that there was no human to human transmission and that the original 27 cases in
the wet market reported on December 31, 2019 were animal to human when actually
human to human transmission was occurring weeks before.   The Wuhan health officials
did not tell him this and he thus gave out false information.   This lapse likely allowed the
outbreak to take hold since Wuhan went about their business with 40,000 pot luck
festivals without social distancing.
Failure of HIV vaccine trial HVTN-702 (Uhambo) conducted in South Africa  >5000
participants showed no efficacy at all.   DSMB stopped trial due to futility
PRESS:  WTOP Radio; CNBC; TRT Turkish TV (x2); CGTN Chinese TV; On
camera interview with Jennifer Ashton in VRC – ABC News; Lou Dobbs FOX
News.
Jan. 4, 2020 -  20,680 cases and 27 deaths.   No sign of diminishing.   We are hearing the
obvious conflicting opinions of the benefit or harm of travel restrictions.
A lot of interest in the revealing that the NEJM paper claiming in one Chinese to German
transmission that it was symptomatic transmission, when it probably was not.   I quoted
that paper (now flawed) in the WH presser.
One death in Hong Kong (total of 2 with Phillippines for non-China deaths)
20,680/426 – 2% mortality
Continuing to evacuate USC from Wuhan.   4 individuals from Hubei Province under
quarantine (2 LAX, 1 ORD, 1 NY)
Chinese officials criticizing USA for travel restrictions.  WHO also adding muted
criticism.
Got urgent e-mail from Lindsey Baden from NEJM to review in 2 hours a pape from
Germany showing that an asymptomatic person can harbor replication competent virus in
nasal passages.
State of the Union address tonight and vote on conviction after impeachment tomorrow –
weird!
PRESS:  Bloomberg Radio;Vox print; Marc Siegal Doctor Radio – Sirius; NPR –
“All Things Considered”- Richard Harris; Good Morning America – ABC;  Yahoo
Finance TV; NY Times – Roni Caryn Rabin; Reuters print; Israeli TV – i24 LIVE;
Picture in Washington Post; BBC Radio interview
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
685Feb. 5, 2000 – Spenty the day on the Hill as part of the President’s Coronavirus Task
Force led by Alex Azar and Mick Mulvany to brief first the Senators in the Dirksen
Building led by Lamar Alexander and Patty Murray and then the House led by Rosa
DeLauro and Tom Cole in the Capitol Visitor’s Center.  Also, spent time in the SCIF
planning for tomorrow when we may be briefing the POTUS again.
25,000 cases/479 deaths.
President was acquitted today by the Senate on a partisan vote.
Much print press about every aspect of nCoV, particularly the controversy about
asymptomatic transmission. In the Washington Post today, Nancy Pelosi, when asked
whether she feels the administration is doing a good job, said the following:
Post – Feb. 5, 2020:
Exiting the briefing, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) praised Anthony
Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who is
also on the administration task force, saying she had worked with him for years.
Fauci was among those briefing lawmakers on Wednesday.
“He has confidence in what is happening at CDC, so again, my confidence is in
him,” Pelosi said. “I think we have to be appropriately alert but not
fearmongering on this, and I think that’s the right tempo.”
Asked about Azar’s leadership, Pelosi said: “I don’t know that much about Azar
but I know Fauci. All I know about Azar is he used to work for a pharmaceutical
company. I don’t know that much about his experience with disease but Dr. Fauci
is a doctor, and this is his life’s work.”
Tragic news – Eric Scorce (my nephew) found dead in his apartment.   Likely
sudden heart attack.
PRESS:  KCBS Radio – San Francisco; MSNBC; Radio Free Asia (TV); Wed MD;
Washington Post
Feb. 6, 2020  - Cases continue to soare with 28,018/563.  Another packed day mostly at
HHS and White House.   Conspiracy theories still abound.   The NAS group with OSTP
met (see above) and decided that there was no clear evidence of malfeasance, but it
should be looked into (see attachement below):
NASEM Response
to OSTP re Coronavi
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
686Briefed the Asia/East Asia Ambassadors on nCoV in Room EEOB-350. Then had long
meeting of Coronavirus Task Force is Sit Room of WH chaired by Mick Mulvany at
4:00- 4:45PM when the core group of Task Force were called to Oval Office to brief
POTUS.   When we walked in the POTUS was not yet in the room.   When he walked in
with Melania, the first thing he did was say“"Anthony, come here and say hello to
Melania”.   Then, to my embarrassment in front of everyone (Kellyanne, Mick, Bob
O’Brien and many in Cabinet) he told Melania that I was the smartest person in the
world.   We then sat down and briefed him and Melania.  He asked what he could do and
we said that since he would be calling Chinese President Xi Jinping late this evening, he
could ask him to approve the WHO delegation of scientists that include CDC and NIH
people.   He did what he did last time and directed most of the questions to me, again
ending with asking me if I thought that we were on the right track.
During the task Force meeting, the issues came up of cruise ships (one in Yokohama,
Japan, and one in New Jersey/New York) that had infected Chinese from Wuhan on them
and discussion of how to handle quarantine for the rest of the passengers.
PRESS: India TV; Podcast with Newt Gingrich; Podcast with Howard Buchner at
JAMA (well-received by NYT and WSJ reporters.
Feb. 7, 2020 – Started with 7:00 AM with a multi-party call hosted by WHO.  Got good
information. See below.
31,211/637.  61 infections on Japanese cruise ship. Chinese are starting to see a slight
downtrend in cases.   Perhaps we are turning things around in China?   I warn on the call
that we need to give developing countries the resources to do contact tracing and isolation
or else as we decrease China, another country will become like China.   Also, need
serologies to determine extent of asymptomatic and minimally symptomatic infection so
that we can determine the true case fatality rate among other things.
Cancelled trip to Florida for Chris’s birthday.  So sorry.
PRESS: Press conference at HHS with Azar, Redfield, Cuccinnelli, Biegun, Szabat;
CNN; interviewed with: USA Today,   Bloomberg Law (Jeannie Beaumann),
Arizona republic, NY Times (Denise Grady), Bloomberg News (Bob Langreth;
WJLA TV ABC7 (Local); CNN with Lou Dobbs.
Feb. 8, 2020 – Numbers today: 34,867/724.  First USCit died in Wuhan.   Much press
about this and the cruise ships in Japan and Bayonne.   Infections and quarantine of the
Japan ship (61 so far, including some USCits.  10 people under quarantine from airport
screening at the 11 airports.   People on Japanese ship getting cabin fever with
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
687quarantine.  People on Bayonne ship have all been released and the Chinese nationals on
the ship are going home.
Tom Frieden called me this AM and we discussed various aspects of the outbreak.   He
and I are on the same page in thinking tht this is acting like a bad influenza in its
transmissibility and that the denominator is much greater than 34,867 (above) making the
case fatality rate (CFR) more like 0.2-0.3 % rather than 2.0%.
PRESS:  FOX and Friends; WTOP Radio; MSNBC
Feb. 9, 2020 – Sunday, but it goes on.   37,593/814.   People on the Japanese cruise ship
are being released from quarantine.  Outbreak still raging in China.   Still only 12 cases in
USA (9 travel from Wuhan and 2 spouses of 2 of the 9).
Briefed the Governors at the Governors convention at the DC Convention Center
PRESS:  CNN International (good interview)
Feb. 10, 2020 – 40,625/910.   Outbreak still progressing.  I will list below the quarantine
centers associated with the various funneled airports:
JB Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii (HNL)
Great Lakes Training Center Navy Base, Illinois (ORD)
Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base, Texas (DFW)
March ARB, California (LAX)
Travis AFB, California (SFO)
Dobbins ARB, Georgia (ATL)
Fort Hamilton, New York (JFK)
Naval Base Kitsap, Washington (SEA)
Joint Base Anacostia, Washington DC (IAD)
Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey (EWR)
Fort Custer Training Center, Michigan (DTW)
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
688The Department of Defense already has quarantine centers at Fort Carson in
Colorado, Travis Air Force Base and Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in
California, and Lackland Air Force Base in Texas.
Ken Cucinnelli sends e-mail to Task Force saying that we should be much more
aggressive in “mitigation” right now and not wait until outbreak in USA occurs.
This triggers calls at HHS since it might look like HHS is not doing things
correctly.   Had a vigorous Task Force call at 4:00 PM to discuss merssaging and
the fact that we need to prepare for mitigation.   Ken Cuccinelli wants to prepare
families and businesses to how they would respond to an outbreak.   I pushed back
saying that my experience with anthrax and the “duct tape” incident made me feel
that this would inspire unnecessary panic or ridicule.   We should prepare more
forward-looking at the state and local health levels, not the family level.
Infections on the Japanese Cruise ship up to 136.   Sick people taken off and rest
quarantined on ship.   Question raised whether aerosol spread through ventilation
system similar to spread of SARS in 2004 in Amoy Garden Apartment Complex
in Hong Kong.
97 people die in China yesterday – most for a single day.
CDC wants the airlines give them the contact information of passangers so that
they can be tracked.
Bob Redfield having trouble clearly articulating the process of converting from
containment to mitigation.   He is a good guy, but Bob is Bob.   Azar/HHS/and
WH are all putting me out there to explain things within our group and to the
press.   Bob seems OK and modestly wants to learn.   I like him.
PRESS: CNN (Jim Sciutto); Diane Rehm Podcast; Sean Hannity Radio Show;
CNN International.
Feb. 11, 2020 – 13th American infected (San Diego).   One of the people air-
evacuated by State to Miramar from Wuhan.   Minimal sxs.
43,138/1018
Bob Kadlec offers the Japanese help in providing remdesivir in a compassionate
use protocol to the people on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
689Now 131 people infected and the rest are quarantined.   I offer Cliff Lane to help
with the protocol.
A PCC document that I just read is proposing that even in Phase IV (see below)
we should continue INA 212 (f) travel restrictions.   I disagree with this since
travel restrictions are to delay the entry of disease into your country.   Once you
have sustained transmission in your country, it is a waste of resources to try to
keep out travelers.   I cannot be on the PCC call this AM (on a panel at the Aspen
Institute in DC) and so I called Bob Redfield and asked him to respresent me and
my reservations about this:
Phases of U.S. Government Response to the 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV)
Phase I—Current Posture
•Description: Foreign nationals who have been in China within 14 days prior to their
actual or attempted entry into the United States are ineligible for admission under
Section 212 (f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).  Departments and
agencies may exercise certain exemptions.  Any person, but specifically U.S.
citizens and legal permanent residents (LPRs) who have been: (1) in Hubei
province within the past 14 days may be subject to 14 day mandatory quarantine;
and (2) in China (outside Hubei province) within the past 14 days may be subject
to screening and self-isolation for 14 days.  All direct and indirect flights from
China are funneled to 11 airports with enhanced CDC medical screening.  CDC is
coordinating with state and local health care clinicians to identify domestic cases,
isolate cases, and conduct appropriate contact tracing.
oTriggers: Already being implemented.
•Objectives: (1) Contain the outbreak at its source, (2) minimize domestic
importation of additional cases, (3) limit potential for domestic epidemic, and (4)
prepare the domestic response mechanisms.
•Messaging: Daily HHS and CDC briefings and on camera task force briefings as
appropriate.
Phase II—Aggressive Containment
•Description: Expand the scope of the travel ban to account for additional states or
territories.  Apply quarantine measures above to people not covered by the travel
ban, including U.S. persons, but who have traveled to these additional states or
territories within the time frames described above.  All direct and indirect flights
from these additional states or territories will be funneled to the 11 airports with
enhanced CDC medical screening.  Consider reducing the number of airports to
concentrate screening resources. CDC further coordinates with state and local
health care clinicians to identify domestic cases, isolate cases, and conduct
appropriate contact tracing.
oTriggers: Sustained human to human transmission and exportation of cases
without nexus to China.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
690•Objectives: (1) Limit the outbreak to the source and additional outbreak areas, (2)
minimize importation of additional cases, (3) limit potential for domestic epidemic,
(4) additional preparation of the domestic response mechanisms and in some cases
executing those plans, and (5) begin outreach to state and local authorities to
prepare for Phase III and Phase IV.
•Messaging: XYZ.
•Specific Department and Agency Activities: XYZ.
Phase III—Partial Mitigation
•Description: Travel restrictions put in place by active INA 212(f) proclamations
remain in place.  Those not covered by any active travel bans, including U.S.
persons from identified countries are allowed to travel to their final destination and
may then be subject to self-isolation for 14 days, as coordinated by state and local
authorities.  Individuals who travel to the affected domestic areas or live in those
areas may be subject to self-isolation for 14 days, as coordinated by state and local
authorities.
oTriggers: Sustained human to human transmission without nexus to China
in two or more domestic locations.
•Objectives: (1) Implement the national response, (2) reacting to the first domestic
epicenters, and (3) mitigating and minimizing the impact of the disease.
•Messaging: XYZ.
•Specific Department and Agency Activities: XYZ.
Phase IV—Mitigation
•Description: Travel restrictions put in place by active INA 212(f) proclamations
remain in place.  Limit non-essential domestic travel, cancel public gatherings,
social distancing, execute private sector and government continuity of operations.
oTriggers: Wide-spread domestic human to human transmission, could be in
cities or regional.
•Objectives: (1) Preserve the functioning of critical infrastructure and mitigate
impact to the economy and functioning of society, and (2) support community
responses to the extent possible to mitigate illness, suffering, and death.
•Messaging: XYZ.
•Specific Department and Agency Activities: XYZ.
WHO officially names the 2019-nCoV as “COVID19”.   Was on Panel at Aspen Institute
chaired by Helen Branswell and with Nancy Messonnier and Ron Klain as co-panelists.
Reminisced with Ron about the Ebole-White House days
PRESS:  NPR Radio 1A (Todd Zwillick); WTOP Radio; Press at the Aspen
Institute (2300 N Street); FOX News (Lou Dobbs)
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
691Feb. 12, 2020 – 45,172/1115  Individual reports are coming out about various
clinical characteristics.   Unreviewed report now of virus in saliva of infected
people.   Let us see what kind of reponse that gets.
Very busy day today with 4 Congressionald briefings!   Also, complicated by
wake of Eric Scorce today and funeral tomorrow.   Much stress.
First we briefed House members at Rayburn led by Rosa DeLauro, Nita Lowey
and Tom Cole.   Then we went to the Senate Dirksen to brief senators led by
Lamar Alexander.   Then to Capitol Visitors center to brief House members led by
Eliot Engel.   Then to Majority hosue leader Steny Hoyer’s office to brief
members.   Steny was profuse in his praise for me, which was  a little
embarrassing
On my way out of White House from the 4:00 to 5:00 PM Task Force meeting, ran
into Larry Kudlow, who has become my new best friend.   He joked about how
many years I have been doing this and he has been following my career.   His
main question was when is this COVID19 going to crash the economy, i.e. when
does he need to start worrying about it.   It told him that we are OK for now but
this could change rapidly if we start seing sustained person-to-person
transmission.   He asked me to keep him informed when in my opinion things are
starting to go bad
Having our second big multipeson conference call this AM with Mike Ryan,
Tedros and WHO, Bruce Aylward (Canadian) called from China.  He is part of
WHO multi-national advance team in China.  Still no invitation for US
representation from China to be part of group. Azar getting very angry and
blaming Tedros for not pushing with China to get us on the group.  Azar feels that
Tedros in bowing to Xi Jinping who does not want USA.  Tough situation since
Tedros and WHO depends greatly on China and often bows to them.
PRESS:  WTOP Radio; Bloomberg TV (by phone;
Feb. 13, 2020 – 60,349/1369    Sharp increase in that they are not using just lab
test for DX; they are using chest x-rays and CT scans of lung.
Meeting at White House with Chairs and Ranking members of big 4 committees
with  Anne Schuket, General Paul Friedrichs, Bob Kadlec in Roosevelt Room.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
692Kevin McCarthy, Steve Scalise, Greg Walden.   Chaired by Mick Mulvaney.
