WASHINGTON — Dr. Anthony Fauci writes in his upcoming memoir that former President Donald Trump hurled expletives at him during a 2020 phone call but also told him he loved him, The New York Times reported.
The call came at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when then-President Trump had repeatedly downplayed the impact of COVID-19 and attacked Dr. Fauci for the guidelines he had given the public to combat the virus.
In his memoir, “On Call: A Doctor’s Journey as a Public Servant,” Dr. Fauci wrote that during the call, Trump “became enraged, told him he couldn’t do any more” and repeatedly used the F-word. The New York Times And that The Daily Beast.
“He said he loved me, but the country was in trouble and I was making it worse,” Fauci wrote. “He added that I had cost the country ‘a trillion dollars’ because stocks only rose 600 points on Phase 1 vaccine good news when they should have risen 1,000 points.”
“I’m a pretty sensitive person, but being yelled at by the president of the United States, no matter how much he says he loves you, is not fun,” he said.
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Republican lawmakers have floated a number of conspiracy theories implicating Dr. Fauci in the COVID-19 pandemic, and during a House hearing earlier this month, Dr. Fauci defended himself against those allegations.
“Anytime someone stands up, whether it’s a news organization, as Fox News often does, or someone in Congress stands up and makes a public statement that they’re responsible for a number of deaths because of their policies or because of this wild idea that they created the virus, immediately, like clockwork, the death threats skyrocket,” he said.
His memoir is due to be published this month.
