Fauci hasn't met with Trump in more than a month and is being sidelined from TV appearances as the US coronavirus outbreak worsens

Andrew Dunn

July 12, 2020 3:19 PM

Anthony Fauci is being sidelined from briefing President Trump in Oval Office meetings, as well as the public through national television appearances.

Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, told the Financial Times he last briefed Trump in person on June 2, more than a month ago.
Since then, the coronavirus crisis has worsened in the US. The nation has gone from averaging roughly 20,000 new infections per day in early June to recently hitting record-high levels at about 60,000 daily new cases.
The White House recently cancelled scheduled television appearances for Fauci on CNN, PBS, and NBC, The Washington Post reported Saturday .
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Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, said he hasn't met with President Trump in more than a month, even as the US has recorded record-high levels of daily coronavirus infections and deaths are on the rise again .

The last time Fauci briefed Trump in person was June 2, the longtime leader of the US National Institutes of Health's infectious disease unit said in an interview with the Financial Times' Hannah Kuchler published Friday .

That was back when the US was averaging roughly 20,000 daily new infections. Throughout June and early July, the rate of new infections has steadily climbed, recently surpassing a record-high of 60,000 per day. Some of the hardest-hit states have also begun to see upticks in hospitalizations and deaths, metrics that typically lag behind new cases.

Fauci "is never in the Oval [Office] anymore," one senior administration official told The Washington Post . The Post reported that tensions between White House officials and Fauci have risen, especially as Fauci has been outspoken about his analysis of the outbreak.

Over the past week, he's expressed views at odds with Trump about the seriousness of the virus. While Trump has touted the low coronavirus death rate in the US, Fauci called that a "false narrative" in a talk with Doug Jones, a Democratic senator from Alabama.

After those Tuesday comments to Jones, the Post reported the White House canceled television appearances Fauci had booked for CNN, PBS, and NBC.

"I have a reputation, as you probably have figured out, of speaking the truth at all times and not sugar-coating things," Fauci told the Financial Times. "And that may be one of the reasons why I haven't been on television very much lately."

Since the beginning of the outbreak in January, the US has recorded more than 3.2 million infections and at least 134,000 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University .

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