Also, Eric Ueland of WH Lewg there.   Good questions.   Many compliments
PRESS:  CBS This Morning (for showing tomorrow); FOX News (Lou
Dobbs)
Feb. 14, 2020 – 64,460/1384   Making plans to deal with Americans on Princess
Diamond Cruise ship in Yokohama harbor.   Cliff flying to Japan to help design a
clinical trial to treat infected people with remdesivir.   Then he is off to China as
part of the WHO-sponsored delegation.
Azar, Redfield, Kadlec and I briefed the entire Cabinet on a teleconference this
AM
PRESS:  FOX  Business; Spectrum News TV; Fox News with Dana
perino;CBS This Morning ; CNBC
Feb. 15, 2020 – 67,178/1527.  Had White House Task Force conference call at
12:00 noon (Saturday).   Big issue was the plan to get Americans off the Diamond
Princess in Yokohama harbor.   State will charter planes to get them to Lackland
and Travis AF bases.   Sick people will stay in Japanese hospitals.   Uninfected
and people whoise status is not clear will be flown out with the proper PPE for
those who are thought to be at roisk of being infected.
Also, discussed on the call the persistent problem of cruise ships in general, which
could derail all polasn for containment since they scatter people from all over the
world to all over the world.
Important conference call chaired by Bob Kadlec with the ASPR and CDC people
who are on the ground with the Diamond Princess Cruise ship in Yokohama.  The
conditions apper to be dreadful with major transmission on the boat.   Many crew
members getting infected.   Japanese are not adhering to the required PPE.  It
seems that they are unaware of the potential transmissibility of the virus.  The
CDC people say the ship is like an “incubator” for the virus.   One called it a
cesspool of virus.  This conversation makes it clear that we need to get US citizens
off that ship.  James Lawlor (Nebraska) and Michael Callahan (Mass. General)
were on the call.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
693PRESS:  FOX News with Molly Line;
Feb. 16, 2020 – 69,275/1670  (Sunday)  Big discussion on phone with Kadlec,
Anne Schuchat and Kevin (ASPR) on whether to remove a person from the
evacuation plane who recently showed to be positive.  Original plan was that
anyone who was infected would not board plane evacuating people from the
Diamond Princess.  Now Kadlec and Kevin want to board them since people on
the bus waiting to board have already been exposed on the bus to several people
who are infected.
Washington Post story by Jasmeen Abutaleb has me defending Azar against slurs
against him (covertly by administration officials).   I also say that w need to be fair
to the POTUS (see below):
"In fairness to the president, someone told him something that has a basis in
reality. ... There is some validity in saying respiratory viruses like flu and
coronavirus are seasonal," Fauci said. "The only thing is when you're dealing
with a pandemic-type virus that is brand new, there's no way of knowing what's
going to happen when the weather gets warm."
Some officials have complained that Trump's comments about the virus emanate
from his briefings with Azar, who they say has been overly controlling in the
response and has told other doctors not to get too far into the details of the virus
and the outbreak with Trump. Azar is disliked by many in the White House, four
administration officials say.
Fauci, however, said Azar has brought medical professionals with him to nearly
every briefing and insisted they be part of Oval Office meetings.
Azar "always defers to the scientists. That's the reason why whenever we're in
the Situation room and the president would like some briefing, Alex always takes
me and (CDC director) Bob Redfield in with him," Fauci said. "He always wants
us to give the straight scientific information to the president."
PRESS: Face the Nation (Margaret Brennan);
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
694Feb. 17, 2020 – 71,438/1775.   454 infected on Diamond Princess cruise ship.
Heated discussion last evening (see above) with Bob Kadlec, Will Walters (State
Med), Anne Schuchat, Kevin (ASPR) about whether to board people on the
evacuation 747 plane who were originally scheduled to come home as
“uninfected” after they just found out that 14 of them are in fact infected.   The
written agreement is that no documented infected people should get on the evac
plane.   Walters, Kevin and to some extent Bob Kadlec (he was complicit) insisted
that since they were already on the bus, we should allow them on the plane.  They
said that we would not know what to do with them if they stayed since we could
not leave them on the ship and the Japanese did not have facilities to take care of
them (I do not believe the latter).  Anne Schuchat vehemently argued that they
should not be allowed to board since the public and written agreement was that
they would be put on a plane WITHOUT infected people and this would be
breaking that agreement.   Nonetheless, Walters pushed and Kadlec (ASPR) caved
and went along.   Of note, later on (today) Walters said that he checked with me
and I was OK with the boarding – a lie!   On the call today Azar was upset since
the entire Cabinet was questioning why we let them board and when he asked our
stance, he heard that we (HHS) disagreed.   He was upset that we did not speak
with one voice and this looked bad.   On the call today, I told him that State
(Walters) was going to do what he wanted to do anyway no matter what we said.
Of note, on these issues in foreign countries, State has the last word.
Several of the 14 infected people from ship who were evacuated went to Nebraska.
Also 3 additional people were notified while on the plane that they were infected.
We air evacuated 328 people from Diamond Princess.  61 Americans elected to
stay in Japan on the ship, but the Japanese want them off the ship because
transmission is occurring on the ship.  There are now 800+ non-China cases, 365
of which are on Diamond Princess.   Now 28 countries have cases and within these
there are 183 human to human transmissions.   Singapore is problem with 68% of
their cases are human to human
PRESS: WTOP Radio; FOX (Caputo) TV; FOX Business TV; CNN (Wolf
Blitzer Situation Room).
Feb. 18, 2020 – 73,335/1876.  More infections appearing on Diamond Princess.
Good thing we got our people off the ship.
Director of a major Wuhan hospital dies of COVID-19.  Liu Zhiming, 51yo
neurologist
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
695Did panel at the Council on Foreign Relations chaired by Fran Townsend.  Bob
Kadlec was other panelist.
Much discussion about Cruise ship issues.
Our planes land in Lakeland and Travis with evacuated Americans.   Infected
people shipped to University of Nebraska for containment; remainder of the
uninfected go into 14 day quarantine
PRESS: CNN New Day (Jim Sciutto and Alisyn Camerota); BBC Radio;
CNN International; FOX America Newsroom; CNBC; FOX News (Laura
Ingraham)
Feb. 19, 2020 – 75,201/2012.  On WHO weekly call with Mike Ryan. 1700 health
care workers have been infected.  Starting to discuss the role of environmental
(surfaces) spread of virus, particularly in the context of the Diamond Princess.
Mike Ryan makes good point that the stringent control efforts of China are putting
pressure on the virus not to spread.  This is somewhat artificial.   He is concerned
that the virus in other countries that cannot be so draconian in control we might
see a resurgence of the virus that is being artificially controlled in China.
CDC Comms concerned that I am being too hard on the Japanese by sayng
publicly that their quarantine failed.   They contacted Courtney.   Too bad.  I tell it
like it is.   They completely messed up the infection control on the Diamond
Princess.   They had over 500 people infected on the ship.  Problem is that
Japanese are releasing people into the community from the ship without the
complete 14 day quarantine.   They consider being on the ship as quarantine when
it is not.  We have “do not board” orders on the people who have left the ship until
they are off the ship for 14 days.
PRESS:  NPR “Morning Edition”; KCBS Radio (San Francisco); FOX
Business News; Siriusx Radio – Michael Smerconish; Nextstar TV; Wall
Street Journal Pocast; NBC Nightly News (did not show – may show in AM);
PBS NewsHour (William Brangham); FOX News (Lou Dobbs)
Feb. 20, 2020 – 75,752/2130.  Had major discussions last evening among the HHS
team.   Some disagreement that we had to sort out between ASPR (Kadlec) and
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
696CDC (Cetron/Redfield) regarding when to trigger the transition from containment
to mitigation.   Kadlec wanted to do it if only 1 location (city, etc) had more than 3
rounds of transmission, whereas CDC wanted to trigger to be >3 rounds in more
than one non-contiguous location (city, etc.) .   After much conference call
discussion we came to a compromise.
Azar pissed off at a story in the Washington Post by Lena Sun.   Someone leaked
the story about the disagreement between CDC and State/ASPR regarding
allowing infected Americans to board the evacuation plane taking people from the
Diamond Princess back to the USA.   Now this is a big story:  “Infected patients
put on plane against CDC advice”
PRESS:  Radio Free Asia (TV); The Doctors TV Show; Home Care Radio
(HCR); NBC Nightly News (from yesterday)
Feb. 21, 2020 – 76,775/2247.   1st patient to die from being on Diamond Princess.
Had intense “Table Top”=like exercise with the WHTF in the Situation Room
from 3:00to 5:00 PM.   Discussed the plans and triggers of going from
containment to mitigation.   Lots of good discussion.   Led by Mick Mulvaney.
CNBC interview wa slightly hostile questioning the “controversial” decision of
putting the infected evacuees from the Diamond Princess on the plane back to
USA.   After my explanation and after I was off the air, Mike Osterholm and Scott
Gottlieb got on and starting spewing forth about the idea that we might be missing
people in the UA who are infected.   The hosts seemed to be pitting me against
them.  Typical media
PRESS: BBC World Radio Show; NBC News print; WJLA Local TV by phone;
CNBC (Meg Terrell)
Feb. 22, 2020 – 77,932/2363.  Seeing  sustained transmissions in Japan and Korea.
CDC issuing travel alert 2 – “consider postponing non-essential travel”.  This is a bad
sign and could be the beginning of the transition to a pandemic.
Press (see MSNBC below) still folucing on the decision to board infected people on the
plane from the Diamond Princess
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
697PRESS: MSNBC; CNN with Michael Smerconish;
Feb. 23, 2020 (Sunday) – 78,804/2463.  Cases of community spread now increasing
greatly in Japan, South Korea, Italy.
Bob Kadlec called me this AM with emerging problem.   We need to house some of the
evacuees from the Diamond princess who are continuing to convert to virus positive in a
place where we can isolate them and have them ready for acute medical care if they
become ill.  There are about 30 people thus far negative for infection who may soon
convert, mostly elderly and frail about whom Kadlec is concerned.  It is projected that 1
of 10 will convert and likely will get seriously ill as has been the case with other elderly
people from the Diamond Princess who got ill in Japan and went to Japanese hospitals.
They are now at air force bases Lakeland and Travis, but the military does not want to
have responsibility for them if they are infected since they are concerned about “force
protection”.  Also, and importantly, Bob Kadlec tried to get the people housed at
Anniston, AL.  Congressman Mike Rogers (R-AL) got furious and reemed out Kadlec
saying he was going to destroy him.   He got on the phone to President trump who was on
a plane going to India and badmouthed Azar.  Apparently, the POTUS called up Azar and
was very pissed off.   He told Azar he had to fix it or else, since the POTUS was
originally angry that we even brought back infected Americans from the Diamond
Princess.   Azar then came to me asking me to help him “fix it”.   And so that is the
origina of this saga.
The suggestion is to ship them to the NIH Safra Lodge so that they have access to NIH
SCSU.  This would be disruptive to NIH, but there does not seem to be many
alternatives.  Had discussions with Francis (boarding a plane to Grand Cayman) and
Larry while on my C & O canal walk with Chris  about how to address this difficult and
frustrating issue.  Francis on way to Grand Cayman for vacation.  This leave it to Larry
and I to “fix”.
Had important conference call with NIH Clinical Center people – Jim Gillman, Tara
Palmore, Rick Davey, etc.   Tara makes good point that we realy cannot use the Safra
lodge since even one infected person would nullify keeping uninfected people there.
Decision was to skip the Lodge and put everyone in the Clinical Center.  Gillman, Tara
and Rick now huddling to figure out how to do this.
I visit the Clinical Center group (Gillman, Tara, Rick, Henry Masur, David Henderson,
nursing, etc in Clinical Center Room 6-3551 where they are convening to work this out.
They present to me that they can make 11 beds available in the CC for evacuees who may
convert.  If they did the full 30 (i.e. +19), it would be dangerous for our staff since we
cannot retrofit that many rooms with negative air flow and proper room for don/doff.
We decide on 11 in CC and Rick works with Lauren Sauer at Hopkins for an additional 8
for a total of 19.   We go with that.   I contact Azar who contacts POTUS who is on plane
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
698to India with Melania.  And so, it is “fixed”.   Azar called me to thank me for “saving his
ass”.
Feb. 24, 2020 – 79,524/2626.  Situation getting worse in Italy, Korea, Japan, Iran.   More
reports of transmissions by asymptomatic people.   Lots of discussions of when the WHO
will declare this a “pandemic”.   WHO is saying that they are no longer using the
terminology “pandemic”
Stock Market plunging today about 1000 points as a result of coronavirus reports.
Mick Mulvaney called my office today to give me the cell number of Larry Kudlow
who wanted to speak with me.   I called and Larry wanted my take on what is evolving
with COVID-19 since it is critical to him in his assessment of the potential impact on the
economy.   He said he trusts my opinion over anyone else.
OMB will release the Supplemental Request to the Congress tonight and I have a
Congressional briefing with AZAR and the HHS team tomorrow AM. They did not
request any for NIAID even though I put in for $145 million.   Spoke with Azar a few
days ago and he said that OMB and he would not be upset if the Congress added to the
Supp request for money for me.   Problem is thsat until then, I may need to defend why I
am not getting or do not need additional money.
Had dinner over mansion  of Adrienne Arst.  Chris Liddell and his wife Renee were also
guests.
PRESS: CBS Radio (NYC); AP TV; FOX Business (Lou Dobbs)
Feb. 25,2020 -  80,277/2705  Major concern ove other countries surging in cases – Italy,
South Korea, Iran.   Stock Market staring to crash due to COVID-19.   Supply chain
concerns.
1st patient evacuated from Diamond Princess to Lackland supposedly will come to NIH
since patient has since converted to virus positive.
Big explosion of media.  On the usual CDC press briefing, Nancy Messonnier made the
comment that a pandemic and community spread in the USA is not a matter of IF, but a
matter of WHEN and we should prepare to do things like close schools and do telework.
This caused a firestorm of media frenzy around the world.  The Stock Market tanked by
1000 points; the POTUS called up Azar asking what the hell is going on.   I went into the
media to try to calm the waters (see press below).  Also, the press was zinging the
POTUS and Larry Kudlow for saying right before Nancy made her statement that
everything is under control in the USA (which it is for now – 14 cases with no
community spread) while CDC officials (Messonnier) were saying that a USA outbreak
was inevitable.   Also, zinging the POTUS who is saying that a vaccine is imminent
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
699(soon).   He is obviously confusing the initiation of a phase 1 trial and having a vaccine
ready.
PRESS:  WTOP Radio; CBS Radio (NYC); FOX with Bret Baier; CNN Situation
Room with Wolf Bitzer; CNN International; CNN with Chris Cuomo; MSNBC;
BBC Radio x2
Feb.26, 2020 -  81,187/2768.  Should be a big day with the POTUS back from India and
going to give a press conference this afternoon.
Big day today!   POTUS returned from India and wanted to clear up the issue of Nancy
Messonnier’s statement that sent the Stock Market crashing.  The Task force, particularly
Azar, me, Redfield, added Anne Schuchat,  Mick M. met with Trump in the Oval
Office  and updated him on coronavirus situation.
(Of note, we have 1st case of community acquired COVID-19 in a woman from Solano
County, CA who had no epidemiologic link to anyone weith COVID-19. This could be
the beginning of something bad)
After we briefed POTUS in the White House, we went into the Cabinet Room and the
other members of the Task Force briefed the POTUS a bit more.   Then we went into the
White House press Room which was more packed than I had ever seen it.   People
standing on chairs in the isles.   POTUS made comments, then Azar, then Anne, then me
on vaccines and therapy.   The POTUS stayed for a long time (45 minutes) answering
questions. He called Nancy Pelosi “Incompetent” in answer to a question  For the most
part he was OK, but tended a little bit to underplay the situation.   After that we went
back to the Oval Office with the POTUS to do a “post-mortem” on the press
conference .   Everyone felt good about the presser.
There was much speculation that the POTUS would either get rid of AZAR or appoint a
Czar.   The press was geared for that.   However, POTUS asked VP Pence to do overall
coordination of the coronavirus effort.    Clearly this was a compromise to not make Azar
look bad since he is friends with Pence and at the same time silence/satisfy those who
want a Czar and/or to get rid of Azar.
