President Donald Trump has terminated Dr. Anthony Fauci’s taxpayer-funded security detail less than a week after President Joe Biden have him a preemptive pardon.
CNN reported Friday on the latest move by Trump to punish his political enemies.
Fauci – the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases – has since hired a private security firm, the network said.
The longtime infectious disease expert has taken much of the blame for the unpopular lockdowns amid the COVID-19 pandemic, despite working under Trump at the time.
During his trip to Asheville, North Carolina Friday, Trump shrugged off the move.
‘No, I think you know, when you work for government, at some point your security detail comes off, and you know, you can’t have them forever,’ the president said.
‘So I think it’s very standard. If it was for somebody else you wouldn’t be asking the question,’ Trump added.
Fauci was among those that President Joe Biden gave blanket pardons to as he left office earlier this week, fearing Trump would seek legal retribution.
President Donald Trump (left) has terminated Dr. Anthony Fauci’s (right) security detail that was being paid for by the National Institutes of Health
Trump has already taken revenge on some critics – and former officials who didn’t endorse him wholeheartedly.
He terminated his former National Security Advisor John Bolton’s Secret Service protection and the State Department detail assigned to his former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo – with both being under threat of assassination by Iran.
Bolton wrote a tell-all book about working under Trump – and published it months before the 2020 presidential election, which the Republican then lost.
Pompeo flirted with running against Trump during the 2024 GOP primary but decided to sit the election cycle out.
He ended up endorsing Trump and even went on the campaign trail for him – but that didn’t make up for comments he made at CPAC in 2023 in which he encouraged Republicans not to follow ‘celebrity leaders’ with ‘fragile egos who refuse to acknowledge reality.’
Pompeo was also critical of Trump’s handling of classified documents amid Special Counsel Jack Smith’s probe.
On the political right, Fauci has become the person blamed for Trump’s poor COVID response.
Republicans have since gone after Fauci for his role in the National Institutes of Health funding coronavirus research – as they’ve tried to tie American dollars to the Wuhan Institute of Virology – where some believe COVID leaked from.
DailyMail.com previously captured Dr. Anthony Fauci (left) arriving home from a workout with members of his taxpayer-funded security detail (right)
Trump went along with his health advisers’ guidance to impose lockdowns in the early weeks of the pandemic.
The president later reversed course and was skeptical of masking – holding large rallies ahead of the November 2020 election.
Trump’s chaotic approach to handling the pandemic ultimately cost him reelection.
President Joe Biden kept Fauci in the same role when he took office in January 2021.
Fauci retired in December 2022 but has kept a security detail since – due to receiving a number of death threats.
