Fauci Goes MIA as White House Looks to Move Past COVID Before Midterms

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden and a mainstay on American television screens over the past two years, has enjoyed a lower profile over the last month.

As governments at all levels announced an end to mask and vaccine mandates and other COVID-19-related measures, Fauci’s interviews appear to have slowed as well.

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Once a constant presence on major news shows, Fauci’s interview schedule has become more sporadic in recent weeks. His appearances include local news broadcasts for Nexstar Broadcasting and Cox Media, the 85 South Comedy Show, and a streaming series called Woke AF.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases runs a Dr. Anthony Fauci in the News page that shows no network news appearances beyond Feb. 18. Prior to that date, Fauci had appeared on CNN, ABC, and PBS in February, and he was interviewed by the New York Times, Der Spiegel, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, the World Economic Forum, and Katie Couric in January.

Democrats are being urged to move on from COVID-19 if they hope to avert disaster in November’s midterm elections. A memo from Impact Research released last week urged the party’s leaders to talk about moving on from the virus — and how Democratic policies have made it safe to do so.

Since then, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has announced a significant loosening of its mask guidance, and Biden spoke of moving beyond the virus during a maskless State of the Union address that his chief of staff touted as the “most normal thing people have seen in Washington in a long time.”

The White House’s COVID-19 briefings, previously held remotely, are now being held in person and without social distancing. However, the shift may mostly be due to the virus entering a new phase and the public focusing elsewhere, argues University of Georgia communications professor Glen Nowak.

“You reach a point in a pandemic when new developments aren’t happening as frequently,” said Nowak, a former CDC spokesman. “We’re at a point in this one where there clearly has been a lot of fatigue from many people. We have a conflict in Ukraine that is getting a lot of attention, and that’s got to be the No. 1 priority right now for the administration.”

Fauci has worked at the top levels of government for decades but shot to prominence two years ago as COVID-19 fears led to lockdowns and public restrictions. Over the course of time and hundreds of interviews, Fauci became the face of the pandemic response in America.

The NIAID director evolved into a hero to many, with talk of a “Fauci effect” driving record medical school applications and a documentary simply titled Fauci.

But many Republicans hold significantly different views of the man. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul frequently duels with Fauci when he appears before the Senate, while Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis sells “Fauci Can Pound Sand” flip-flops and “Don’t Fauci my Florida” Koozies on his campaign website. House Republicans have promised to investigate Fauci should they take back the chamber in 2023.

“The rapid fading of the COVID apparatus and the withdrawal from the constant appearances in the news cycle by the lab coat tyrant Fauci is a direct function of politics,” conservative talk radio host Buck Sexton told Fox News, adding that Fauci had been used as a “weapon” against civilian dissenters of COVID-19 policies.

With Democrats now coming into closer alignment with Republicans on scrapping restrictions, Sexton said it is his “mission in life between now and Election Day to remind as many Americans as possible” how Fauci treated them.

Nowak, who led the CDC’s media relations team during the 2009 swine flu pandemic, said that polarization was almost inevitable given the length and shifting nature of the pandemic.

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“A lot of the recommendations that [public health experts] make, people, including experts, can disagree about. And you’re not going to know with a great deal of foresight how well things will play out in the real world. You don’t know how easily something can be implemented until you implement it,” Nowak said. “I’d imagine that whoever is in a visible position during the initial stages of a pandemic will get both lots of praise and lots of criticism.”

Nowak predicted that Fauci’s fade may continue — if only because the next steps in treating COVID-19 fall more under the purview of the CDC and Food and Drug Administration rather than the NIAID.