Another interesting twist was that they announced that Debbie Birx would be the new
“coronavirus coordinator” in the NSC.   Apparently, she may have been fired from
PEPFAR where there was considerable discontent about her leadership style (very
dogmatic and inflexible)
Finally, we all adjourned to VP Pence’s office to discuss his new role  in coordinating
coronavirus activities.
White House had us cancel all press briefing commitments since they wanted all the news
to be the POTUS.   This led to the impression that I was being “muzzled” and led to a
real twitter forestorm
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
700PRESS:  CNN New Day with John Berman and Alisyn Camerota; FOX News;
CNBC Squawk Box;
Feb. 27, 2020 – 82,446/2808.  Very interesting things evolving.   Got phone call from
Azar this AM (while in Building 31 cafeteria).  Azar is frustrated with the operational
incompetence of the CDC and asked me to start thinking abou a possible replacement for
Redfield at CDC in case Azar needs to replace him.  He prefers a woman, and someone
who is not an obvious anti-Trump person.  Azar admits that regardless of all the PR, the
fact is that Pence is now in charge.  Also, Azar told me that Pence ordered the lockdown
of all press by everyone including Azar.   Azar is trying to turn this around since it is
obviously a bad idea.
Got phone call fom Tom Bossert (former Deputy National Security Advisor to Bush and
National Security Advisor to Trump until John Bolton forced him out).   Tom saw the
press briefing on TV last night and was appalled by the denialism of the problem by
Trump.   He wanted to know if I was trying to bring in some reality testing.  I told him
that this was difficult.  I emphasized that we should be testing thousands of people and
not just a few hundred.   With the 1st community case in CA, it is clear that there are
other infected  people out there in the USA.  Also, there is a 2nd community case in
California.  Turned into an amazing day .  Chris Cuomo calls me up and says that he
wants me on his show since he is going to rip apart the CDC for not having enough tests
available to screen for community spread cases (i.e. no known geographic connection).
He says that people from NYC and elsewhere are calling us saying that they have
suspicious cases and they cannot get test kits from CDC.   Actually, this is for at least 2
reasons: 1) the CDC has not worked out the glitches in their kits and the criteria for
testing a PUI (person under investigation) included their having an epidemiologic
connection to a case.   This is crazy since by definition, a community-based case (which
we are trying to screen for) does not have any recognizable epi link.   I realize that we
have to fix the CDC problem and I call Brian Harrison and we both walk into Azar’s
office and explain that we need to get CDC, FDA together to loosen the regulatort
constraints on getting tests out.  It was my pushing that did it.  They come up with a
solution of regulatory relaxation of QC.
Stock Market crashing!  Also the issue of “muzzling Fauci” is going wild.  See above: It
started when the VP took over the Task Force and his Chief of Staff (Mark Short) and his
comms person Katie Miller wanted to re-assess the communications.  This was really
triggered by the Nancy Messonnier’s statement.  I had agreed to a number of TV hits and
we got word from the VP office to Bill Hall that we need to stand down on all media for
the time being so that we can re-submit clearances.   This got interpreted that Fauci was
being muzzled and triggered an amazing twitter storm that was widely and virally
tweated to not suppress the “great Fauci”.   I was getting hundreds and hundreds of e-
mails of support.  There is even a #freeFauci out there.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
701Big surprise was at 10:35 PM tonight I got a phone call at home from President Trump
who wanted to chat about the coronavirus situation in general.   We spoke for about 20-
25 minutes.   I encouraged him not to underplay the seriousness of the situation since if it
turns out bad, it would look like he is covering up.   I even spoke to him from a political
standpoint that his chances for re-election might be more damaged if he downplayed the
potential spread of virus in the USA than if he said we may face serious problems and
even if the Stock Market goes down further, he was at least honest and the country would
respect him for it.   I thought that he heard what I said, but the next day, he again
underplayed it.
Feb. 28, 2020 – Much community spread in South Korea, Italy, Iran, Japan.
Briefed the All House Membership at the Capitol Visitor Center.   Question came up of
whether I am muzzled and I explained that this was not the case.
PRESS:  MSNBC – Chris Matthews Hardball; FOX Business with Gregg Jarrett;
Feb. 29, 2020 – 86,000/2941.
Important Day – Went to Situation Room  for a Saturday AM (10:00 AM task force
meeting) when it became clear that there was several new cases of “community spread”
There were already 14 cases (12 from Wuhan and 2 spouses).   Then we learned a few
days ago that there were 2 cases in California that were community based and both were
now on respirators.   The NEW information from yesterday is that there are now 6
additional cases – 1 in Oregon of a 45 yo who is now in the ICU and 5 cases near Seattle
Washington, one of whom died last night; another one is hospitalized; and a 73 yo in long
term care is now in an ICU; one just returned from Korea and so that might be a link for
that person, but the others are unknown source .   A new chapter in the outbreak.
6 hour meeting in the White House Situation Room.  We increased travel alert to Italy
and Korea and no travel to Iran.   Level 3 for Italy and Level 4 to Northern Italy.   Level 3
for Korea and Level 4 for Daegu in Korea.   I suggest and it is accepted as the “Fauci
Rule” of asking these countries to do exit screening on people coming from their country
to USA.
Meeting led by VP Pence.   Trump joins meeting and we decide to make
announcement at press briefing in WH press Room of new findings (plus the fact that
they signed an agreement with the Talaban to end the war in Afghanistan).   Pence and
Mick Mulvney want me standing right next to the POTUS on the podium so that I can be
seen on TV, and I make remarks about the recent community cases.   POTUS speaks,
then VP Pence, the Azar, then me, and then Redfield.  They wanted just me, but I pushed
to have Redfield also make remarks.
During the question period, the issue again comes up about whether I am muzzled.  I go
to microphone and say I am not nor have I ever been muzzled.
VP Pence and Azar to be on Sunday Morning Shows tomorrow
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
702PRESS:  NBC Today Show; MSNBC;
Mar. 1, 2020 – 87,137/2977.  Bob Redfield and Nancy Messonnier telling me that there
are now more cases in Chicago, Rhode Island, Florida, Massachusetts.   Nancy is
frustrated that Bob is not sounding the alarm to start social distancing.   She is asking for
my help.   I will bring it up at the AMA call and the Task Force call.
Got call at home this AM (Sunday) from Gov. Andrew Cuomo (NY) asking advice how
he should handle the COVID-19 siutation in NYC.   Had long conversation in which he
stressed a few times, how much his father (and mother) loved me and used to tell Chris
and Andrew how much they respected me and how proud they were that I was an Italian-
American.
Sylvia Burwell appeared on Fareed Zakaria GPS show.   I was supposed to be on with
her, but it was one of the shows that got cancelled for me.   She called me this AM while
Chris and I were on our walk and asked advice and fact checking for her interview.
On several of the Sunday Shows my name kept coming up by people in interviews and
panels (Chuck Todd – Meet the Press) saying that “we should have Dr. Tony Fauci out
there speaking to the American people.   He has a decades long history of giving the truth
in a calming way to the public.”
Sunday conference call with AMA followed by VP Pence and Task Force.   We are
moving to mitigation in Santa Clara section of California where there are cases and in the
Seattle area of Washington State.  Reason – we have sustained community transmission
in those areas.
PRESS: FOX and Friends;
Mar. 2, 2020 – 89,197/3038.  2nd death in the USA (Washington State man).   Several
more community based cases plus a NYC case that returned from Iran.   We will need to
move to mitigation + containment in Washington State, which has declared state of
emergency.
89 cases in USA with more cases each day.  6 deaths in USA
Deb Birx on board.   Had a slight run in with her when she told me that the WH was
pissed at me for sayng on n NBC interview today that we have an outbreak and “likely a
pandemic”.   It all go cleared up after I spoke with Katie Miller who is now running the
Comms shop for COVID-19.   She is the VP’s Comms person.
Someone trying the hurt Azar by leaking to press (Politico and WSJ)that on a phone call
wher we discussed the contamination problem with the CDC test that Azar and Brian
Harrison said to send the tests out anyway even though they are defective.   The leaker
said that I was on the call and tried to persuade them not to do this.   The entire story was
a fabrication and Brian Harrison, Redfield and Steve Hahn talked the reporter out of it.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
703Met in the Cabinet Room with POTUS, VP and multiple CEOs of PHARMA to discuss
contribution on industry to treatment and vaccine effort.  POTUS very deferential to me
at meting.  Getting many, many e-mail and press writing about my role helping the
country.   Much press exposure (daily WEH briefing from press room)
Having a daily Task Force meeting at 4:00 PM will destroy my schedule to do anything
else.
PRESS:  CNN New Day with Alisyn Camerota; CNN with Chris Cuomo;  Daily
press conference from WH press room.  Mutliple spinoffs
Mar. 3, 2020 – 91,320/3118.    POTUS and VP visit NIH today.
Amazing day!   Testified with Steve Hahn, Anne Schuchat, Bob Kadlec before Senate
HELP Committee chaired by Lamar Alexander.   Patty Murray complaining about lack of
testing availability in Washington State where there is increased community spreading
now with 6 deaths most in nurtsing home.  In the middle of the hearing Sen Keane asked
me why I was disinvited to the Democratic caucus lunch.  It was scheduled that after the
Hearing, Hahn, Birx and I should make comments first at the GOP Senate caucus lunch
and then the Dem.  In reality someone in the VP’s office screwed up and felt that I would
not get to the NIH in time to greet the POTUS who was coming up on Marine One.  They
did not know that I was supposed to ride in the motorcade with Pence.   Anyway when
the VP’s office heard about the outrage of Keane, they immediately re-invited me.
Keane thought that this wa another example of them “muzzling me”.   A real cluster.
However,  the VP spoke so long at the Dem lunch that it was clear that the POTUS would
arrive before me, who was supposed o greet him.  Finally Azar and I raced up in his car
with no motorcade to NIH.   Amazing that the POTUS got to VRC/NIH before me and
Azar and actually waited in the holding room for me. Yikes!  We did our thing; I made a
presentation, we had a press conference in the VRC.  Graham and Kizzmetia Corbett
made presentation on 2nd floor and then the POTUS invited me and Azar to return to
White House with him on Marine One.   After we got off Marine One, the POTUS and I
held a press conference on the lawn.  Amazing.
We then had our Task Force meeting followed by another press conference.
Importantly, I have been pushing for blanket testing throughout the country on
symptomatic and asymptomatic people to get some data.   CDC and FDA are promising
this now, but I doubt if they can deliver.  I am beginning to quedtion the competency of
CDC and the innocent inexperience of Steve Hahn and FDA
In the middle of this, Larry Corey calls me up and mentions that they did in Seattle a
screening of people presenting with Flu like sxs in 4 emergency rooms, and of 380
people, 4 were positive for Coronavirus.   This is bad since this is 1%.   I told Larry to
call Bob Redfield and let him know.    This may be the beginning of a major outbreak in
the USA
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
704PRESS:  Good Morning America with George Stephanopoulos; multiple press
conferences, including one on White House Lawn after getting off Marine One with
the POTUS
Mar. 4, 2020 – 95,125/3254 Countriesd with cases – 77.   South Korera -5328 cases;
Italy – 2502.  In USA 22 cases travel related + 38 person-to-person (10 deaths) = 60
cases + 3 Wuhan and 45 Diamond Princess repatriated – 48 .  total – 108.
Testified with my NIH colleagues at the House Approps Subcommittee chaired by Rosa
DeLauro and present was Full committee Chair Nita Lowy.  Again much praise for my
role in coronavirus.
Many senators want to speak individually to me.   Today spoke with Senators Manchin
(D-WV), Gary Powers (D-MI), and Pat Toomey (R-PA) clarifying point about testing,
which is the big topic since the CDC and FDA lagged behind.
More briefings today of House GOP and Dem caucus in Capitol Visitor Center.   Totally
standing room only.   Kevin McCarthy ran GOP and Nancy Pelosi ran Dem. Much praise
for me.   VP came with Birx and then took me with them to return to WH in his
motorcade, which was really fun – driving at 50 miles/hour down usually crowded streets
that are now all blocked off.
Daily task force meeting – I presented to group the 4 cases of community spread in
Seattle (Corey phone call).  VP and Steve Mnuchin pownplayed and VP bought it saying
that 1% is a small number.   I tried to explain to them that 1% reflects the situation a few
weeks ago givin incubation and the real number is probably hundreds of infections.   I
wanted to have them do social distancing.   Birz looking like she wants to tell the VP
what he wants to hear.   Not looking good.  Sean Conley appropriately questions the VP
going to Seattle.
I call up Marc Short tonight and express my concern that they are downplaying the 4
patients.   He understands and will relay this to VP.
Governor Cuomo wants me (texts) to go to NYC and do a press conference with him.  I
told him that this is unlikely.   He texts me back: “You are doing the important work!  I
am in the cheap seats.  God Bless.   Whenever works”.
PRESS:   Press conference after the Task Force meeting.   I stress difference
between risk of infection and risk of complication.
Mar. 5, 2020 – 97,381/3348   Now have 12th death in USA – another of the Seattle
nursing home.   Total cases in the USA = 152.  Seattle seeing community spread (see
above).
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
705Did Full Senate and Full House briefings in the Capitol Visitor Center with Azar, and
some members of Task Force.   Some hostility between Azar and Congressman for Texas
regarding the issue of the Congressman questioning whether CDC people were properly
PPE’d when they brought expatriated people from Diamond Queen.
Following the briefings, we did a press conference.   Many hostile questions regarding
what the POTUS said that AM on Hannity.   He said that most people who get infected
and do very well and can go back to work.   He obviously misunderstood the briefing of
him that most people whore infected (>80%) do well and do not need hospitalization.
He also quoted a modeling study from CDC (Spoken by Brett Giroir) that the real CFR
was between 0.1% and 1.0%.   The press asked me how this could differ from the WHO
number of 2-3%.   I explained that the WHO only counts cases that come to the attention
of the medical community (and this was pure arithmetic of numerator (deaths) and
denominator (number of recognized infected people) and the CDC model was making
assumptions about the actually number of infected people who might be asymptomatic or
minimally symptomatic and not get noticed.
Did a Podcast with Alan Alda (really wonderful guy).
Congress passed a $8.3 billion supplement for coronavirus.   NIAID gets $826 million
Govenor Inslee of Washington State called me even though the VP was on his way to
visit the Govenor and asked me my opinion about mitigation, i.e. should they start it.   I
told him a definitely yes.   He said that he trusts me and no body else in the
administration.   I also answered a number of questins from him and his staff.
Someone still is planting stories to discredit Azar.   Judy Steckler (HHS) has asked me on
a couple of occasions (see above) to call the reported and give the other side of the story
which I have done.
Press stories that the White House did not like the Profile of me in Politico since it is off
message (Really???).  Yet everyone in the WH is congratulating me on the piece (watch
your back, Tony).  I am pretty safe, I believe since the public adulation of me has been
amazing with every young intern as well as seasoned veteran in the WH coming over to
me congratulating me and thanking me for my work and even asking for selfies.
Bad news with another cruise ship – Grand Princess.   A person was on the ship, did not
feel well, got off in a port in California, then was hospitalized, tested positive for
COVID-19 and died.   Now the cruise ship wants to dock in SF.   Not being allowed
Several people on board have respiratory sxs.   Flying tests in to see if there is infection
on the ship.   If there is, we will have to quarantine the entire population of the ship OFF
the ship to avoid a Diamond princess situation.   Problem is that logistically we have no
easy way to quarantine 4000 people.   More tomorrow when we get results of tests.
PRESS:  FOX Business with Lou Dobbs; CNN Town Hall with Anderson Cooper.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
706Mar. 6, 2020 – Nancy Messonnier calls me asking for help in getting the message out
that we must protect the vulnerable (elderly with co-morbidities).   She wants to say it but
she says the VP’s staff are pushing back.   I promise to bring up at TF meeting.   I do and
get support to announce it, which I do at the WH press conference this afternoon.   I say
that people with underlying conditions, particularly the elderly, should start to practice
some form of social distrancing as well as avoiding any non-essential travel, particularly
airplanes.
