Fauci: Operation Warp Speed Will Go Down in History as a ‘Highly Successful Endeavor’

Dr. Anthony Fauci said on Tuesday, hours after he got the coronavirus vaccine, that Operation Warp Speed will go down in history as a monumental achievement.

Fox News anchor John Roberts first asked Fauci about an uproar over members of Congress getting vaccines already. It’s raised a serious ethical debate — one of many during the vaccine rollout — about who deserves priority access.

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez got the vaccine, for example, and told people in her Instagram post, “I would would never, ever ask you to do something I wasn’t willing to do myself.” On the other side of the coin, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar has said she will not take the vaccine yet because, as she argued, “We are not more important then frontline workers, teachers etc. who are making sacrifices everyday.”

Fauci did not wade into the politics of the issue, and instead pointed to the security reasons why lawmakers are being vaccinated.

“You want to keep the government intact. That’s the reason why you do vaccinate in a priority setting the people who are the leaders of the country in the sense of keeping the country running. It’s very much similar to essential workers in my mind,” he said.

Roberts then brought up President-elect Joe Biden giving credit to the Trump administration for the success of Operation Warp Speed.

“Without the Trump administration’s efforts and without Operation Warp Speed, we would be sticking needles in arms at this point?” Roberts asked.

Fauci said “unlikely”:

I think President-elect Biden was correct in giving credit to the Trump administration for Operation Warp Speed. Operation Warp Speed will go down historically as a highly successful endeavor which allowed us to do things with regard to the timing of it and effectiveness of it in a way that a few years ago people never would have imagined. It was a combination, John, of the fundamental basic science — science that was done right here at the NIH, as well as places that were funded by the NIH and by the Department of Defense and other government agencies. That, plus the creative initiative of Operation Warp Speed made this possible.

He added that “a lot of credit goes to the administration,” singling out HHS Sec. Alex Azar and DOD officials like former Defense Secretary Mark Esper.

You can watch above, via Fox News.