“Show me a school that I shut down,” Anthony Fauci challenged his critics in Congress. “I never did.”As America’s top infectious disease official during the COVID-19 pandemic, Fauci often brushed off criticisms, insisting that he never shut anything down.His defense is not a total lie. On the literal level, Fauci didn’t have the authority to close schools. Secondly, he had a mixed record when it came to closing schools and keeping them closed. In fact, Fauci, after the 2020 election, began publicly saying we should open schools and close bars.
But Fauci’s defense against the school-closer charge is still misleading on at least three fronts:
He did advocate school closures early on.
He promulgated safety standards (most importantly the 6-foot social distancing standard) that were not required by science and did force school closures.
Throughout the summer of 2020, when Democrats were attacking President Donald Trump for advocating the reopening of schools in the fall, Fauci took the Democrats’ side.