During task force meeting it became clear that there were at least 21 infections on the
Grand Princess out of the 46 tested.   All but 2 were in the crew.   I and others strongly
push to get these people off the ship to avoid another Diamond Princess fiasco.   Leave
crew on ship and test everyone and put inot holding facility (March or Travis) and then
send the California passengers to self-isolation at home, provide charter flights for the
non-Californians to their home, and have the UK, Canada and other countries come and
make decisions for their citizens as to their disposition.
POTUS in Florida tells VP that he would keep the people on the vessel, but if Fauci and
others feel it is better to take them off, then take them off.   Yet, when he does a press
conference in Florida, he says does not favor taking them off ship.   I am beset with
having to deal with always being asked if I disagree with the POTUS.
Continually being pressed about the lack of availabioity of tests when Hahn at FDA is
saying that 750,000 tests are distributed and 1.5 million more are on the way next week.
PRESS:  NBC Today Show with Savannah Guthrie; JAMA Podcast with Howard
Bauchner; Tape CBS 60 minutes for airing on Sunday March 8);
Mar. 7, 2020 – 102,969/3511.  Meeting at Deb Birx home to hash out issues in
preparation for TF meeting today (Saturday) at 4:00 PM.   Tom Frieden comes down
from NYC, Joe Grogan, Steve Redd (now detailed from CDC to Deb), Matt Pottinger,
Olivia Troye.
We make decision to recommend that staff of all nursing homes and extended care
facilities act as if they are infected and wear masks, wash hands, etc. in dealing with
clients.   Also, limit visits of family members, and if they do visit, they should do as the
staff does.
Still have not made decision about whether to ban all embarkment s of cxruise ships for
USA.   We want to do this, since we do not have the facilities to quarantine thousands of
people on a single ship when we know from DOT that at any given time there are 99
cruise ships out there with >300,000 people that are planning on disembarking at USA
ports.
Announced last night that Mick Mulvaney is out as Chief of Staff to POTUS and will
now be Special Envoy to Northern Ireland (Yikes!)
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
707At Deb house we learm that 2 people from the AIPAC (American Israel Public Affaitrs
Committee) meeting are infected and one who has now actually gotten sick has hugged
Mark Meadows, the new Chief of Staff to POTUS.   I speak with Sean Conley, Physician
to POTUS, and tell him that Meadows needs to be isolated at home now; he needs to be
tested now;   if negative, then OK, but still isolate 14 days’ if positive, we have a real
problem sine he has made contact with many public Figures, possibly the POTUS
already.   VERY INTENSE TIMES.   Meadows test is negative.  Will isolate for 14
days.
Gov. Cuomo calls my cell and wants me to help him get masks from the WHO supply
since the SNS does not have enough to service New York.   I give him Stewart
Simonson’s cells phone and they connect.
Had important TF meeting in Sit Room.   VP phones in from Mar a Largo.  At least 4
cruise ships with crew members who were on the Grand Princess are out there.   Could be
a logistic nightmare.   I propose that we urge seniors with co-morbidities to avoid crowds,
unnecessary travel, particularly on planes and absolutely on cruises as part of my
campaign (see above) to protect the vulnerable.   I write (handwritten at the Table) a
statement for the State Department to publish with DHS that this is our recommendation.
VP loves it (on phone) and says let us call it the Fauci doctrine.
Mar. 8, 2020 – 105,427/3583.   2 cases in DC and at least 3 in Montgomery County.   I
am going to start social distancing myself – am 7 monhs shy of 80 years old.   Today is
the Sunday show day.   I emphasized on FOX (Chris Wallace) and Meet the Press that
people with underlying conditions, particularly the elderly with such conditions should do
social distancing, avoid all by absolutely essential travel, do not take long plane trips and
absolutely avoid cruise ships.
The meetingof the TF today emphasized getting people off the ship.   There has been a
delay with the union of longshoreman somewhat passive aggressing the USG.   Pence to
Call Gov. Newsom.   Pence tasks Deb and I to put together some “Doctor Talk”
statements in clear language.
Pence clearly very happy the way I handled the 2 Sunday Shows that I did.
Nice Profiles of me in Politico and NY Times today.
Amazing outflow of thanks from hundreds of people!!
Article from Denise Grady:
Not His First Epidemic, Dr. Anthony
Fauci Sticks to the Facts
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
708Where politicians fumble and other government health officials step back, he steps up to
explain.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases,
speaking before the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday.Credit...Anna
Moneymaker/The New York Times
By Denise Grady
•March 8, 2020, 3:04 p.m. ET
•  •  Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading expert on infectious diseases, is widely
respected for his ability to explain science without talking down to his audience — and
lately, for managing to correct the president’s pronouncements without saying he is
wrong.
President Trump said that drug companies would make a coronavirus vaccine ready
“soon.” Dr. Fauci has repeatedly stepped up after the president to the lectern during
televised briefings or at White House round tables to amend that timetable, giving a more
accurate estimate of at least a year or 18 months.
Mr. Trump said a “cure” might be possible. Dr. Fauci explained that antiviral drugs were
being studied to see if they might make the illness less severe. The president also said the
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
709disease would go away in the spring. Dr. Fauci said maybe so, but because it was caused
by a new virus, there was no way to tell.
Experts like Dr. Fauci should be the ones who speak to the public during epidemics, said
Representative Donna E. Shalala of Florida, who was his boss during the Obama
administration, when she led the Department of Health and Human Services.
“I think Tony is playing the same exact role that he has in the past — to make sure the
science is accurate and clear,” Ms. Shalala said. “During a health emergency, it’s the
scientists and physicians that are the credible people to the American public, not
politicians.”
“I used to make him wear his white coat when talking to the public,” she added. “I used
to make them all wear their white coats so people were reassured that they are real
doctors.”
On Sunday, Dr. Fauci appeared on at least two television news shows, warning that as the
virus spread — there were more than 450 cases in at least 33 states — some stricter
measures to isolate the infected might be considered. He also offered advice for older
adults and those with underlying health conditions who are most at risk, saying they
should avoid cruises, flights and large gatherings of people.
At a recent Congressional subcommittee hearing, one representative asked Dr. Fauci if he
had a twin, because he seemed to be everywhere lately. Another offered medical advice:
lemon, honey and bourbon for his voice, which has been hoarse for weeks from endless
rounds of talking to lawmakers, scientists, health officials and reporters.
If Dr. Fauci has become the explainer-in-chief of the coronavirus epidemic, it is in part
because other government scientists have left a vacuum, avoiding the news media
spotlight or being reined in by the Trump administration and accused of exaggerating the
threat from the virus. When reporters call Dr. Fauci, he calls them back.
Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is
famous for being unknown: He has given few interviews or public talks outside those
required by administration news conferences. Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the
C.D.C.’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, who warned on
Feb. 25 that the coronavirus was likely to spread  in the United States, and that “this could
be bad,” came under fire from the administration and has toned down her advisories.
“Nancy Messonnier told it like it is,” said Dr. Thomas Frieden, the former director of the
C.D.C. “And she was 100 percent right, and they silenced the messenger.”
The C.D.C. has made few of its other scientists available for interviews about the
coronavirus. And it is now facing sharp criticism for long delays in providing states with
kits to test for the virus, and for setting such tight limits on the tests performed at its
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
710headquarters in Atlanta that some diagnoses were delayed or missed, possibly leaving
infected people to spread the virus to others.
Dr. Fauci, 79, does not seem to be in the cross hairs. Although he was recently told he
must clear his many TV, radio and print interviews through the White House, he has said
that he has not been muzzled.
“You don’t want to go to war with a president,” Dr. Fauci told Politico. But he thinks the
public needs solid, understandable medical information, especially during crises. He
makes a point of not trying to “razzle-dazzle” audiences with his knowledge, he told an
interviewer in 2015, adding that his education at a Jesuit high school and college taught
him intellectual rigor and the value of public service. As director of the National Institute
of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984, Dr. Fauci has lasted through six
presidents, and has declined multiple requests to lead his agency’s parent organization,
the National Institutes of Health. He has led federal efforts to combat diseases caused by
emerging viruses, including H.I.V., SARS, the 2009 swine pandemic, MERS, Ebola and
now the new coronavirus.
He was an architect of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, started in 2003
by President George W. Bush, to fight H.I.V. globally.
In 2001, after anthrax was mailed to Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the Bush
administration tried initially to minimize the threat, but Dr. Fauci was characteristically
blunt.
“This is material that is quite formidable, that is infecting people with inhalation anthrax,
infecting them in the absence of direct contact,” he said. “You can call it whatever you
want to call it with regard to grade and size or weaponized or not weaponized. The fact
is, it is acting like a highly efficient bioterrorist agent.”
Previous disease outbreaks have kept him on the lookout for new pathogens, and in
January, reports of unexplained pneumonia cases in Wuhan, China, set off alarms in his
head.
“Even before we knew it was a coronavirus, I said it certainly sounds like a coronavirus-
SARS type thing,” he said. “As soon as it was identified, I called a meeting of top-level
people and said, ‘Let’s start working on a vaccine right now.’”
He is among the most highly paid federal employees, earning about $400,000 a year,
more than the vice president or the chief justice of the Supreme Court. He oversees a
2020 budget of $4.75 billion, which is $769 million less than last year’s after being cut by
the Trump administration.
Unflappable though Dr. Fauci may seem, the new coronavirus worries him, especially its
spread in the Seattle area and the toll it is taking in a nursing home there. He said he
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
711thought it was still possible to stop the disease, but health authorities would have to know
where it was to do that, and he said the lack of testing capacity was a huge obstacle.
Test kits sent by the C.D.C. to states were flawed, and it has taken weeks to begin
replacing them. And strict regulations from the Food and Drug Administration hampered
outside labs’ efforts to begin to do their own tests.
But Dr. Fauci declined to join the chorus of blame against the C.D.C.
“It’s so easy to play Monday morning quarterback,” he said. “Every element of the
federal government was working full-speed to try to get this out and get things going.”
“What I really want to concentrate on is the idea of getting enough tests out there to get
an evidence-based foundation of where we are in this country,” he said. “Seattle is of
concern. We need to know the extent of the community spread.”
At times in the past, Dr. Frieden said, Dr. Fauci may have over-promised a bit in his
enthusiasm for projects of his that have yet to pan out — an H.I.V. vaccine, and a
universal flu vaccine that would provide long-lasting immunity to multiple strains so that
people would not need another shot every year.
“It’s the role you have to play to get money from the Hill, and the role of a researcher to
be eternally optimistic about a cure being around the corner,” Dr. Frieden said. “He’s
very effective at asking for money from Congress.”
He is also a fair-minded colleague, Dr. Frieden added. During West Africa’s Ebola
epidemic in 2014, after two nurses treating a patient who had traveled to the United
States became infected, the C.D.C. was harshly criticized for not having helped hospitals
to prepare better. Dr. Fauci did not pile on.
“Not everything we did was perfect,” said Dr. Frieden, who then headed the C.D.C.
“There are many people in similar roles as Tony who might have taken advantage of that
for the interest of their institution, and Tony was always honorable.”
“If we did something wrong he was frank about that,” he continued. “When we were
getting attacked unfairly, he defended us. That’s very unusual behavior in the
bureaucratic situation you see in Washington sometimes. I think that’s why Tony is so
respected.”
During the early years of the AIDS epidemic, the U.S. government and its health
agencies were a frequent target of criticism and protests, blamed for inaction on potential
treatments and inadequate funding for research and medical care.
When AIDS activists demonstrated outside his institute in 1988, demanding a chance to
try experimental drugs, Dr. Fauci surprised the leaders by inviting them into his office.
He wound up working with them to develop new ways to expand access without
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
712compromising the clinical trials that were urgently needed to determine which drugs
worked — an approach that was later applied to research in other diseases as well.
“There are a lot of world class scientists, but Tony has a special set of skills,” Ms. Shalala
said. “An ability to communicate, high integrity and an understanding of politics — and
to know to stay out of politics in order to protect scientists.”
Dr. Fauci acknowledged that his age puts him in one of the groups at highest risk for
becoming severely ill from a coronavirus infection. But it has not slowed him down. He
sleeps only about five hours a night, works most of his waking hours and jumps on the
Metro to get around the Washington, D.C., area, from his office to the Capitol and the
White House. Most days, he runs or power walks 3.5 miles.
“I’m not worried about myself,” he said. “I’m worried about the job I have to do.”
Andrew Jacobs contributed reporting. Alain Delaqueriere contributed research.
Disclaimer:  Any third-party material in this email has been shared for internal use under fair use
provisions of U.S. copyright law, without further verification of its accuracy/veracity.  It does not
necessarily represent my views nor those of NIAID, NIH, HHS, or the U.S. government.
PRESS:  FOX Sunday with Chris Wallace; Meet the Press with Chuck Todd;
Appeared on 60 Minutes (CBS) Special on coronavirus
Mar. 9, 2020 – 111,354/3892.  Stock market really crashing.
Even though we are saying that 1.1 million tests are out there, and millions (4 mill this
week) to follow, we still do not know how many tests have been performed and whether
anyone can get a test who needs it.  hate to say it, but some incompetence at CDC/FDA.
We are  geeting killed publicly by this vulnerability.   Am now told by CDC that we only
have 1 million nasal swabs to collect the specimens.   And so now we have more tests
than swabs!   And the limiting factor is the swabs.
Gov.  Cuomo calls me up and asks my advice on whether to close schools in the orthodox
Jewish section of Westchester where they have 90 cases (more than rest of NYC).   I tell
him yes.   He also asks about closing subways.   I tell him not yet, but let us stay tuned.
I will push for more surveillance testing.  Lab Corps and Quest
On phone call with VP and all the Govenors. I talk about protecting the vulmerables with
co-morbidities, particularly among the elderly   I bring Cliff into the group on an almost
fulltime basis.
Cases in 35 states.   >500 cases with 22 deaths
Priority 1 is to get people off the Grand Princess.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
713Had press conference.   POTUS came.  Had good conversation with him.   He is getting
very crummy with me.   I sarcastically answered one of the persistent questions about the
cruise ship issue by saying I personally would never get on a cruise ship.
PRESS:   CNN New Day with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman; FOX and
Friends.
Mar. 10, 2020 – 116,588/4090.  USA cases now 712. Deaths 29
Just signed off on a Level 3 State (“Reconsider Travel”) and a Level 3 CDC (“Avoid
non-essential travel) for the European Schengen Area   This measn that all travelers from
this area are required to enact a 14 day voluntary quarantine after arriving to USA.  Also
will consider an INA Section 212(f) Proclamation banning travel to USA bu any foreign
national, with limited exceptions,  who has been physically present in Italy in the last 14
days
I  push hard with Jerome Adams to expand community mitigation.  One topic was
whether there should be campaign rallies.   I insiste that we say all large crowds should
be avoided.   Marc Short pushes back since the POTUS will be doing rallies.   Jerome and
I continue to push.   I will say that the degree of stopping depends on the area of the
country – Washingotn State (bad); Nebraska (probably OK).
Chris Liddell becoming a friend and encourages me to stick by my guns – good guy.
For better or worse, I am becoming an international celebrity.  Calls from all over the
world.
Am concerned a bit about my health.   Having total body pain and will again stop Crestor
Reports from Italy are really bad.   Running out of equipment and just letting the elderly
and frail die without intervention.
Katie Miller defending my saying what is my opinion  based on good  public health
principles despite others in the  VP’s staff wanting me to be a bit more politically
sensitive, particularly around campaign rallies.  Katie wants to have me do ther “Fauci 5”
this coming Sunday.
Chatted with Govenor DeSantis (R-FL) who was concerned that I said at Press
conference today that Florida had community spread, when in fact Florida just had a big
cluster.   He was correct, was nice on the phone call arranged by WH after he
complained.   We came out with a statement correcting.
Spoke together with (Bob Redfield)with Nancy Pelosi at the request of VP to convince
her to pass a bill to indemnify companies who make the surgical masks.   There are 2
categories of masks: 1) medical, and 2) industry.   They are really the same with some
very minor differences.  We do not have enough medical and so we want to sell the
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
714industrial ones to medical use. The PREP act allows indemnification   The companies
want indemnification to sell the industrial ones to medical.
PRESS:  NPR Morning Edition; FOX  Hannity
Mar. 11, 2020 – 121,098/4366.    >1000 cases in USA – 29 deaths (WHO numbers).
