Tom Brenner/The New York Times

Anthony Fauci’s M.D. ’66 security funding was revoked following action from President Trump.

January 24, 2025

Trump Removes Fauci’s M.D. ’66 Security Funding

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During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Anthony Fauci M.D. ’66 confronted death threats while operating as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the chief medical advisor to the president of the United States.

Now, he faces President Donald Trump’s removal of his security funding, as of Thursday night. Fauci has since hired his own security detail, which Trump had suggested when he cut funding.

“When you work for government, at some point your security detail comes off and, you know, you can’t have it forever,” Trump said, according to reporting from The New York Times. “I can give them some good numbers of some very good security people.”

Trump’s actions follow Senator Rand Paul (R-K.Y.) publicly calling for Fauci’s security to be cut. Paul also recently criticized former president Joe Biden for pre-emptively pardoning Fauci, saying that Fauci was “accepting his guilt” by accepting the pardon.

In a statement released after the pardon was issued, Fauci said that he had “committed no crime” and that there were “no possible grounds” for any criminal allegations against him.

Trump has told reporters that he would feel no responsibility if Dr. Fauci was harmed after losing his security detail, according to The New York Times. The stripping of Fauci’s security follows Trump’s revocation of Secret Service detail from his former National Security Advisor John R. Bolton. 

In his memoir On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service, Dr. Fauci described his relationship with Trump as “complicated,” saying that Trump would alternate between telling him he “loved” him and publicly threatening to fire him.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Fauci faced death threats to himself and his family. He initially received protection from federal marshals and then by a private contractor paid by the government.

As the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Fauci was originally recruited by Trump to work for the White House Coronavirus Task Force. Biden announced his appointment of Fauci as the chief medical advisor to the president in December 2020. Fauci acted as a public health spokesperson and became a household name for Americans throughout the pandemic. 

Fauci stepped down from the NIAID and the White House on Dec. 31, 2022. He is now a distinguished professor at Georgetown University teaching medicine and public policy.

Cornell was the birthplace of Fauci’s medical career. At Weill Cornell Medicine, he studied adult internal medicine and graduated as valedictorian in 1966. After graduation, he completed an internship and residency at Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York City.

In an address to the graduating Weill Cornell Medicine Class of 2020, he said that his education at Cornell “prepared [him] well for the unexpected events,” including the COVID-19 pandemic, that “shaped [his] career.”