Last updated on June 6th, 2021 at 03:12 am
Representative Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) targeted Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading expert on infectious diseases, claiming that he “betrayed” America to get former President Donald Trump out of office. How? She did not say––she merely contributed to the number of baseless claims that has turned a public health emergency into an exercise in political polarization.
“Anthony Fauci, whom I refuse to refer to as ‘doctor,’ betrayed America to help Democrats get Trump out of office,” she wrote.
“For that crime alone, no penalty is stiff enough,” she added.
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Anthony Fauci, whom I refuse to refer to as “doctorâ€, betrayed America to help Democrats get Trump out of office.
For that crime alone, no penalty is stiff enough.#FireFauci
— Lauren Boebert (@laurenboebert) June 3, 2021
Boebert has repeatedly claimed that Fauci lied about the pandemic’s origins and has, along with Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) led a campaign to fire him. Greene, for her part, once introduced a “Fire Fauci Act,” legislation that would reduce Fauci’s salary to $0.
Both women have asserted that the coronavirus, the virus that causes Covid-19, was created in a lab in Wuhan, China.
“A draft study associated with a group founded by former Trump adviser Steve Bannon is giving new life to social media claims that the coronavirus was manufactured intentionally in a Chinese lab,†the Associated Press reported last year after conducting a fact check.
“The four authors list their affiliation as the Rule of Law Society, a group founded by Bannon that says its mission is ‘to expose corruption, obstruction, illegality, brutality, false imprisonment, excessive sentencing, harassment, and inhumanity pervasive in the political, legal, business and financial systems of China.’ It is not a scientific organization,†the outlet added, noting that the conspiracy theory continues to thrive.
Boebert also fails to account for the Trump administration’s pandemic response, which repeatedly downplayed the severity of Covid-19 and caused cases to skyrocket nationwide. More than 595,000 people in the United States have died of Covid-19 since the pandemic began, according to data from Johns Hopkins University of Medicine.
Alan is a writer, editor, and news junkie based in New York.