Congressional House Energy and Commerce Oversight and Reform Hearing today –
Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) Chair
AMAZING DAY!!  Before Hearing we were told that the POTUS wanted me at the
White House at 12:30 PM for a meeting about travel restrictions that we had been
discussing and the Hearing was supposed to end at 12;30PM ..  I obviously had to leave
at 11:45 AM.   I left. The chair and committee was very annoyed.   The twitter feed
blasted that since I was being very forceful in saying that :”Things were going to get
worse before they got better” and gave a very serious warning about what was ahead, that
the POTUS yanked me out of the hearing (Amazing).. Multiple TV cameras and
hundreds of camera clicks followed me out of the Rayburn Building as I had a car
waiting for me to take me to the Oval Office.
The days discussions were historic.   I, Bob Redfield, Deb Birx and Azar argued and
discussed for a couple of hours that we should retrict all travel from the Schengen
countries (the 26 European countries) similar to what we did with China (see above).
USCITS can come back but will be funneled through 1 of 13 airports and when they get
here, they must self isolate fo 14 days.   Non-USCITs can only come if they had spent the
last 14 days outside of the Schengen.   Reason was that 70% of all new global infections
were in Europe (particularly Italy and France) and 30 of the 35 US States had infections
that originated in Europe.   Level 3 travel to Europe – only essential travel
Steve Mnuchin and Larry Kudlow were against this since they felt it would cause a
depression, not just a recession.   We went back and forth multiple times.   Jared Kushner
and Bob O’Brien (NSC) weighed in with me and Bob/Deb.
We went in and presented to the POTUS and he asked good questions, many of them to
me.   He agreed and was clearly concerned more about the health of the American people
than he was about the economy, which he said would recover.
We then went and asked the opinion of the CEOs of the major banks who were waiting
for POTUS in the Cabinet room.  We did not them what we had alredy decide, but we
asked them what they thought about travel restrictions.  They were favorably disposed.
Speech written mainly by Steve Miller with help from Jared Kuschner.  I helped in
reviewing of the Speech which the POTUS gave at 9:00 PM from the Oval. POTUS
writers took out some good stuff that I wanted in and kept in some stuff I did not like.
However, in all it was a good speech.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
715The VP and I called Pelosi, Schumer, Mitch McConnel, and Kevin McCarthy to give
them a heads up
After I went home and watched on TV, the CNN commentators (Chris Cuomo, Anderson
Cooper, David Gergon, David Gregory) all discussed me as the adult in the room and the
person wew should all trust.
Finally, Nancy Pelosi called me at home and was enraged and yelled at me for about 25
minutes saying that we left out the UK because of Trumps relationship with Boris
Johnson.   She is completely incorrect.   UKwas not part of Schengen.   She did not care.
She said that I have lost all of my credibility now by saying that I said this was a public
health decision when it really was a political decision.   Terrible phone call!!!   I called up
Olivia Troye (Assistant to VP) after the call and explained.   We will try to address this
tomorrow.   Probably should get Steve Beigen (State) to explain Schengen to her.
PRESS:  WTOP Radio;   Clips of me all over all the news on multiple
networks/cable.
Mar. 12, 2020 – 129,846/4931.  1267 cases in USA, 38 deaths.   Cases in 44 states.
Italy continues to surge
Has House briefing in Capitol and Senate briefing in Dirksen.  Then continuation of
House Energy and Commerce Hewaring from the other day with Malonet as Chair.
Again, they hammered us about testing.  The Senators and Congressperrdsons were
enraged, especially Patty Murry (D-WA).   Steve Redd during the briefings and Bob
Redfield during the Hearing continued to be incoherent in explaining about the difficulty
regarding testing the “Public health” system that the CDc set up works well in individual
small numbes of patient/physician related requests.   However, it is not suited to mass
screening.
Calls with Se. Joe Munchin (x2); Gov. Cuomo; Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL)
Very flattering article abpout me in the Washington Post by Karen Tumulty (see below)
that explains the above:
Anthony Fauci fights outbreaks with the
sledgehammer of truth
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
716Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health,
on Capitol Hill on Thursday. (Joshua Roberts/Reuters)
By
Karen Tumulty
Columnist
March 12, 2020 at 5:32 p.m. EDT
A virus that is deadly and little understood. An administration in deep denial. Anthony S.
Fauci has been here before.
As the coronavirus epidemic escalates, the director of the National Institute of Allergy
and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) has become a familiar media presence.
Fauci’s expertise and credibility shine against the contradictory and false messages
coming out of President Trump. The administration has at times sounded more concerned
with protecting the president politically than stopping the spread of a potentially lethal
disease.
While Trump tries to play down the severity of a public health crisis that might affect his
reelection prospects, Fauci has laid out the best assessment of the true danger in stark
terms.
In testimony Wednesday on Capitol Hill, he warned that the coronavirus has a mortality
rate 10 times as great as that of the flu, and refuted Trump’s rosy promise that a vaccine
will be ready “in a fairly quick manner.” Fauci also said flatly that the government is
“failing” when it comes to the urgent imperative of making widespread testing available.
The latest updates on the coronavirus
After federal officials gave lawmakers a briefing on Thursday, a frustrated Rep. Anna G.
Eshoo (D-Calif.) told me: “Everything was wrapped in confusion. The only one who
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
717answers the questions — he not only gives the science, but then he says, let me explain
this in pedestrian language — is Dr. Fauci.”
Then again, this is not the first time Fauci has found himself in the position of having to
navigate a public health crisis fraught with political land mines. A renowned international
expert on the immune system, Fauci took over NIAID in 1984, barely a year and a half
after scientists had identified a mysterious retrovirus that was killing thousands of people.
It would be nearly another year before President Ronald Reagan would publicly utter the
name of the disease it produced: AIDS. Reagan’s sluggish handling of the epidemic left
one of the deepest scars on his legacy.
In 1986, Reagan’s surgeon general, C. Everett Koop, produced a report that described in
graphic terms the potential toll of AIDS, projecting that 270,000 Americans might
contract it by 1991. The report used explicit language, explaining that the disease was
transmitted through “semen and vaginal fluids” and during “oral, anal and vaginal
intercourse.”
Conservatives approved of some of what was in Koop’s document: It warned against
“freewheeling casual sex,” and asserted that the surest means of preventing AIDS were
through abstinence and monogamy. But they weren’t so happy with the surgeon general’s
recommendation that condoms be used as a fallback.
Koop was concerned that his findings were being buried by the Reagan administration, so
two years later, he and Fauci cooked up a bold idea: mailing an abridged version of his
report to every single one of the 107 million households and postal boxes in the country.
The problem, however, was that the surgeon general lacked the budget to do it. As Fauci
recounted to me during a 2018 interview, he told Koop: “You know, there is a
mechanism called an interagency transfer.” Fauci had the authority to provide funds to
get the project off the ground, because combating AIDS related to his own agency’s core
mission.
Congress picked up the idea and ordered the largest mass mailing in U.S. history. It also
stipulated that the seven-page brochure be “distributed without necessary clearance of the
content by any official, organization or office” — in other words, that it not be edited to
suit anyone’s political agenda.
In addition to being printed in English and Spanish, “ Understanding AIDS” went out in
Chinese, Portuguese, Haitian-Creole, Vietnamese, Laotian, Cambodian and Braille. It
debunked many myths about the disease, for instance stating unequivocally that AIDS is
not spread by mosquitoes, and could not be caught through casual contact with saliva,
sweat or toilet seats.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
718Subsequent surveys found that nearly 87 million adults perused part or all of the booklet
— making it the most widely read publication in the country in July 1988, with Reader’s
Digest coming in a distant second with 48.5 million readers.
Of course, there are many differences in scale and severity between the AIDS epidemic
and the coronavirus threat. While most who contract coronavirus will recover, AIDS
during the 1980s was a death sentence wrapped in stigma.
But as Fauci well understands, all infectious diseases have something in common:
Accurate information is one of the most powerful weapons for fighting them.
Fauci has already shown how important it is to hit a microscopic enemy with a
sledgehammer of truth. A yet-untold number of Americans will be betting their lives on
him to do it again.
Looks like I may have Polymyalgia Rheumatica or really bad Crestor myalgia
PRESS:  On Pebble Beach at the White House after the TF meeting:   ABC Evening
News; CBS Evening News; NBC Evening News;   Then, I did a gaggle of 5 questions
on Pebble Beach;  CNN Coronavirus Town Hall with Sanjay Guptya and Anderson
Cooper;
Mar. 213, 2020 – 132,382/4981    USA 1694    Deaths.  Primary health care facilities.
Hot areas – WA, CA, MA, NYC
I thought that it would be a quiet day since the TF meeting was called off.  However, at
2:00 PM, I was called down to the White House since the POTUS wanted me next to him
at the podium of the Rose Garden as he made the announcement of deckaring at
“National Emergency” which would give him and the Secretary of HHS the power to
remove many constraints in  response to a national emergency. Also on the podium were
the CEOs of the major private sector companies that would make tests readily available –
CVS, Target, Walmart, etc.  I was at the posium and answered many questions of the
press in the Rose Garden.   I will be on the 5 Sunday Showes  2 days from now (The
“Fauci Five”).  Prior to that, I was involved in helping to proof the speech he would give.
There were some glaring errors in the speech that I corrected.   Got to meet Hope Hicks
who was very nice.   Jared is playing a major role in all of this.
After the presser the White House people showe me a minute by minute graph of the
stock markert from the time the POTUS went to the podium and it went down to the 45
minutes of the speech and questions.   The DOW went up in 45 minutes 1980 points,
which was the greatest single increase in the market in history.   The POTUS signed a
copy of the graph for me and several of the CEOs
My tooth crown fell out in flossing this AM and Dr. Eric Hosaka so nicely fixed it for me
right away 2 hours after I called him Also, got and MRI for my leg pain.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
719Alex Azar is obviously being pushed aside as he played a very minor role in the Rose
garden Presser.
PRESS:  MSNBC Morning Joe; GMA (ABC);CBS The Morning; FOX and Friends;
BBC World News; Rose Garden Presser with many cameras.
Mar. 14, 2020 (Saturday)  -  CDC numbers (less than WHO numbers.  142,320/5388.
129 countries involved.   China numbers going way down – only 11 new infections.
Koreaa flattening out.   USA – 2226 cases, 50 deaths, 532 new cases.
POTUS came into the TF meeting with “USA” baseball cap on.   We spent a lot of time
talking about “ratings’ of yesterday’s press conference and its effect on the stock market.
He dwelled on doing more press conferences and how the ratings would be even better
than the best fake news TV ratings.   He made the right decisions about now doing travel
restrictions in UK + Ireland and so what I ma seeing is someone who actually makes
decision that are bestr for the public health since he follows what the TF recommends
(driven by me and Deb and CDC) but his public expression and even private expression
is related to the fluff of ratings and publicity.   And so he wants us to do 2 press
conferences/day – one in AM and one in PM.  Really interesting.  We now will have no
time to do work.
Hope Hicks seems as uncomfortable with this as I am.  I see her as a future ally.  POTUS
Did press conference and Alex Azar was not invited in  order to make room for
“diversity” on the podium with Ben Carson and Jerome Adams.   Death by a 1000 cuts
for Azar.   I volunteered to Alex that in my introduction I would mention that the
Declaration of Natuonal Emergency gacve Azar as Secertary enormous powers and
flexibility to unshackle our response.   I did so.
Mahor positive profile of me in The Atlantic yesterday (03/13/2020)
https://www.theatlantic.com/notes/2020/03/time-capsule-2-exceptional-dr-
fauci/607957/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=email&utm_source=a  (see below):
As of today, March 13, 2020—three-plus years into the current
administration, three months into public awareness of the
coronavirus spread, seven-plus months until before the next
election—Anthony Fauci is playing a role in which no previous
Trump-era figure has survived.
One other person has been in the spot Fauci now occupies. That is, of
course, James Mattis, the retired four-star Marine Corps general and
former secretary of defense for Trump. Former  is the key word here,
and the question is whether the change in circumstances between
Mattis’s time and Fauci’s—the public nature of this emergency, the
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
720greater proximity of upcoming elections, the apparent verdict from
financial markets and both international and domestic leaders that
Donald Trump is in deep over his head—will give Fauci the greater
leverage he needs, not just to stay at work but also to steer policy
away from the abyss.
Why is Anthony Fauci now, even more than James Mattis before him,
in a different position from any other publicly visible associate of
Trump’s?
1.Pre-Trump credibility, connections, and respect . Fauci has been
head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases, at the National Institutes of Health, since Ronald
Reagan’s first term, in 1984. (How can he have held the post so
long? Although nothing in his look or bearing would suggest it,
Fauci is older than either Bernie Sanders or Joe Biden. He
recently turned 79.)
Through his long tenure at NIH, which spanned the early days
of the HIV/AIDS devastation and later experience with the
SARS and H1N1 epidemics, Fauci has become a very familiar
“public face of science,” explaining at congressional hearings
and in TV and radio interviews how Americans should think
about the latest threat. He has managed to stay apart from any
era’s partisan-political death struggles. He has received a raft of
scientific and civic honors, from the Lasker Award for health
leadership, to the Presidential Medal of Freedom, awarded by
George W. Bush.
Thus, in contrast to virtually all the other figures with whom
Trump has surrounded himself, Fauci is by any objective
standard the best person for the job — and is universally seen
as such . This distinguishes him from people Trump has favored
in his own coterie, from longtime consigliere Michael Cohen to
longtime ally Roger Stone to longtime personal
physician Harold Bornstein; and from past and present
members of his White House staff, like the departed Michael
Flynn and the returned Hope Hicks and the sempiternal Jared
Kushner; and fish-out-of-water Cabinet appointees, like (to
pick one) the neurosurgeon Ben Carson as Secretary of Housing
and Urban Development.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
721Put another way: Very plainly, Trump needs Fauci more than
Fauci needs Trump. This is not a position Donald Trump has
ever felt comfortable in— witness the denouement with Mattis.

2.The ability not to abase himself before Trump . The first Cabinet
meeting Donald Trump held, nearly three years ago, was unlike
any other conducted in U.S. history, and very much like
subsequent public appearance of Trump in company with his
appointees.
In that meeting, on June 12, 2017, as TV cameras were rolling,
Trump went around the table and one-by-one had his
appointees gush about how kind, wise, and far-sighted he was—
failing only to compliment him on his humility. (Tina
Nguyen described the meeting at the time in Vanity Fair .) After
praising himself, Trump called on others to praise him, starting
with the reliable Mike Pence. “It is the greatest privilege of my
life to serve as the vice president to a president who is keeping
his word to the American people,” Pence began. All the others
followed his example—with the prominent exception of Mattis.
He spent his “praise” time instead complimenting the men and
women in uniform he led.
No public event like that Cabinet meeting had happened before
in the United States, simply because no other president has
been as needy for in-public  adulation as Trump is. Of course
most politicians and all presidents are needy; you could not run
for the presidency if you had a normal temperament.
(Background reading on this point, while you’re “socially
isolating”: Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men.)  Every
political leader eats up the praise in private—“Wonderful job
today, Mr. President—you were really connecting!”, not to
mention Veep —but all the rest of them have been savvy enough
to know how tacky this looks in public. The modern exception-
illustrating-the-rule might have been Lyndon Johnson, with
enough of the Sun King in his makeup to enjoy having
people humble themselves before him. But holding a public
adulation-fest? If George W. Bush had heard, say, Karl Rove
start in that way, he would likely have said, “OK, Turd Blossom,
what are you angling for?” Barack Obama—or John F. Kennedy,
or Jimmy Carter— would have arched an eyebrow as if to ask,
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
722“Hey, did you think you were still playing in the minors?”
But what we saw in that Cabinet meeting, we have seen again
and again from those around Trump. The most humiliating
recent examples come from the people in charge of the
coronavirus response: Pence again; Alex Azar, head of Health
and Human Services; Robert Redfield, head of the Centers for
Disease Control; and Seema Verma, in charge of Medicare and
Medicaid. The beginnings and endings of their public
statements, and the answers to many questions, are larded with
praise for Trump and his “decisive and visionary action.” (For
the latest example, see Verma under questioning from Martha
MacCallum of Fox News. Verma repeatedly dodges
MacCallum’s direct question about whether hospitals have
enough ventilators and other supplies (as Fred Barbash laid
out in the Washington Post . MacCallum makes one last try—
and Verma seeks refuge in saying, “And that’s why the
president has taken such a bold and decisive action.” That claim
made no logical sense to MacCallum or the listeners, but it
reflected the inescapable logic of what is expected from
members of the Court of Trump.)
