2026-07-273brief

Fauci’s diary goes public

Rand Paul (Sen-R Kentucky) released 1,141 pages of Anthony Fauci’s pandemic-era diary ahead of Fauci’s Senate testimony Wednesday on the origins of the coronavirus. Early entries show Fauci closely tracking his sudden celebrity and describing some of the intense press attention as “flattering.”

In the thread accompanying the release, Paul highlighted Fauci’s Feb. 1, 2020 note on a 12-scientist call: two participants concluded the virus had a natural origin, while, in Fauci’s words, “the rest felt that deliberate insertion was possible.” Paul argues that the entry undercuts later portrayals of the early scientific discussion; the diary records the discussion, not a settled finding about the virus’s origin.