Making an appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience Tuesday, Sen. Rand Paul (R–Ky.) expressed his frustration that the Trump administration has failed to refer Anthony Fauci for criminal prosecution for lying to Congress.
Paul told Rogan that he believes Fauci’s blanket pardon—issued by former President Joe Biden during the waning hours of his presidency—should be challenged in court. Paul said he has provided Attorney General Pam Bondi with evidence that Fauci misled Congress about gain-of-function research and also instructed his deputies to destroy public records in order to stymie scrutiny.
“I’ve summarized it again in a criminal referral to Trump’s attorney general, and I still haven’t gotten action,” said Paul. “They ought to take it to court.”
Senator Rand Paul just revealed to Joe Rogan that the Trump DOJ won’t investigate Anthony Fauci.
“Under the Biden administration, I sent criminal referrals for Anthony Fauci to Merrick Garland twice, and I sent them evidence that he had lied to Congress, which is a felony.”… pic.twitter.com/7MBbYDI16F
— End Tribalism in Politics (@EndTribalism) January 13, 2026
Paul insisted that he couldn’t guarantee victory in court, given the sweeping nature of the pardon issued to Fauci. But he thought it was worth doing in order to see if the Supreme Court might narrow the pardon.
Reason‘s Christian Britschgi has argued that Fauci’s statements to Congress about whether the agency he oversaw funded high-risk gain-of-function research that could have caused the COVID-19 pandemic were certainly misleading. Moreover, the timeline of the Fauci pardon is quite suspicious, since it covers the period of time during which Fauci plausibly signed off on gain-of-function research despite a presidential executive order mandating a pause on such funding. The pardon window does not cover just his time as the nation’s top coronavirus adviser, nor does it extend to his entire career in government service: It dates to 2014, when President Barack Obama halted gain-of-function research.
Paul and Rogan also recapped many of the erroneous policies recommended by Fauci during the pandemic: made-up social distancing guidelines, mask mandate flip-flops, and vaccine requirements.
It’s always refreshing to see libertarian views being represented on such an important platform. And given President Donald Trump’s misguided zeal to enlist his Justice Department to investigate various political enemies for dubious reasons—James Comey, Letitia James, Jerome Powell, and others—it’s disappointing that the DOJ isn’t contemplating action against Fauci, who is a much more deserving target.
Maybe Bondi just has her hands full drawing black lines all over the Epstein files.
