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Fauci previously praised his own ‘personal ethics’ in explaining why he doesn’t practice Catholicism anymore
Dr. Anthony Fauci’s requests for federal grant recipients to nominate him for cash prizes is both “unlawful” and “unethical,” according to a Rutgers University expert.
New documents released by Senator Rand Paul detail Fauci’s “side hustle,” which include winning millions of dollars in cash prizes. Fauci would solicit his allies who also received federal funding from the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases to nominate him for prizes.
Some of the solicitations occurred during the nationwide COVID lockdowns that were created at the prompting of Fauci.
He also instructed federal staffers to work for him to find prizes and manage the application process, including one that netted him $900,000.
Sen. Paul highlighted how Fauci asked Dr. Barton Haynes, director of the Duke Human Vaccine Institute, about a nomination for the Shaw Prize. Haynes responded to Fauci’s request writing “You bet!!! Let’s do it.”
The revelations drew criticism from Rutgers biologist Richard Ebright.
“Fauci used his position in the federal bureaucracy to operate an apparent unethical and unlawful pay-to-play scheme,” Ebright wrote in an email to The College Fix.
“Fauci had final approval authority for all NIAID extramural research grants. In particular, Fauci had final approval authority–including full authority to ignore or overrule priority scores from external peer reviewers–on the very large, tens of millions of dollars each, grants known as ‘center grants’ and ‘program project grants,’” Ebright explained.
The money that went to Fauci’s friends “came from US taxpayers, and those $1.2 billion dollars reek of pay-to-play.”
Ebright called for the Department of Health and Human Services to “investigate Fauci’s apparent pay-to-play scheme” and “claw back” both the “cash prizes” and “improperly awarded grants” if the allegations from Senator Paul are confirmed.
He said federal bureaucrats should not be able to win cash prizes by “soliciting nominations and letters of support from grantees.”
Fauci and Haynes did not respond to two emails sent in the past week asking for comment on the report and concerns about a quid pro quo arrangement. He also pleaded the 5th during a Congressional hearing when asked about the revelations and in response to all questions.
A political theorist and economist at Loyola University of New Orleans also criticized the arrangement in comments sent to The Fix.
Professor Walter Block criticized Fauci for using government employees to solicit prizes on his behalf.
“It is one thing to get an award from X while being paid full time by Y. That’s ok. Heck, I myself have received awards from people other than my employer, and I’m employed full time,” Block told The Fix. “But, it is quite different to use other employees for this purpose.”
Block instead describes Fauci’s actions as “stealing from the employer. It is even improper for Fauci himself to seek awards, on company time. That, too, is stealing from his employer.”
Government employees should not be allowed to seek prizes “on company time, nor ask other employees to do so,” Block said.
Fauci has previously touted his own “ethics,” in explaining why he no longer is a practicing Catholic.
“First of all, I think my own personal ethics in life are enough to keep me going on the right path,” he told a BBC interviewer in 2023. “And I think that there are enough negative aspects about the organizational church, that you are very well aware of.”
“But as far as practicing it, it seems almost like a pro forma thing that I don’t really need to do.”
MORE: Fauci holds several ‘professor’ titles at Georgetown, but never teaches
