Washington (CNN)The White House is making a concerted effort to discredit Dr. Anthony Fauci as he becomes increasingly vocal about his concerns over reopening the country amid a national surge in coronavirus cases. The moves to undercut Fauci come just days after he gave an unvarnished look at his relationship with President Donald Trump, including that they have not spoken in weeks.
The tension between the two men -- who are no longer speaking, CNN reported last week -- has grown publicly as they have responded to one another through interviews and statements. But recent moves by the White House to publicly diminish the nation's top infectious disease expert amounts to a significant escalation as it seeks to divert attention from the government's failure to contain the coronavirus and instead push Trump's call to reopen the country. That effort continued Monday morning, when the President retweeted a baseless claim by game show host Chuck Woolery that "everyone is lying" about the coronavirus -- including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In a statement Saturday, a White House official told CNN that "several White House officials are concerned about the number of times Dr. Fauci has been wrong on things." The official went on to provide a lengthy list of examples, citing Fauci's comments early in the pandemic and linking to past interviews.
These bullet points, which resembled opposition research on a political opponent, included Fauci downplaying the virus early on and a quote from March when Fauci said, "People should not be walking around with masks," among other comments. Not included were previous statements from the surgeon general urging people not to buy masks or an acknowledgment of the President's own false claims and misstatements about the virus.
Fauci did not return a request for comment by CNN. But in a recent series of newspaper and radio interviews, Fauci, who has worked under six US presidents from both parties, has at times openly disagreed with Trump.
In particular, a recent interview with the Financial Times in which Fauci disclosed that he has not briefed the President in weeks prompted the White House to distribute the list of Fauci statements, an aide familiar with the matter said. Among other things, Fauci disputed Trump's claim that "99%" of coronavirus cases in the United States were "totally harmless" -- saying that was "obviously not the case" -- and drew a connection between his insistence on "speaking the truth at all times" to his noticeably diminished television appearances.
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