First Lady Jill Biden and Dr. Anthony Fauci toured a COVID-19 vaccination site at a historic Harlem church on Sunday as the White House wa...
First Lady Jill Biden and Dr. Anthony Fauci toured a COVID-19 vaccination site at a historic Harlem church on Sunday as the White House was standing by the top medical adviser after he's come under fire for his handling of the virus.
Biden, Fauci and U.S. Sen Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat, watched as people got their shots in the basement of the Abyssinian Baptist Church in the New York City neighborhood.
But outside the place of worship there were dozens of protesters chanting against Fauci, who advocated for lockdowns and mask-wearing when some now are saying those measures went too far.
Meanwhile, Fauci has also taken heat for flip-flopping on whether COVID-19 is man-made - perhaps leaked from a Wuhan lab - or whether it is naturally occurring, coming from a bat as China contends.
Former President Donald Trump, who brought Fauci on as a top adviser, has now recently blasted him. On Saturday night, he called him 'great promoter, not a great doctor.'
President Joe Biden, meanwhile, who kept Fauci on board, has said he will not fire the doctor and has praised his work.
First Lady Jill Biden, center left, standing with Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, makes a statement while visiting a vaccine clinic at the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem on Sunday
An anti-mask protester holds one that says 'fascism' during the Sunday protest in Harlem
Demonstrators protest outside Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, where the infection rate has been higher than the rest of the city but the vaccine rate is roughly only seven percent
'Fire Fauci!' many shouted while a man with a bullhorn said 'We will not comply, Dr. Fauci!'
Several dozen people protested outside the church, where one held a sign with Fauci having a Hitler-style mustache, saying that the world is being 'scared into submission' by COVID rules
Another protester suggested on a sign that fascism by another name was 'Faucism'
Officers from the NYPD prevented protesters from getting too close
Protesters who had gathered outside had messages that looked to be centered on lockdowns - and their opposition to them. Some even compared the lockdown orders and mask-wearing that Fauci had pushed to fascism.
'Fire Fauci!' many shouted while a man with a bullhorn said 'We will not comply, Dr. Fauci!'
One demonstrator told a pair of NYPD officers to take Fauci into custody.
'Arrest Fauci. He was right there,' he said to the New York Post. 'You should have arrested Fauci.'
Inside, Fauci spoke to a small number of the press who had gathered.
'We're going to end this outbreak with absolute certainty and the vehicle to ending it is vaccination,' the doctor said. 'And that's why I'm so impressed by being here and so honored to be here.'
Amid the calls for his firing, the former head of the Food and Drug Administration, Scott Gottlieb, has said Fauci told world leaders in the spring of 2020 that the coronavirus may have escaped from a lab in Wuhan, China.
U.S. researchers around that time still were considering whether the virus came from a lab break, and Fauci told the health leaders gathered that the newly identified strain of the coronavirus 'looked unusual,' according to Gottlieb.
Former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said he was told Dr. Fauci had briefed world leaders on the possibility that the novel coronavirus leaked from a lab
The disclosure from the former FDA chief comes as an increasing number of mainstream scientists and media figures no longer are parroting the line from the Chinese Communist Party that the virus came from a bat.
Even President Joe Biden has ordered government agencies to investigate the possibility that it might have come from a lab.
Now, Gottlieb says Fauci last year at least considered that COVID-19 could have come from a lab - before closing ranks around the idea that it occurred naturally.
Gottlieb, who served under President Donald Trump, said a former senior member of the Trump administration told him at the time of Fauci's 2020 talk. Gottlieb said he'd recently reconfirmed with that person that Fauci had given the talk.
'I think early on, when they looked at the strain, they had suspicions,' Gottlieb recalled Sunday on CBS Face the Nation, speaking of U.S. scientists. 'And it takes time to do that analysis, and that dispelled some of those suspicions,' he added.
Meanwhile, Gottlieb said it was a mistake to only look at the virus from a scientific perspective: It also needs to be examined from a national security lens, he said.
'A scientific mindset looks at the virus and the virus' behavior and draws a conclusion,' he said.
