Sen. Rand Paul wrote a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi on Monday requesting that the Department of Justice investigate Dr. Anthony Fauci for potential criminal prosecution regarding Fauci’s congressional testimony in May 2021 about gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Fauci is the former Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a lead member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force under President Donald Trump during his first administration, and chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden. Fauci played an integral role in the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic during the Trump and Biden administrations.

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“In July 2023, I referred Dr. Anthony Fauci to the Department of Justice for lying under oath to Congress. His own emails directly contradicted his sworn testimony,” Paul said in a press release. “The New York Times reports Fauci was quietly pardoned by an autopen, operated by Biden’s staff. If the President didn’t authorize this pardon personally, then the Department has a duty to investigate and prosecute as it would any ordinary citizen. Fauci has been sainted by the extremist Left, but it doesn’t erase his lying before Congress.”

This is Paul’s second time referring Fauci for a criminal referral. Both involve his previous congressional testimony. This referral, however, concerns the preemptive presidential pardon Fauci received from President Joe Biden in Jan. 2025, amid the recent discovery that Biden may not have directly authorized the pardon.

“I write to renew my previous requests for the Department of Justice (DOJ) to open an investigation into former Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Anthony Fauci’s testimony before the United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions on May 11, 2021,” Paul wrote in his letter to Bondi. “This most recent request stems from new allegations that call into question the validity of Dr. Fauci’s purported pardon.”

Paul acknowledged the recent reports that questioned the legitimacy of the pardon.

“However, new information has revealed that these pardons were executed via autopen, with no documented confirmation that the President personally reviewed or approved each individual grant of clemency,” Paul wrote. “According to reports, White House staff authorized the use of the autopen to issue the clemency documents.”

“This raises serious constitutional and legal concerns about the legitimacy of Dr. Fauci’s pardon,” Paul added.