As Dr. Anthony Fauci prepares to leaves his job at the end year, he swung by MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports for softball interview that mostly consisted of Mitchell asking how horrible he believes his critics to be.
First on the list of critics was Elon Musk, “Here you are after this storied career, about to step down. From this position as you go on to new adventures and Elon Musk tweets out his pronouns are ‘prosecute/Fauci.’ So he's describing you as a criminal. Who should be prosecuted. And how do you feel when someone with that big a megaphone labels you a criminal?”
For as much as Fauci tried to argue he doesn’t pay attention to Twitter, he couldn’t help but take a shot at Musk’s vision for Twitter, “the Twittersphere as it is has really gone berserk lately. It's going to become almost a cesspool of misinformation.”
Moving right along, Mitchell read a tweet from former CIA Director John Brennan defending Fauci and afterwards opened the floor back up to Fauci, “The real impact of the public hate and the divisions. The politicization of public health is really something that you've had to deal with.”
Fauci responded by lamenting that the current environment may cause young people to turn away from a career in public health and, “it really is, I believe Andrea, a manifestation of the profound divisiveness which we have in our society right now and the politicization of science which leads to absurd statements like that.”
Instead, she repeatedly asked how bad former President Donald Trump was, “How difficult is it for you when you hear him saying things that you know are not accurate? About public health?”
Mitchell also wondered about his critics more generally, “Do you think that lives were lost because of the way all of this became so polarized?”
After lamenting that his response would get blown out of proportion, Fauci mentioned not just vaccines, but masks and social distancing as being good public health principles that people objected to.
When Mitchell followed up by asking if there was anything he could have done differently to avoid this, Fauci declared he could not stop the politicization, but maybe could’ve explained things better, mainly that over time, he and others did not flip-flop, but simply learned more information.
Instead of challenging Fauci on what even the liberals at Slate called his “noble lies,” Mitchell went to commercial. After the break, the closest Mitchell came to a tough question was asking about what he learned about school closures. Fauci danced around the question and not provide a direct answer and Mitchell did not press for an answer.
These segments were sponsored by The Farmer’s Dog.
Here is a transcript for the December 13 show:
MSNBC Andrea Mitchell Reports
12/13/2022
12:30 PM ET
ANDREA MITCHELL: Here you are after this storied career, about to step down. From this position as you go on to new adventures and Elon Musk tweets out his pronouns are “prosecute/Fauci.” So he's describing you as a criminal.
ANTHONY FAUCI: Yeah.
MITCHELL: Who should be prosecuted. And how do you feel when someone with that big a megaphone—
FAUCI: Yeah.
MITCHELL: -- labels you a criminal?
FAUCI: Well, to be honest, with you Andrea, I don't pay attention to that. Yeah, he has a big megaphone, but, I mean, the Twittersphere as it is has really gone berserk lately. It's going to become almost a cesspool of misinformation. So I don't -- not even sure what he said. But I don't pay attention. I don't have a Twitter account. I don't tweet and I don't listen to tweets. So whatever he said, I'm not paying attention to it.
MITCHELL: You had plenty of defenders. John Brennan, the former CIA director says, “Dr. Fauci is a national hero. Who will be remembered for generations to come for his innate goodness and many contributions to public health. Despite your business success” — he said to Elon Musk— “you will be remembered for fueling public hate and divisions.”
FAUCI: Right.
MITCHELL: The real impact of the public hate and the divisions. The politicization of public health.
FAUCI: That’s bad.
MITCHELL: Is really something—
FAUCI: Yeah.
MITCHELL: -- that you've had to deal with.
FAUCI: Well, I've had to deal with them and even though I don't listen to or bother with those strange, bizarre tweets like prosecute me for what? I don't know what he's thinking.
What it does is it-- it really is -- turns people away, I'm afraid younger individuals for who are interested in getting into public health might say what is all this about where officials who are doing nothing more or less than trying to save people’s lives by promoting and public health principles get attacked for reasons that seem inexplicable.
So, it really is, I believe Andrea, a manifestation of the profound divisiveness which we have in our society right now and the politicization of science which leads to absurd statements like that.
