Donald Trump is losing patience with the White House's most credible infectious disease specialist, Dr. Anthony Fauci because the NIAID director has contradicted him too many times on the COVID-19 response and provided fuel for the president's critics.
The NYT reports: “Dr. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984, has grown bolder in correcting the president's falsehoods and overly rosy statements about the spread of the coronavirus in the past two weeks — and he has become a hero to the president's critics because of it. And now, Mr. Trump's patience has started to wear thin. So has the patience of some White House advisers, who see Dr. Fauci as taking shots at the president in some of his interviews with print reporters while offering extensive praise for Mr. Trump in television interviews with conservative hosts.”
Science doesn't fly in the White House.
In an interview with Science, Fauci was asked how he can stand there when Trump says things that aren't factual, and Fauci responded, “The next time they sit down with him and talk about what he's going to say, they will say, ‘By the way, Mr. President, be careful about this and don't say that.' But I can't jump in front of the microphone and push him down. OK, he said it. Let's try and get it corrected for the next time.”
Fauci also made a splash on social media after he put his hand over the face after Trump referred to the “deep state department.” Fauci has been missing from the podium since then.