There is one exception: Anthony Fauci. He has occasionally said
that he agrees with aspects of the administration’s or the
president’s policies, but he has avoided the ritual self-
abnegation. Of course Fauci held his job long before Trump
came to town, and is not part of the normal round of high-level
appointments each new administration makes. (To the best of
my knowledge, though, directors of NIH institutes, like Fauci,
serve “at the pleasure of the president” and so could be
removed. If I’m wrong on that, will update. Update: Several
NIH veterans have written in to say that Fauci’s position is
officially different from that of the NIH director, and is not
directly a presidential-political appointment. Recent history
teaches that a vindictive president can make things difficult
even for career civil servants. But I am grateful for the
clarification. )
But Fauci’s polite but consistent reluctance to grovel cannot
have gone unnoticed by the audience-of-one for all the other
appointees: Trump himself.

Released by Chairman Rand Paul
7233.Daring to contradict Trump, in public . This is a step beyond
anything Mattis attempted. Through the first two years of the
administration, background-sourced stories and reports based
on “those in a position to know the Secretary’s thinking” laid
out the increasing distance between Mattis’s view of American
interests and what Trump was saying and doing.
But there is no precedent, from Mattis or anyone else, for what
we have seen these past few weeks from Fauci at the podium. Is
the coronavirus problem just going to go away (as Trump had
claimed)? No, from Fauci. It is serious, and it is going to get
worse.  Is the testing system “perfect” (as Trump had
claimed)? No, it is not working as it should . Is the U.S. once
again the greatest of all nations in its response to the
threat? No, it is behind in crucial aspects, and has much to
learn from others.
Fauci is saying all these things politely and respectfully. As an
experienced Washington operator he knows that there is no
reason to begin an answer with, “The president is wrong.” You
just skip to the next sentence, “The reality is...” But his
meaning—“the president is wrong”—is unmistakable.
Anthony Fauci has earned the presumption-of-credibility for
his comments. Donald Trump has earned the presumption that
he is lying or confused. A year ago that standoff—the realities,
versus Trump-world obeisance—worked out against James
Mattis. Will the balance of forces be different for Fauci? As of
this writing, no one can know.
PRESS: Press conference in WH press room; The Atlantic (see above)
Mar. 15, 2020 (Sunday) – BIG DAY!
142,539/       USA = 2888 with 58 deaths and 662 new
I did all 5 Sunday Shows today (my 3rd Fauci 5”) with This Week on ABC, Meet the
Press on NBC, Face the Nation on CBS, FOX with Chris Wallace and CNN.   All went
very well
Had press conference at White House.  POTUS made intro and then left for us to take
Questions.  Brett Giroir brought a bunch of USPHS officers with their dark blue work
uniforms and told the press how great they are.   I spent an hour before the press briefing
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
724in the VP’s office.   In preparing for the briefing which was geared to rolling out the high
throughput tests in collaboration with the States and the private sector that will be
operational in the next day or so, they wanted to spin it that this was unprecedented that
no one has ever done this so quickly.   Deb did not speak up which shows me that she is
really inhibited by her Presidential appointee status.   A little shame on her.   I spoke up
and said that several countries have already done what we are talking about, i.e. China,
South Korea and so why not stop bragging and just say that we are entering a new phase
of our response to COVID-19, i.e. a much more expansive testing capability.  Hope Hicks
and Jared Kuschner were my allies in this and both seem to now want to make sure that I
am involved in everything and approve everything.
The POTUS came in and misunderstood thinking that we (the USG) would be
implementing the testing.  He was pissed.  Brett and VP corrected him.   However, he
remained in a bad mood.  He then said that he wanted to show his face and make some
remarks without Qs and As at the briefing.   Hope felt this was dangerous and said he
should not do it.   He started to berate Hope in front of everyone say that he became
president because he was good and dealing with the public and was pissed that Hope was
trying to tell him what he could or could not do.
I spoke with Bill de Blasio (Mayor – NYC) and convinced him based on what I was
saying publicly and my conversation tonight to close the NYC schools (he had already
decided based on what I was saying on TV).   I went on to tell him he should close the
bars and restaurants in NYC.   He said that he would base this on my recommendation.
I had a similar call with Ann O’Leary, the COS of Gov. Gavin Newsom of California.
Ann said that based on my TV appearances today and yesterday, the Governor has
decided to close the schools in California as well as the bars and restaurants.
When I left the WH and crossed Pennsylvania and 17th Street, several cars honked their
horns and shouted “thank you” out the window.
Congress (Blount) call and wants to give us a lot more in a 2nr supplement.
Mar. 16, 2020 – Came out with the guidelines that reflected my pushing for a more
aggressive mitigation 15 day strategy →  If you are elderly, self-isolate; do not
congregate in groups >10 people; stay away from bars, restaurants, theaters, sporting
events;  if a community has community spread CLOSE the bars, restaurants and places of
congregation; close schools where there is community spread; no visitors to nursing
homes; if family member is  sick, others in family should take extra percautions; only
necessary travel, telework as much as possible.
Press conference after was highly attended.   Stock market dropped byu 3000 points, the
biggest percentage drop in history.
PRESS: ABC 20/20 coronavirus special with David Muir;
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
725Mar. 17, 2020 – 168,000/6700; 151 countries; USA 4529 cases (903 news); 84 deaths
(16 new).   At TF discussed supply chain issues; also testing still somewhat of an issue.
Press conference with POTUS.   He is now coming around (largely through my efforts) to
say thatr this is really a serious problem, but he still always brags about how well we are
doing as opposed to emohasizing the challenges ahead.   I gave some support to Gov.
Cuomo during a question of me.
Issue arising of clains from France that hydroxychloroquine is effective in decreasing
the duration of viral shedding and also is used as a prophylaxis in exposed people.   All
uncontrolled studies.
PRESS: Press conference after TF.   I was featured heavily in the presser; FOX with
Laura Ingraham;  Sean Hannity Radio; Barstool Sports Podcast
Mar. 18, 2020 – WH wanted me to not wear myself out.   Have had private car and
driver since Mar. 13 (Friday).   I will stay at NIH today and do some press tonight from
truck at home.   Very positive press with Laura Ingraham on FOX last night
My diagnosis of PMR really bothering me.  Will start on prednisone today.
On WHO call, Dale Fisher (Australian working in Singapore) gave warning to other
countries that after you lift the lock down, be prepared for a rebound and use the lock-
down period to stock up on supplies, prepare alternative hospitals (gyms, schools, etc.)
preserve PPE and not use them for unnecessary things.   Also, from Italy, 12% of ICU
patinets were 19-50 years od and ~30% were 50-70 yo; 50% of French patienets in ICU
are under 60 yo.
Bloomberg report on March 18 (Tommaso Ebhardt et al) said that in Italy 99% of thois
who died had “othe illness”.   However, 75% of these had hypertension.   These latter
must have been on anti-hypertensive meds and so the issue of ACE inhibitors absolutely
must be pursued.
On TF call we discussed the Defense Production Act and a possible EO.   Also, the VP
said over the phone that he wanted me at the Pressor today and Katie (good for her)
pushed back and said that I should stay at NIH.   VP looked surprised.   Probably will
hear more about this.
Also, at TF meeting they decided to fully embrace FEMA and make a big announcement
about that with the POTUS today.
New York City and State are facing a “Sophie’s Choice” regarding PPE.   They are very
low and they have to make a decision of using PPE for testing versus giving to HCWs
who are taking care of patients.   Obviously, it goes to HCWs, but that will interfer with
testing.   This was related to me by phone call with Peter Staley, Mark Harrington, and
James Krellerstein.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
726Also, had phone call with Major de Blasio who wants to go to “shelter in place for the
entire city.   He is asking my advice since Gov. Cuomo is pushing back.   I advised
DeBlasio to go ahead and do it.   I will try to speak with Cuomo.
POTUS called me up from Oval.   He has Alex Azar, Steve Hahn, Bob Redfield Scott
Gottlieb, and Deb Birx in the office with the usual WH crowd.   They want me in on the
discussion.   A friend of POTUS (Tom Ellison of Ellison Foundation ?) said that he
heards that someone gave Hydroxychloroquine (HC) to 51 people and 51 got better.
POTUS has heard similar stories, including Remdesivir (R) about other drugs and wants
to make these available.   To my amazement and dismay, Azar said that he could approve
HC and Remdesivir now with the powers that he has.   Steve Hahn and to some extent
Deb and Bob started to chime in that this would give people hope.   I took a deep breath
and said that this was wrong and should not be done.   If you want expanded access (EA)
of HC which is an approved drug, you can do it in an EA protocol and still get wide
distribution and possibly learn something.   I stated that with R it is different since this
was not approved.   In the chorus of eeveryone agreeing with the POTUS that we need to
give hope to people, I insisted that we can do both, but in the context of a trial.   To his
credit, POTUS agreed with me as long as we get the drugs out there.   They wanted to
announce this today, but I convinced them to do so tomorrow when I am there.   Below is
an e-mail that I sent right after the conversation:
From: Fauci, Anthony (NIH/NIAID) [E]
Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2020 2:27 PM
To: Redfield, Robert R. (CDC/OD) <olx1@cdc.gov>; Stephen Hahn
<SH1@fda.hhs.gov>; Birx, Deborah L. EOP/NSC <Deborah.L.Birx@nsc.eop.gov>
Cc: clane@niaid.nih.gov; Troye, Olivia EOP/NSC <Olivia.Troye@nsc.eop.gov>; Short,
Marc T. EOP/OVP <Marc.T.Short@ovp.eop.gov>; Miller, Katie R. EOP/OVP
<Katie.R.Miller@ovp.eop.gov>; Hicks, Hope C. EOP/WHO <Hope@who.eop.gov>;
kellyanne conway <Kellyanne.e.conway@who.eop.gov>
Subject: Follow-up of today's conversation
Folks:
     When we put together the proposal for the protocols/distribution of
Hydroxychloroquine (HC) and Remdesivir, I feel that it is important that we
do not make the program the same for each.   We need to link Remdesivir to
a much more strict protocol as opposed to HC which is an approved drug
and although it has some adverse events, we have tons of experience with
it.  I am comfortable with the HC plan as discussed in the Oval.    In
contrast, we know much less about the unapproved drug Remdesivir.   I have
more concern about the potential toxicities of this unapproved,
investigational drug in the context of COVID-19 as well as the need to prove
that it works before we widely distribute it.   The bulk of the data that we
have with Remdesivir is in Ebola where it did not have a clear benefit.  We
should consider leading with HC in a flexible distribution protocol and
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
727accelerating the clinical trial aspect of Remdesivir.   Also, we clearly need to
have a discussion with Gilead about drug supply and the plan for any
accelerated study.  Finally, and importantly, the Chinese already have a
clinical trial of Remdesivir with more than 200 people enrolled in the
advanced disease arm of the study.   Someone should directly contact the
Chinese investigators (Bin Cao, et al) and find out if they have any
preliminary data on efficacy and safety.  In my mind it is imperative that we
find out what they know before we launch any distribution program. Happy
to discuss.
Thanks,
Tony
Anthony S. Fauci, MD
Director
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Building 31, Room 7A-03
31 Center Drive, MSC 2520
National Institutes of Health
Bethesda, MD 20892-2520
Phone: (301) 496-2263
FAX: (301) 496-4409
E-mail: afauci@niaid.nih.gov
PRESS: Dave Webb Radio Show; Mike Gallagher Show; FOX Tucker Carlson;
CNN Cuomo Prime Time;
Mar. 19, 2020 - >200,000/~10,000; USA – 9026/150; 2900 new.   Italy >31,000
In the USA testing:  ~70,000 tests with ~10% positive
Met yet again with POTUS right before the press conference, which did not include me
since it was predominantly an FDA issue with Steve Hahn.  POTUS excited about
making drugs (Chloroquine, Remdesivir, etc.) more accessible.  Therapy was the theme
of the day.  They actually were going to go too far (see above) and make them all
available on compassionate use.  I convinced them not to.   POTUS was hot to give out
chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine since Jeff Ellison thinks that it is a great drug.  Steve
Hahn did a good job in stressing the need for safety and efficacy data.
Katie Miller and Kelly Love are trying to not overload me and particularly Katie is
sensitive to my time.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
728Call with Gilead regarding remdesivir studies and supply
PRESS:  Marc Levin Radio; PBS NewsHour with Judy Woodruff; Facebook with
Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan; CNN Town Hall with Anderson Cooper and
Sanjay Gupta; NBC Evening News with Lester Holt
Mar. 20, 2020 – Another day at the WH.   Important TF meeting and press conference.
During the day, Gov. Cuomo had a press conference that he wanted me on to join him,
but I could not since I did not want to do a press conference outside of USG and the
WGH would not let me do it anyway.   Cuomo took a gigantic step forward.  90% of
the new infections in the USA are now coming from NYC and Westchecter, but mostly
NYC.   Cuomo is essentially shutting down all non-essential activity in the city..  100%
of non-essential workers must stay at home and not intermingle.  I strongly praised
Cuomo for doing this at the Presser after the TF.
We met with the POTUS (as usual) in the Oval.   The theme of the presser will be the fact
that we are now having only essential travel to Canada and Mexico, and
IMPORTANTLY, no aliean/immigrants can enter the countrywithout proper papers from
Canada or Mexico, although the order is clearly aimed at Mexico.   The rationale is that
we are shutting down entry to USA from China, South Korea, Iran, Europe and
UK/Ireland and yet people from these same countries are crossing over from Mexico.   If
some are infected and we take them in, we put them in facilities including with
unattended children, we could have another cruise ship situation.   The decision relly was
a public health decision.
LAST NIGHT, Katie and Steve miller called me up and explained why the CDC order to
do this was given (CDC was essentially told by state and DHS to do it).  They wanted my
support to emphasize that this was a pubic health decision and not an anti-immigrant
decision.   I believe that they have a good point.
During the presser, the reporters continued to ask me about the free distribution of
Hyrdoxycholorquine (HC) , which the POTUS wants, and my statements that the
evidence to do this is purely anecdotal and there is no convincing evidence by an RCT
that either HC ro remdesivir works.   After the presser the press went wild saying how I
again contradicted the POTUS and I received hundreds of e-ails of people thanking me,
even though I did not intend to or like the idea of contradicting POTUS, but I need to
stick with the science.  They also had a tweet that went viral of me holding me head
seemingly in disgust as the POTUS was talking.   That wa not my intention.
Most important part of the day and disturbing was my conversation with Mark Meadows
and Marc Short together with Deb Birx   Meadows praised me for a while and then got to
the point.   He wants me to consider the tone that I say that HC has no evidence of
efficacy.   I told him that I cannot compromise my scientific principles.   Tough
conversation.   He wa being a gentleman, but he wanted me to go to a place that I would
not go.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
729Even more disturbing was the conversation where he wanted me to support the idea of
lifting the mitigation restrictions after the 125 dya periods since if we do not do this,
Mark fees thatwe will trigger a depression (not just a recession).   Mark Short agreed with
him, but seemed much more sensitive to the fact that I did not want to get into that kind
of situation that would use my credibility to sell an economic and a political issue.   After
I left the office, Mark Meadows called my cell and said that afterhe looks at some
modelling, he would like to sit down with me and figure out how we can resolve this
issue.   He did ask me directy, if I thought we needed to extend the mitigation program
beyond 15 days and I said yes.   He seemed to accept that.   There certainly is more
ahead.   I called a meeting at my house with Cliff lane, Chrsitine and me to discuss how
to handle this as we go forward.   I cannot and will not compromise  acting on my good
judgment.   However, I can understand Marks dilemma with the economy.   There will be
more discuss.