'A national security assessment looks at that and then looks at the behavior of the Chinese government, the behavior of the lab, other evidence around the lab - including the infections we now know took place - and that changes the overall assessment,' he said.
Although some experts still believe the virus was transmitted from a bat to some other species of animal, then to humans, its origins remain unproven.
President Joe Biden said the majority of the intelligence community believes it is equally likely that the virus originated in a lab or from an animal.
Some people who appeared to be against vaccines - comparing the shots to tests given on lab rats - also gathered outside of the church as Fauci and the First Lady were inside
One person appeared to be suspicious about masks, vaccines and fluoride
There was little sympathy for the nation's top infectious disease expert
'We will not comply, Dr. Fauci!' one man shouted through a bullhorn
The Wuhan lab was famed for conducting tests on bat coronaviruses, with experts who support the leak theory saying the same city being ground zero for the outbreak is too great a coincidence to ignore.
Fauci is now facing accusations that he mishandled and downplayed the theory the virus leaked from the lab in Wuhan.
At the New York event on Sunday, around 15 people were vaccinated during the visit which lasted for just over half an hour.
Biden asked a teenager about to get his shot how old he was, and when he said he was 14, she responded, 'You're 14, that's exactly what we want! Twelve and over.'
As of this past week, nearly a quarter of all children between ages 12 and 17 have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine in the U.S.
Since the Pfizer-BioNTech shot was approved for emergency use in teenagers on May 10, 6.3 million out of 25 million have gotten an initial dose.
An additional 2.2 million youngsters are fully vaccinated, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
'Thank you for setting an example,' Biden told Annette Gausney, who got the shot after being encouraged by her grandson, Shareif Jones.
'I'm not really afraid of needles anyway but, you know, it's pleasant when people are pleasant and Biden certainly was,' Gausney said.
Nearly a quarter of U.S. children between ages 12 and 17 have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine, according to CDC data
First lady Jill Biden, center left, and Dr. Anthony Fauci were present for just over half an hour
Around 15 people managed to receive their vaccine in the time Biden and Fauci were present
'We're going to end this outbreak with absolute certainty and the vehicle to ending it is vaccination and that's why I'm so impressed by being here and so honored to be here,' Faucie said
The 92-year-old had been hesitant to get the vaccine because 'news makes it hard to know what to 'really believe and what not to believe,' Jones explained.
'I understand where she's coming from, though, since, like, what she's been through growing up…It's hard to convince somebody, who is an elderly black woman in America, going through what they go through.'
The Abyssinian Baptist Church has often hosted elected officials and other dignitaries, including in February when former President Bill Clinton and former Sen. Hillary Clinton attended a memorial service for actor Cicely Tyson.
The church first started offering vaccine doses in January in an effort to boost the vaccination rates in New York City's black and Hispanic communities and so far more than 12,000 people have been vaccinated there.
'I think it's important for Dr. Biden, First Lady and Dr. Fauci, come to emphasize the importance, especially in the Black and brown community of the church in being the first line of defense against COVID-19,' Rev. Calvin Butts of the church said.
Meanwhile, the call to 'Fire Fauci' has been gathering pace, particularly in Republican circles in recent weeks.
House Republican Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy called for Fauci to resign or be fired from his role as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
Fauci has been a political lightning rod since the early days of the pandemic, lionized by the left and condemned by the right for flip-flopping on issues including face masks and the theory COVID-19 leaked from a Wuhan virus lab.
But with the release of a trove of Fauci's emails this past week, Republicans have upped the pressure on Fauci, with McCarthy the highest profile figure so-far to turn on him.
'The American people don't have trust in Dr. Fauci,' McCarthy told the Breitbart News Saturday radio show. 'Let's find a person we can trust. Take politics aside, I mean we're talking about American lives here.'
When asked by the interviewer if that meant 'You think he needs to go?' McCarthy said 'yes'.
'Yea, because you do not have the trust in him,' he replied.
On conservative news channels, President Joe Biden's pandemic adviser has been pilloried as a liar who misled the American people about the origins of COVID-19 to protect the Chinese government.
Fauci has branded the claims against him 'nonsense.'
But Republican calls for his resignation have grown louder, as have demands for new investigations into the origins of the virus.
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