Anthony Fauci has highlighted how “painful” disagreements with former President Donald Trump have been for him over policy in the face of the coronavirus pandemic and led him to be “the object of anger” from the right.
Speaking Thursday on MSNBC, the president’s former lead medical adviser, who was the face of the government’s reaction to the pandemic, said he feared for his life and said he now has a private security service.
Reacting to a clip of Florida Gov. and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis telling a crowd in 2022 that “somebody has to grab this little goblin and throw him across the Potomac,” the prominent immunologist said comments like that “trigger” other people “who are bad and I need to hurt other people.
While in the workplace at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Fauci seemed to disagree with Trump over his public posts. In March 2020, after the former president advised that hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malaria drug, could save infection by the virus, Fauci refuted that claim to reporters, calling the evidence “anecdotal. “
A month later, after the former leading medical adviser, who renounced his public involvement last year, made a grim assessment of the COVID outbreak in the United States, the Trump White House questioned the accuracy of Fauci’s predictions.
“I was the one who had to do it – in an awkward way; I’m not satisfied with that; I’m not satisfied with doing it — that I had to publicly disagree with the president of the United States,” Fauci said Thursday. It’s been very painful for me because I have a lot of respect for the presidency of the United States.
“But I felt that, in order to maintain my personal and professional integrity and my duty to the American public, I had to tell it as it is and I had to do it publicly. “
The immunologist added that his disagreements with the president “provoked some negativity towards me from the extreme right” and that it temporarily made him a “symbol” and “object of anger. “
In a new interview with me, Dr. Anthony Fauci says that Ron DeSantis “provokes other people who are evil and need to hurt him and others; other “crazy” people. Ron DeSantis asked for someone to “grab this little elf and throw him out. “through the Potomac. pic. twitter. com/WJUim2zxBU
This isn’t the first time Fauci has spoken out about the rhetoric leveled against him. In March, amid accusations of covering up the true origins of the pandemic, some possibly caused by a lab leak in China, Fauci called the attacks “politically motivated” through Republican politicians.
At the time, a Trump spokesman described him as “a liar and a con man. “
More recently, Fauci sparked outrage after appearing to admit there wasn’t enough evidence to show that wearing a mask prevented the spread of the virus at the population level, amid fears that pandemic-era policies would be reinstated due to the accumulation of cases. .
Asked to respond to DeSantis’ comments, the former lead medical adviser said he believes Florida’s governor “doesn’t intend to hurt me,” but added, “When they say something like that, you have someone who doesn’t know. “anything about me that’s crazy [that] says, “Wow, I’m going to catch this user” or “this user will be killed” or “this user will be prosecuted. “And that’s why I have to be safe. “
Fauci has said several times since 2020 that he, his wife and children have been subjected to death threats and abuse. In May 2022, a West Virginia man pleaded guilty to emailing death threats to him and other top fitness officials, adding that Fauci and his circle of family would be “dragged into the streets, beaten to death and set on fire. “
Thomas Patrick Connally Jr. , 56, sentenced to more than 3 years of criminal sentence last August.
Newsweek reached out Friday with Fauci and DeSantis’ workplace email for comment.
Aleks Phillips is an American journalist for Newsweek based in London. It focuses on American politics and the environment. He has extensively covered climate change, as well as fitness care and crime. Aleks joined Newsweek in 2023 from the Daily Express and in the past worked for Chemist and Druggist and the Jewish Chronicle. Se graduated from Cambridge University.
You can reach Aleks by sending an email to aleks. phillips@newsweek. com.