Also, had conversation by phone with Governor John Bell Edwards of Louisiana who has
~400 cases in NOLA and wants my advice about how aggressive he should be and maybe
copy NYC.   He has already closed all the bars and restuarants.  I told him to look at the
inflection of the curve over the next day or so and contact his Commissione of Health.   It
the curve is steep, he should consider mandating only essential work and everyone else
stays homw, but not quite yet.
Also, Petrer Staley, Mark Harrington, James Krellenstein and others called late at night
and told me that they had a bad situation in NYC where the desire to do many tests was
eating up PPEs that were needed by HCWs who were taking care of COVID-19 patients.
The implored me to speak out that ony necessary testing should be done, i.e. on
hospitalized patient and those with sxs not in hospital, and not just anyone who wants a
test.   They sounded desparate that NYC would un out of PPEs within the next 7 days.   I
will bring this up to TF tomorrow.
PRESS:  CBS Evening News with Norah O’Donnell; FOX with Bill Hemmer;  WH
Press Conference; Major Washington Post Profile on me
May 21, 2020 – Global 234,100 – new 24,200; deaths 9800
Italy 3,400 deaths, now surpassed China
USA – 19,300; new 5300; deaths 272 (73 new)
At task force meeting I stressed the problem about the PPEs being diverting to testing as
opposed to HCWs.  I also emphasized this strongly at the subsequent press conference.
Again, we met with POTUS after the TF meeting and in preparation for the presser.
Very good press conference.
Big front page article abut me appeared in the Washington Post.   Very flattering.   The
situation with my national and international fame is explosive and really unimaginable.
It is not hyoperbole to say that today I am the most famous and talked about person in the
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
730country and one of the most recognizable peson in the world.   Countless profiles on me
in multiple media.  I cannot even read all the things that are written abuyt me since I am
so busy….seriously. POTUS seems to be enamored of me even though I am taking the
spotlight away from him.   We are developing a very unique and interesting relationship.
The entire secret service corps is coming over to me and chatting.   They let me into the
first gate without even checking ID.   Everyone is worried about my health and welfare,
probably because it is all over the place that I am almost 80 years old.
PRESS:  WH press conference picked up by many outlets.  Many print profiles and
features on me.   Ridiculous – too numeous to count!
Mar. 22, 2020 (Sunday)– Cases continue to soar. 30,000 in USA with 400 deaths;   Italy
still escalating.   My please to the TF regarding needing desparately to get PPEs and other
supplies to NYC seems to be working since FEMA in pusing stuff to them.
250,000 tests now done not counting those from hospitals and medical centers
Press is going wild with me.   Front page in Washintgton Post  yesterday and Op Ed by
Maureen Dowd in NY Times today about me and my relationship with the POTUS.
Profile by Peter Nicholas on me in The Atlantic .  I am trying in several articles and on TV
to clarify that the POTUS is tsalking about hope for therapies although there are no good
data, while I must stick to the science and so fundamentally we are approaching this from
different, but not conflicting standpoints.   The press are crucifying the POTUS for “not
listening to me and making crazy statements about “game-changing” therapies and
praising me fot stivking to my guns.
ORACLE (Larry Ellison – a bit of a loose cannon) .   Mark Meadows wants CDC, FDA
and me to help put together by 5:00 PM tomorrow an on line site for tracking availability
of drugs like Hyroxychloroquine and Remdesivir and making these drugs available via a
physician.   Bad idea, but it will happen.  I will go with this as long as it does not interfere
with the conduct of RCTs.   Cliff Lane helping out but employing NLM and NCATS
people.  I am giving him full authority since I have absolutely no extra time given what I
am doing already.
Also, Jared and Mark are very skeptical about the CDC modesl about the trajectory of the
outbreak and what can be predicted regarding timing of modification of the mitigation.
They want to see the data before they believe the models and get CDC out of the business
of doing this alone and making policy – good for them – it is about time.   I am getting
Cliff to get MIDAS people in on this.
Press conference  (I did not attend) after the virtual TF meeting.   POTUS went into detail
with very granular numbers of all the things USG (mostly FEMA) is doing regarding
sending masks, PPE, other equipment to high risk locations (Washingto State, CA, NYC,
etc.)   On TV programs, FEMA Pete Gaynor did not look good since he did not have any
idea how many ventilators and other equipment was available.  POTUS went on and on
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
731about all the things that we are doing. Very rambling and disorganized as he ad libs his
speech  I would have advised against this, since we are still getting calls that many
locations do not have enough of anything.   Also, they are talking about the now hundreds
of thousands of tests that are out there  and being done.   However,as I have always said,
testing for the sake of testing without  reason only consumes PPEs of the people
administering the tests.
Looking at the presser from home on computer has made it clear how self-congratulatory
the POTUS, VP and others appear on the stage.
Title 42 enacted – use of National Guard to help.
Role out of telemedicine without reguations so that people do not have to leave the house
to interact with their physician.
A lot of promises – I hope we can back them up.
PRESS:  CBS Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan; Multiple print features
May 23, 2020 – Global 292,000/12,800; new cases – 26,000;  USA 33,300/391;  new
cases 6800.  Cases in USA went up overnight by 20%.   Bad news.
Got copy of proposed POTUS press conference speech for this afternoon.   I objected
sharply to the ststament that the ORACLE system (see above) will be able to follow
every coronavirus patient in the country starting in 2 days (Wed).   This is logistically
impossible and I surely will clash with WH people, particularly Mark Meadows.   He is a
good guy, but wedded to this.
They are pushing to get HC out and we really need to do it under and IND and a protocol.
Much tension between me (also Steve Hahn, Cliff Lane) and the White House (Meadows
et al)
Apparently the WH is very upset that I am being profiled and it looks like I am putting
down the POTUS and becoming a star that outshines him.   The press is playing into this
as is the tweet storm.   Very stressful!!
Had improatnt and good meeting with Marc Short (VP- COS) and explained that 3 of the
5 profiles of me were without even interviewing me.   The others started as inteviews and
wound up as Profiles (Science – Jon Cohen, The New York Times - Maureen Dowd).  The
profiles always pit me (the good guy) against the POTUS (the bad guy).   I explained to
Mardc that I have no desire to conflict with, embarrass or show up the POTUS.  He
completely understood the situation that I was in and was very sympathetic.   I told him
that I would not do anymore profiles.
Very important meeting in the Oval Office with the POTUS, Deb Birx, Jared Kushner,
Mark Meadows, the VP and Marc Short about the timing of liftinbg the mitigation
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
732guidelines and telling people to come back to work since if we go much longer, the
economy will definitely will tank and more damage to health might occur not to mention
civil violence.   He wnted to lift everything by Easter Sunday (April 12).   I pushed back
heavily saying we need to model out how to do this in segments and not just declare
“Opening Day”.
POTUS at press conference has essentially said he is going to open up the country.   Did
not say when, but hinted it was a few weeks at most.  Getting calls at home from  many
people wanting tomknow what I think.   I am nit anwering most.   Spoke with Gov.
Cuomo who is concerned about me and the position I am in.   Also, spoke with Chris
Cuomo who feels the same.
Amazing firestorm about me on TV tonight with Chris Cuomo, Don Lemon and
others, wanting to know why I was not at the presser.   Chris is being wonderful about
saying that the press should not use Fauci as a foil against the POTUS.   We need Fauci
and we are putting him in a terrible position by pitting him against the POTUS.
PRESS: Several print profiles;   Mentioned all night on TV (see above)
Mar. 24, 2020 – 392,000/17,000; 45,000/550 in USA.  Cases still soaring in NYC.
COVID Cases
3.24.20 powerpoint
Incredible intrigue going on with people (likely WH staff) feeding total lies to media
about the frayed relstionship between me and the POTUS.  This is really bad stuff.   I am
getting calls from media (Reuters) saying that a source told them that the POTUS was
screaming at me and being abusive about the issue of HC treatments.   Total nonsense.
See below.   Typical of many aryicles over the past few days:
In order to save Dr. Fauci, we must
destroy him
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of
Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is a study of calm and
competence in the middle of a pandemic. Which makes
him an endangered species, working as he does for a
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
733boss who is notoriously insecure and made his name
shouting “You’re fired!” on a reality TV show.
By Kevin Cullen Globe Columnist,Updated March 23, 2020, 5:25 p.m.
209
Dr. Anthony
Fauci’s calm, reassuring competence in response to the coronavirus pandemic is placing
him at serious risk of hearing the words that made his boss famous: You’re fired.Jabin
Botsford/The Washington Post
Dr. Anthony Fauci  is a bum.
A quack, a snake oil salesman.
He got his degrees online, not from Holy Cross and Cornell .
He watches Wheel of Fortune but not Jeopardy.
He’s a Yankees fan.
Such character assassination is unsavory but necessary because Fauci’s calm, reassuring
competence in response to the coronavirus pandemic is placing him at serious risk of
hearing the words that made his boss famous: You’re fired.
President Trump is watching and listening to the same thing we are, i.e., Fauci going to
the podium to rebut with facts the latest outbreak of paranoid anxiety or the president’s
regularly reckless statements .
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
734Fauci is an oasis of rigor and reason in a barren desert of confusion and fear.
Which, given who he works for, makes him an endangered species.
During the Vietnam War, some US Army officer supposedly suggested that in order to
save a village from the Vietcong they had to destroy it.
And so, to save Dr. Fauci, we must destroy him — at least in Trump’s eyes.
Now that might sound crazy, but we’re dealing with a crazy president in crazy
circumstances.
It’s not as if there’s no relevant precedent here.
Two words: Bill Bratton.
Two other words: Rudy Giuliani. Who happens to be Trump’s BFF.
Before Giuliani grew old, deranged, and more qualified to be a spokesman for Miracle
Ear than the president’s lawyer, he was the reform-minded mayor of New York City.
Rudy rode into Dodge, which is what Times Square resembled at the time, and vowed to
clean it up. His hand-picked sheriff was Dorchester’s own Bill Bratton.
As police commissioner, Bratton did much to stem violent crime in the nation’s biggest
city, but even more remarkably got his cops to reduce the incidence of more minor, so-
called quality of life crimes that had made New York less livable, from the tony sections
of Manhattan to the Tony Fauci sections of Brooklyn.
Bratton did his job too well. He ended up on the cover of Time magazine, hailed as the
guy who pulled the worm out of the Big Apple. He became more popular than the mayor.
This drove Giuliani nuts. Rudy had to be the smartest guy in the room, had to get all the
credit. Sound familiar?
So Bratton had to go .
That wasn’t Bratton’s first rodeo. Long before he landed in New York, he became the
face of progressive, modern policing in his hometown, the youngest-ever Boston Police
superintendent. Police Commissioner Joe Jordan resented his overly-ambitious No. 2 so
he busted Bratton .
The point is, insecure bosses don’t like being shown up by smarter, more competent
subordinates. Small men make big mistakes.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
735It may be too late  to save Fauci. He just got the star treatment from Maureen Dowd
in The New York Times.
There used to be a thing called the Sports Illustrated curse, that after an athlete appeared
on its cover his or her career tanked.
Similarly, being in the Trump administration and getting praised by The New York
Times is the kiss of death.
Now, normally, you could print something in the Times and chances were the president
wouldn’t read it. He routinely dismisses the Gray Old Lady as fake news, except when
his and his family’s lousy books are mass-bought onto the newspaper’s bestsellers
list. He is not fond of polysyllabic words and prefers to get his news from “Fox &
Friends” or whatever white nationalist website  his aide Stephen Miller might
recommend.
But Trump reads Mo Dowd because they have known each other forever and she writes
about him at a nuanced, personal level that drives him especially cuckoo.
We’re way past the theoretical  here.
Tony Fauci is in real danger, and by extension so are the rest of us who expect — nay,
pray for — one person in the White House to be trustworthy and competent in a time of
unprecedented crisis.
So, again, repeat after me, Dr. Anthony Fauci is a bum.
Long live the bum.
Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at kevin.cullen@globe.com .
Search many other similar articles from today (Wash Post, etc.)
TF meeting today at 3:00.   Met with Joe Grogan and importantly with Jared Kushner
about the strategy to get Trump to be more flexible instead of sticking to his desire to lift
the mitigations by Easter Sunday.   Then met with Trump in the Oval.   As usual he was
wondeful to me, asking me most of the questions.   He fixed on easter and I pushed back
and said we need more data that we would get with testing to be able to inform policy
about mitigation.   He ent back and forth, but agreed.   He fixed on the increase in the
stock marhet by 2000 points (biggest increase in nistory); hweoevr, wew recently had the
biggest drop in history.   He also focuse on his approval rating for how he is handleing
the outbreak.   It is all polls, ratings, and image.   In some ways he is endearing, but he
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
736really is far from “Presidential”.   At the press conference, the reporters were glad that I
was there and “not fired or dead”.   Twitter fed still exploding about me.   I explained at
the presser that we need flexibility in the date about when to “open up”.   Easter is
“aspirational for the POTUS, but he is flexible in looking at all the data.   Good
conference.   No conflicts.   Keep getting calls from people wanting me to steer the
POTUS in one direction or another.   Gov. JB Pritzker (Illinois); Ken Langone of NYU,
Lindsey Graham, etc.
PRESS:  WMAL Radio; Chris Stigali Radio (Philly); FOX Laura Ingraham
Mar. 25, 2020 – 435,000/20,000; USA – 54,622/749.   On WHO weekly call.   China
removing restrictions – critical to watch this closely to determine what happens in light of
what POTUS is trying to do in reducing restrictions by Easter .   Giuseppe Ippolitto
reporting from Italy – major restrictions of non-essential industries.   Good control in
Central and Southern Italy.   Lombardy still very bad.  People moving from North to
South bringing cases to South.  Contact tracing impossible in major outbreak areas.
Deaths mostly in older (>60 yo) people.   From Italy – no evidence of bad effects of ACE
inhibitors on COVID-19, hence no need to change meds.   CHINA – in regions where
they have gone doen to no cases, they are seeing reintroductions from imported travel
cases.  Big problem.   Also, need to get infected people out of the homes since they are
secondarily infected the rest of the family → family clusters.  Discussed the issue of loss
of sense of smell as an early sign of COVID-19.
At TF meeting, Jared still throwing barbs at CDCbecause they did not nail down the
recommendations for returning critical infrastructure (CI) people to work after an
exposure where they did not kno if they were infected, but were asymptomatic.
Metagain with POTUS in Oval.   He really acting like he is very fond of me, always
deferring to me.   His staff definitiely notices this (Hope Hicks, Kellyanne Conway).  I
believe that the mole who does not like me is Alexa, the Comms person.   Hogan is OK.
Devin is getting better and Katie Miller is great (tough, smart,but great).   Interesdting
couple with Steve Miller.
At press conference, it went well as I fashion a new slant for each presser.   I apologized
to reporter Philip Wegmann for answering him sharply when he asked what I thought
about Tedros favoring the Chinese.  He wrote me a nice note afterwards.
Big issue from the appearance on CNN Cuomo Prime Time was when I answered the
question about the timeline to re-open the USG, I said “we do not determine the timeline,
the virus determines the timeline”.  That will not play well among some of the POTUS
staff.
PRESS:  Bob Rose Radio (Gainesville, FL); WABC Radio (NYC) Bernie and Sid
Show; CNN Cuomo Prime Time
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
737Mar. 26, 2020 – Global - 414,000/18,400; USA - 68,600/1000; NYC 20,000/280.
Continued pressure regrding POTUS aspitational goal of wanting to open up on Easter
Sunday.  Cases now coming into NIH with several staff infected.   Admissions to the
SCSU
Received another of now several calls from Gov. Andrew Cuomo wanting guidance on
interpreting the trend of new cases/day and what this means to predictions of where the
outbreak is going in NYC.   Had the usual good and warm/friendly conversation.   He and
Chris Cuomo are becoming friends.   Also, we discussed his and my relationship with
Trump.
CRAZY, CRAZY – donuts are being named after me; T shirts have my picture on them
and are being sold;  San Francisco radio is dedicating a song to me – Curtis Mayfield
singing “Keep on Pushing”; coloring pictures with crayons for my picture, face time with
Trevor Noah; Instagram with Steph Curry
Color me
Fauci.docx
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
738Steph Curry Had An Instagram Live
Chat With Dr. Fauci About Coronavirus
That Was Super Informative
Barack Obama and Justin Bieber posted some emojis.
