Dr. Anthony Fauci, who led the U.S. response to the Covid-19 pandemic, privately complained about President Donald Trump’s ramblings — and compared him to an “obnoxious adolescent” — in personal diary entries released this weekend.
More than a thousand pages of Fauci’s journal were released by Sen. Rand Paul, who heads the Senate Homeland Security Committee. As part of an investigation into the origins of Covid-19, Paul has called on Fauci to testify on the pandemic before the committee Wednesday. The Kentucky Republican has long peddled the theory that the virus came from a leak at a lab in Wuhan, China, accusing Fauci and other government officials of misleading the public about its source — claims Fauci has denied.
The journal entries date from December 2019, in the lead-up to the outbreak, to December 2022, when Fauci stepped down as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. The diary entries provide insight into the pandemic’s most critical moments, and lawmakers are expected to probe Fauci on Wednesday about what he knew and didn’t know as the pandemic was unfolding.
While some of Fauci’s entries reflect early uncertainty about the source of the virus, others delve into his newfound fame — having become the public face of the pandemic in the U.S. — as well as his fickle relationship with the president.
The Independent has contacted Fauci and the White House for comment.
Fauci’s tumultuous relationship with Trump
During the first year of the pandemic, Fauci wrote about working with Trump on the pandemic’s response, with many of his entries detailing his efforts to counteract the president’s persistent downplaying of the pandemic.
Fauci spoke positively about meeting Trump for the first time on January 29, 2020, in the Situation Room.
During the meeting, Trump told Fauci, “Anthony, you are really a famous guy. My good friend Lou Dobbs told me that you were one of the smartest, knowledgeable and outstanding persons he knows,” Fauci wrote.
“He then stayed for 20 minutes and asked most of his questions of me. I was surprised and very pleased and the deputies were clearly stunned and impressed,” Fauci wrote, later adding that Trump thanked him after the meeting, telling him, “We are counting on you.”
Fauci also vented about Trump’s “rambling,” in numerous entries, writing on March 27, 2020, “Very laborious press conference where the POTUS rambled on. He wasted the opportunity to just focus on the relief package and went into his diatribe against previous administrations.” A day later, he called a discussion with Trump a “disturbingly rambling discussion.”
While Fauci frequently wrote about his positive interactions with Trump, during the summer of 2020, he began to write about how the media was “making an open conflict between me and Trump,” alluding to his frequent urging of the president to stop downplaying the outbreak.
On July 15, 2020, Trump called Fauci and “started off by saying that this tension of me versus him is terrible and needs to stop. He ‘loves’ me and knows we have a very special relationship and have bonded right away from the beginning.”
Fauci continued, “He then started to talk to me about how bad or not things were. He wanted me to be ‘positive.’ I took the opportunity to say, ‘Mr. President, with your permission, can I be absolutely frank with you? We have a problem and we need to own it. We need to admit that the situation is serious, otherwise we completely lose credibility. We should own the problem and then emphasize how we are going to fix it as opposed to denying the problem.”
“He was not entirely happy with this but said that he understood the point that I was making,” Fauci added. “It was a very good conversation.”
However, on August 4, 2020, Fauci wrote that he had to explain to Trump that increased testing did not cause more Covid cases.
“All in all it was a manifestation that he is desperate and still does not understand the pandemic. Very interesting encounter,” Fauci wrote.
In an October 24, 2020 entry, Fauci wrote that Trump “keeps saying that we are ‘turning the corner’ and this will be under control very soon. Press pitting this against what I and other credible scientists are saying.’”
Then, on November 1, 2020, after the Washington Post published an article where Fauci said Joe Biden’s campaign was “taking it seriously from a public health perspective,” while Trump was looking at the outbreak from the perspective of “the economy and reopening the country,” Trump called Fauci and “did his usual rambling,” Fauci wrote.
“Tony, I really like you, and you know that, but what the f*** are you doing? You constantly drop bombs on me. Everybody wants me to fire you, but I am not going to fire you, you have too illustrious of a career, but you have to be positive,” Trump said, according to Fauci.
“I like you but so many people, not only in the White House, but throughout the country hate you because of what you are doing…And that f***er Biden. He is so f***ing stupid. You are 10 times smarter than he is. I am going to kick his f***ing ass in this election. I will win by a landslide. Just wait and see. … Tony, you have to be positive. I do not want to keep you off TV, but when you are out there, you have to be positive.”
In a March 29, 2021 entry, Fauci called Trump an “obnoxious adolescent.”
Wuhan lab-leak theory
Ahead of Fauci’s hearing on Wednesday, Paul has narrowed in on diary entries addressing a theory that Covid originated from a lab in Wuhan. Paul has long pushed the viral theory, and has accused Fauci and other government officials of misleading the public about the outbreak’s origins.
Fauci has denied Paul’s claims, and his diary entries reflect this.
In April 2021, Fauci wrote that members of the “radical right wing” like Paul, were trying to “connect me with the virus from WUHAN,” adding that, “They are saying that I deliberately worked with the Chinese together with [zoologist] Peter Daszak to create a virus that would be released to the world. This sounds very much like a way-out conspiracy theory, which it is. However, there are enough crazy people around to make this a problem.”
A month later, Fauci wrote about how the conspiracy theory was spreading again, noting that it was brought on by “the usual cast of characters.”
Fauci skyrocketing to international fame
As Fauci became the face of the pandemic response in the U.S., his entries often grappled with — and sometimes reveled in — his newfound fame.
“For better or worse, I am becoming an international celebrity. Calls from all over the world,” he wrote on March 10, 2020.
Several days later, he wrote, “WH press conference picked up by many outlets. Many print profiles and features on me. Ridiculous — too numerous to count! … Press is going wild with me.”
Three days later, he noted the White House was “upset” that he was being profiled and that “it looks like I am putting down the POTUS and becoming a star that outshines him,” describing the situation as “Very stressful!!”
Later entries note merchandise with his face on it, and his interactions with celebrities such as Julia Roberts, Joan Baez and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
In May 2020, Fauci wrote: “The situation with my national and international fame is explosive and really unimaginable. It is not hyperbole to say that I am the most famous and talked about person in the country and one of the most recognizable people in the world.”
“POTUS seems to be enamored of me even though I am taking the spotlight away from him,” he later added.
Security issues and threats against Fauci and his family
As his fame grew, Fauci wrote of security threats to his family.
“SECURITY ISSUES — Threats on the ‘dark web’ against me, Chris and the girls. They know everything about us including where my daughters live and work. Strange people hanging around my house and taking photos of the house,” he wrote on March 27, 2020.
In one of his last entries, dated in December 2022, Fauci noted that he was still “trying to work out my protection post Jan 1” but that it was “clear that the far, extreme right and Qanon literally hate me.”
Trump ended Fauci’s security detail, despite ongoing threats to him and his family, in late January 2025, after starting his second term as president.
