Republican officials in Alabama and Florida are moving to investigate Dr. Anthony Fauci under state law for his COVID-19 conduct, arguing that Joe Biden's blanket pardon shields him only from federal charges, not from accountability closer to home.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama told Fox News Digital that Biden's pardon does not extend to state-level crimes, and that he intends to use the governor's office to hold Fauci accountable for what he called the deaths of tens of thousands of Alabamians. Tuberville, the former Auburn football coach who is favored to succeed term-limited Gov. Kay Ivey, said he would order Fauci to Montgomery to face state charges if elected.
The push follows a Senate hearing at which the 85-year-old former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination 111 times. That performance, a retired public health official refusing, again and again, to answer questions from the senators who once relied on his guidance, set off a chain of announcements from Republican state leaders who say the pardon Biden signed does not end the matter.
Tuberville, who sat on the Senate HELP Committee and heard from Fauci regularly during the pandemic, did not hold back. Speaking to Newsmax from the Capitol, he said Fauci "should be locked up before he leaves this building today."
On Fox Business, Tuberville said Fauci "lied... and knew he was lying." He pointed to the constitutional text limiting presidential pardons to "offenses against the United States" and argued that state-level crimes fall outside that protection.
Tuberville told Fox News Digital he wants Alabamians to bring civil claims against Fauci as well:
"We lost 20-30,000 (people) in Alabama alone, and I hope every d*** one of them sues Fauci."
He went further, describing a future in which Fauci faces courtroom after courtroom:
"He's going to court every day of his life for the rest of his life. And he's going (to) have to look these people in the face, these families, because the pardon does not cover state government."
Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri made a related argument. Hawley contended that Biden's blanket pardon eliminated Fauci's federal criminal exposure for covered conduct, and in doing so, undercut the very basis Fauci used for refusing to answer senators' questions. If the pardon removed the threat of federal prosecution, Fauci's Fifth Amendment claim lost its legal footing. He invoked it 111 times anyway.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier confirmed to Fox News Digital that "any and all potential violations of Florida law" are on the table regarding Fauci's pandemic-era conduct. His press secretary, Jae Williams, laid out the scope in a statement:
"Our inquiry will focus on what Fauci knew, when he knew it, and how he misled the American people. We will examine the physical and monetary harms to Floridians that may have resulted from his deceptions and determine whether his conduct exposes him to liability under state law."
That language, "physical and monetary harms" and "liability under state law", signals that Florida's investigation could extend beyond criminal exposure into civil territory, opening Fauci to lawsuits brought by or on behalf of residents who suffered under COVID-era mandates and guidance.
Florida Lt. Gov. Jay Collins backed the probe in an interview with Fox News Digital. Collins, a 100%-disabled retired amputee veteran, described a personal encounter with the federal vaccination regime that still angers him.
"I had to make a choice of getting my prosthetic care and having a leg to walk on versus taking an immunization that I didn't want or believe in."
Collins said the broader push for accountability goes beyond one man. Families faced threats. Children risked losing access to school. The federal government, under Fauci's guidance, pressured institutions, including the VA, into compliance regimes that gave citizens no real choice.
Broader efforts to declassify COVID-origins records have added fuel to the push for a full accounting of what federal officials knew and when they knew it.
Collins pointed to Gov. Ron DeSantis as the leader who made Florida's resistance possible. DeSantis, he said, "became America's governor" and was "the greatest governor in our state's history, largely because of what he did in COVID." Collins noted that DeSantis stood firm even as the president, the federal government, and world leaders attacked him.
DeSantis himself weighed in on Fox News, calling Fauci "the most destructive bureaucrat in the history of the United States of America." His office directed Fox News Digital to those comments when asked for a response.
Collins, who is running to succeed DeSantis as governor, did not hold back:
"We protected America. We pushed back on the Fauci-Ouchie and all the nonsense that came from it... I'm glad (Fauci) was offended."
The accountability push is not limited to red states that resisted pandemic mandates. Steve Hilton, the Republican gubernatorial nominee in California, a state that complied with and welcomed Fauci's prescriptions under its current leadership, announced his own plan after watching Fauci plead the Fifth.
In a Facebook video, Hilton called the hearing "an absolute disgrace" and asked when there would be any accountability. He then made a campaign pledge:
"I tell you, when I'm governor of California we will have a COVID Accountability Commission."
Hilton said the commission would examine Fauci and California officials over policies "who caused so much pain and suffering and cruelty in this absolute disaster of public policy." Coming from a candidate in the state that imposed some of the nation's longest and most restrictive lockdowns, the proposal carries a different weight. California residents lived under rules that Fauci endorsed and that state officials enforced with enthusiasm. A formal commission would force those officials to answer for the results.
Ongoing debates over federal health policy and vaccine decisions continue to shape the political landscape around pandemic accountability.
The legal thread running through every announcement is the same: Biden's blanket pardon protects Fauci from federal prosecution for covered conduct, but the Constitution limits presidential clemency to offenses against the United States. State crimes sit outside that shield.
Tuberville put it bluntly. The pardon Biden signed by autopen does not apply to state-level crimes. If Alabama or Florida prosecutors identify conduct that violated state law, fraud, misrepresentation, maladministration causing harm, the pardon offers Fauci no defense.
Whether these investigations produce charges, civil suits, or simply a public record of what went wrong remains to be seen. Fox News Digital reached out to Fauci through his counsel for comment. No response was reported. The outlet also contacted Gov. Kay Ivey's office to ask whether Alabama's current governor would pursue similar action in her remaining months. No response was reported there, either.
Fauci sat before the Senate, shielded by a pardon he did not need if he had nothing to hide, and declined to answer 111 questions. Now officials in at least three states want to ask their own, and the pardon cannot stop them.