Tasneem NashrullaBuzzFeed News Reporter
Posted on March 26, 2020, at 3:04 p.m. ET
•  Tweet
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
739•  Share
•  Copy
The journalists at BuzzFeed News are proud to bring you trustworthy and relevant
reporting about the coronavirus. To help keep this news free, become a
member and sign up for our newsletter, Outbreak Today.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
740Instagram: @https://www.instagram.com/stephencurry30/?hl=en
Thousands of people tuned in to NBA star Stephen Curry's Instagram live Q&A
with Dr. Anthony Fauci about the coronavirus on Thursday because 2020
continues to be surreal.
Mar. 27, 2020 – USA now has more cases than any country in the world
Global – 542,788/24361
To my surprise yesterday, the POTUS sent a letter to Governors outlining a plan to
reopen county by county while moniroring the spread of virus in the low risk
counties.   This was half-baked and never shown to Deb or I before it was sent out.
It was derived by Jared and Kevin Hassett (modeler) and I cannot see how it can
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
741be implemented.   I am surprised at Jared, who is usually very measured.   This is
reckless since it would require monitoring with much testing by CDC and they do
not even know about it.   Poor Bob Redfield is totally out of it.
IMPORTANT DAY – There has been a disconnect between what we in the TF
have been saying about the availability of PPE (particularly masks) and ventilators
and whether the people in the trenchs (ICUs) sare actually getting them.   We keep
saying that the equipmen is out there and the medical centers just need to get them
and the medical centrers are saying that they are trying to get them and either they
do not know how or the USG is outbidding them for the equipment.
I got on the phone via Cliff’s treatment guidelines committee that he is organizing
and listened to ICU docs from all over the country.  The are very fearful of
running out of PPEs within days to a weeks.  Ventilators are mostly a NYC issue;
they may fall behing and still there is this tension of Cuomo asking for 30,000
vents and USG (us) sayng that the vents are in the warehouses; they just need to
get them.  I promise the group I would try to fix this nonsense.
At the TF meeting, I took over and said we really have to stop this shit and fix this.
We are acting like these people have everything they need and the fact is they do
NOT.   I was very empnatic and the VP (good for him) listened.   We had FEMA
(Pete   ) and Adm Pete on the screen and the Adm acted like a rigis navy officer
saying thsat they did their job and got the vents and PPEs to the warehouse and
now it is up to the locals to get it distributed.   I essentially said that this is bullshit
and we need to communicate to them how they can actually get the material.   I
asked is it our job to just check our own boxes or are we trying to actually get the
job done in real life.   Clearly, Adm Pete is not happy with me, but so what!
Hope Hicks, Kellyanne Conway strongly agree with me as does Marc Short and
the VP.   The VP order to make this happen.   Also, the POTU finally invoked the
DPA to have GM make ventilators and we are stopping (via me) saying that NYC
has enough.   Just give them what they ask for and if it is overkill, they they can
return them and give to others.
Important discussion with  Deb Birx that I have some concern about.   She is using
a model from Chris Murray to plot out how to delay the POTUS from pulling the
plug for at least 2 weeks more.   Critical issue that I feel strongly about and
discussed with Cliff is that if we are going to lift restraints on certain areas, we
must have the capability of flooding the system with people to do identification,
isolation (out of the home) and contact tracing.   Otherwise, we will precipitate a
surge as is NYC, NOLA, and other locales.   Big discussion coming over the
weekend.
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
742POTUS signed $2.2 Trillion (uo to $6.2 trillion) relief package for the economy to
give aid to laid off workers and other vulnerables.   POTUS signed bill in the
OVAL and actually delayed the signing until I wsa called from the lower West
Wing lobby to be there for the signing.   When I entered the OVAL the POTUS
said, “Anthony, come here with us.   I cannot sign this without you being here”.
The entire crowd in the OVAL including several Senate (McConnell) and House
(McCarthy) leaders and Cabinet members present applauded me as I entered.
Very embarrassing.   I am not comfortable with this attention.   After the signinf,
the POTUS asked me and others to make comments before the many TV cameras
that were let into the OVAL
Very laborious press conference where the POTUS rambled on.  He wasted the
opportunity to just focus on the relief package and went inot his diatribe against
previous administrations.
SECURITY ISSUES – Threats on the “dark web” abainst me, Chris and the girls.
They know everything about us including where my daughters live and work.
Strange people hanging around my house and taking photos of the house.   DC
police now stationed at my house in addition to ISG agents with me all the time.
HHS is giving me heavy security with ISG agents (Lonetto et al) guarding me 24
hrs.   Agent George Adams assigned to me.
PRESS:  Bloomdaddy Radio Show – Pittsburgh; Morning News with Brian
Haldane Radio Baton Rouge – both right wing radio shows; Press in the
OVAl with the signing; some press at the Presser.
MAR. 28, 2020 (Saturday) – 509,000/23300; USA 104,200/1700; NYC –
26700/450.   Cases still escalating.  First day with full sceurity
Lindsey Graham trying to help.   Will go on TV and opush my message of holding
off the POTUS to pull the plug too soon.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker called with report of death of a 9 month old from COVID-19 in
Chicago.   Prtiztker concerned that this will generate panic in mothers throughout
the USA.   May be 1st infant in USA to die of COVID-10
The USNS Comfort taking off from Norfolk, VA to NYC to supply beds and
treatment for non-COVID-19 patients in order to free up on shore beds for
COVID.  Also, the USNS Mercy has already arrived in LA for same purpose
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
743The “swag” around me is getting really ridiculous.   You can but Fauci T-shirts,
mugs, donuts, sweat shirts, candles, pillows, etc.  Geeeez!!   I do not like this one
bit.
AMAZING interaction with POTUS.  Today Trump tweeted that he was considering
quarantining the NY tri-state area (NYC, NJ. CN).  This triggered a major news buzz.
Gov. Cuomo called me ; I was in my NIH office getting ready to do the Saturday TF
meeting from the NIH SCIF.  Cuomo asked me to help dissuade the POTUS since he
(Cuomo) would have to forcibly push back on this and would defy National Guard troops
sent to enforce the Q.
At the TF meeting we had major discussions lead by VP.   I helped convince people that
a quarantine was not tenable and that we should recommend to POTUS to do a “strong
travel advisory” that the governors would strongly support instead of having the Feds
enforce a quarantine.
I thought that I was finished for the night and would go home to an evening off when the
VP said I should come down to his office and we should, together with Deb, Chad Wolff,
Steve Mnuchin, Mark Meadows, Marc Short meet with the POTUS to tell him our
recommendation to announce tomorrow.
We met with the POTUS in the living quarters (not the OVAL) for about 1 hour.  I led
the discussions since the POTUS kept referring to me.   It was a disturbingly rambling
discussion since he kept talking about TV ratings, and HC, and influenza and virtually
everything else as I was trying to keep him on track (with the help of the VP).
Finally, we got him to agree to “travel advisory” and not quarantine.   We wanted to
announce tomorrow, but he wanted to tweet this tonight.   He also said he wanted to get
the Governors on board and so he wanted to call Gov Cuomo (NY), Gov Murphy (NJ),
Gov. Ned Lamont (CN).   And so, we adjourned to the Lincoln Study and finalized the
language for the Advisory right at the Lincoln desk where the Emancipation
Proclamation was signed.   I kept insisting that they do not slip and let the CDC (from
whom the Advisory must come) to use their words of “DO NOT TRAVEL”.   Also, I
insisted through the rambling and lack of attention span that the POTUS explicitly say
that this is NOT a quarantine.   Finally, he individually called the 3 Governors starting off
by saying “I am here with Tony and a few other people…..”   Cuomo was OK but
questioned to be explicit as to just what “Advisory” meant.   We go it straightened out
and before he went to the other Govs, he called up Sean Hannity to schmooze about TV
ratings (I am not kidding).   Finally, he got to the other Governors and we stopped for the
nigh.   Marc Short will work with CDC to get the right language out and the POTUS will
tweet this later.
I texted Cuomo saying that I had pushed back and we had avoided the quarantine.  He
responded: “I know that.   It wasn’t his conscience.   He would have made a terrible
mistake for the nation.   I would have had to organize the Governors to rebel.   Last thing
we need.  Thank you….on behalf of all of us.”
WHAT A NIGHT!!!
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
744PRESS:  Desus and Mero Showtime TV;
Mar. 29, 2020 (SUNDAY) – Cases continue to soar.   BIG DAY AT WHITE
HOUSE    Spent several hours with the POTUS.   Bottom line.  Deb and I pushed
hard to have the POTUS extend the 15 day guidelines for another 30 days to end
of April even though Mark Meadows and Kevin Hassett were against this. They
wanted to just go to 15 days extra and then re-evaluate.   We pushed and said that
we would leave to the POTUS.
We met with the POTUS in OVAL and Deb and I presented the case for 30 days.
He accepted that right away (he really trusts me very much).   He decided that he
did not want to wait three days to Tuesday to announce and so we Chaotically and
quickly wrote into his speech the announcement that it would be 30 days.  We had
a press conference in the Rose Garden (RG) and he called several times of me and
Deb to explain the rationale behind the decision.   It was another of the painfully
rambling press conferences that lasted on a beautiful evening the RG for 2 hours.
POTUS kept on mentioning the potential 1.5 to 2.0 million deaths in the USA due
to Coronavirus, which is actually the worst case scenario of a flawed model;
however, he felt that if he keeps mentioning that, then the people will take what
we are saying seriously.   He is incorrigible.   At the end of the day it was a good
outcome since we convinced him to go with 30 day instead of ending the
mitigation prematurely, which I feel would be a disaster.   At the presser, I
emphasized that we must pay attention to the cities/states/areas with relatively few
cases since they could explode just like NYC and NOLA and other cities.
CRAZY PRESS – the fringe far-right crazies are cooking conspiracy theories that
I am a Hilary Clinton mole trying to destroy Trump. See NY Times – Sunday
March 29, 2020 “Chief Scientist Draw Venom From the Right” by Davey Alba
and Sheera Frankel.  Also, article in NY Times on “Testing Blunders….” By
Michael Shear et al.
GOOD ARTICLE: March 29, 2020 article by Jenny Jarvie
AIDS crisis shaped Anthony Fauci, disease expert at front lines of
coronavirus pandemic
Los Angeles Times
You're making me feel guilty,” President George W. Bush said in 2008 when he awarded Fauci , the
longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy ...
Flag as irrelevant
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
745Great areticle in WSJ by Ben Cohen – March 29, 2020: WSJ: Dr. Fauci Was a
Basketball Captain. Now He’s America’s Point Guard.
https://on.wsj.com/33TOug3
PRESS:  CNN State of the Union with Jake Tapper; big exposure at Rose
Garden press Conference after announcing the 30 day extension of guidelines
for mitigation.
Mar. 30, 2020 – Cses still soaring.  Spent another entire day at the WH.   Met with
the POTUS and had Press conference in Rose Garden.   Today most attention o
CEOs and companies coming to indicte that they would help in any way.
Discussion at theTF meeting about Ad Bax (I brought it up) and the issue of
aerosol merely by speaking and whether we should now seriously think about
recommending that everyone wear a mask.   More to come.   Also, I am
continuing to push that we onnect the dots about how we are going to handle the
inevitable flares that we will soon see in other smaller cities.   There needfs to be
the capasbility of testing, identification, isolations and contact tracing.   No one
seems to be in charge. CDC is their usual lack of stepping up.  I love Bob
Redfield, but he relly is not the right perdon for this job and this time.   Joe Grogan
trying to get things organized in this regard.
PRESS: ABC Good Morning America with George Stephanopoulos; CNN
New Day; Rose Garden Press Conference
Mar. 31, 2020 – Perhaps some early indication of leveling of new admissions in
NYC.   Careful.
Complete craziness with this Fauci cult hero stuff.   See below in Washington Post
today:
Fauci socks, Fauci doughnuts, Fauci fan
art: The coronavirus expert attracts a cult
following
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
746Doughnuts bearing the likeness of Anthony S.
Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, rest on a plate
at Donuts Delite in Rochester, N.Y., on March 25. (Shawn Dowd/Rochester Democrat &
Chronicle/AP)
By
Antonia Noori Farzan
March 31, 2020 at 5:15 a.m. EDT
Early last week, Nick Semeraro wanted to find a way to honor Anthony S. Fauci. As the
owner of a small doughnut shop in Rochester, N.Y., he had been closely tracking the
latest news about the coronavirus pandemic. And night after night, he’d been impressed
by how Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases,
approached the crisis in a calm, knowledgeable manner.
So, as a tribute, Semeraro put the renowned immunologist’s face on a doughnut.
Expecting to sell a few hundred, he was shocked when the store sold out day after day,
with thousands flying off the shelves. Donuts Delite was besieged with requests to ship
the buttercream-frosted creations all over the country, and one Fauci fan drove three
hours just to pick up a dozen. Soon, bakeries in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania  followed
suit, using edible paper to decorate pastries with Fauci’s likeness.
“We had no idea it was going to blow up this big,” Semeraro told CNN. “We didn’t know
everyone else felt the same way we did.”
While Fauci was already a respected scientist before the outbreak, his appearances during
White House press briefings have made him a household name and an unlikely celebrity.
With his straightforward demeanor and willingness to contradict President Trump, he’s
begun to develop the same kind of cult following as Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg and former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, who inspired countless
“Plank like RBG” tank tops  and a bizarre illustrated children’s book, respectively.
Even as whole swaths of the global economy collapse, the pandemic has created a robust
cottage industry of Fauci-themed merchandise, including bottle openers, magnets and
mugs. On Etsy, you can buy “Honk for Dr. Fauci” bumper stickers, prayer candles
depicting “St. Fauci” and socks printed with Fauci’s face. Graphic T-shirts bear slogans
such as “I Need a Hero”  and “In Dr. Fauci We Trust.”
Released by Chairman Rand Paul
747If so inclined, you can even decorate your home with an “I Heart Dr. Fauci” throw
pillow , or purchase a replica of Fauci’s jersey from the time he captained the basketball
team at Manhattan’s Regis High School. Lingua Franca, which sells cashmere sweaters
embroidered with resistance-friendly slogans for $380 and up, recently began taking
orders for an army-green “Dr. Fauci Fan Club” knit.
In honor of Fauci’s Italian heritage, a clam bar in Long Island named  a linguine dish after
him this week. (Available for pickup only, “the linguine with white clam sauce shares
origins with Fauci, as the sauce itself was invented in the Fauci Family’s native Sciacca,
Italy,” the restaurant claimed in a statement.)
As countless Americans remain glued to the news while trying to stay indoors, a robust
Fauci fandom has flourished online. On Facebook, the “Dr. Anthony S. Fauci Fan Club”
has over 32,000 members. Thousands more congregate in groups with names such as
“Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the Man, the Myth, the Legend,” “Dr. Fauci Speaks, We Listen”
and “Dr. Fauci Memes for Social Distance Teens.”
An unassuming 79-year-old public servant who has advised six presidents, Fauci has
become  a “reliable

Summary:
Sen. Rand Paul's 24 July 2026 release of Anthony Fauci's personal diary entries (December 2019 - December 2022), obtained through the HSGAC oversight process and presented alongside his contemporaneous public statements. Released ahead of Fauci's subpoenaed testimony before HSGAC on 29 July 2026.

Excerpt: 670while being filmed.   Also, Jenny was worried about the anxiety this might cause Megan.    It all worked out well as they were individually interviewed by Janet 1-on-1.  Janet was  terrific.   I am starting to collect Cacti in my home office.  Dec. 30, 2019 – Over the years I have helped Dionne Warwick to find physicians for  herself and her colleagues.   I have done this sometimes through as intermediary, Guy  Draper, who is well-known sould song wsriter and agent for many groups .   Guy  called me up today and asked for a referral for a peripheral vascular physician at Hopkins  for one of Dionne’s friends.   I recommended in Medicine Dr. Elizabeth Virginia  Ratchford and in Surgery Dr. James Hamilton Black.   Also, Guy wanted me to put on  my calendar for June 13, 2020 a ceremony at…