At least, that’s what he implied Friday in an interview with Fox News host Neil Cavuto.
In explaining that Fauci was getting pushback from former top Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro, said he was the “father of COVID,” and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who said that what’s taking place at the border is a “super spreader event,” Cavuto asked the immunologist to respond.
“I’ve become, sort of, for some reason or other, a symbol to them of what they don’t like about anything that has to do with things that are contrary to them, anything outside of their own realm,” Fauci said. “It’s a little bit bizarre, I would say.”
Continuing, he said that while he and Graham had a good relationship and that he liked the senator, he found it odd and inappropriate for “equating me with things that have to do at the border.”
“I mean, I have nothing to do with the border,” Fauci insisted. “Peter Navarro saying I created the virus? I mean, how bizarre is that…I mean, think about that a second. Is that a little weird? I mean, come on.”
Cavuto replied that Graham appears to be concerned about the manner in which illegal migrant adults and children are being “crammed” into detention facilities, adding that perhaps the South Carolina senator believes Fauci’s “expertise” could be required along the border to help mitigate the spread of the virus.
“Do you think it could be a super spreader event?” Cavuto asked.
“Obviously, it is a very difficult situation at the border,” Fauci acknowledged. “We all know that. The administration is trying as best as they can to alleviate that situation.
“Having me down at the border, that’s really not what I do. You know what I do; I develop vaccines, I develop countermeasures. I mean, having me at the border, I don’t know why they’re saying I should be at the border any more than someone who has experience in those types of things,” Fauci continued.
Graham tweeted on Friday, “You [Dr. Fauci] need to go to the southern border and witness in person the biggest super spreader event in the nation-president Joe Biden’s immigration policies. Thousands of migrants from Central America are coming into the country with a 10% COVID-positive rate.”
“Obviously this is of concern to the administration. The president himself has expressed that,” Fauci responded. “We don’t want people to be coming over the border,” adding that COVID-positive migrants are “tested to the extent possible.”
“If they’re positive, they’re quarantined. That’s what I know about it,” he noted further. “No one is denying that it is not a difficult problem at the border.”
He then said he becomes “a little bit concerned when people equate what I do with the border.”
“I don’t know the reason for the animus, but I’m really not quite sure. And quite frankly, I am so busy trying to do some important things to preserve the health and the safety of the American people that I can’t be bothered with getting distracted with these people that are doing these ad hominems … I have more important things to do,” Fauci added.