Rush Limbaugh mocks Dr. Anthony Fauci for wearing a mask at White House event
Limbaugh: “The mask is a symbol of fear,” and Fauci looks “muzzled” behind Trump’s pronouncements
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These clips are from the May 15, 2020, edition of Premiere Networks’ The Rush Limbaugh Show. The compilation of videos was posted to Rush Limbaugh's website.
RUSH LIMBAUGH (HOST): Look at this. There’s a Rose Garden ceremony right now, and Dr. Fauci standing behind Trump, for the first time wearing a mask. I know — the media jumped on him, but the mask is a symbol of fear. They’re using the mask as a symbol of fear, and now Dr. Fauci, the world’s foremost authority, obviously he’s gotta be scared. It’s got to be worse than Dr. Fauci thought, he’s wearing a mask. That’s the message conveyed by the photo.
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Dr. Fauci positioned right behind President Trump’s left shoulder, wearing that — he's wearing a gigantic mask. It looks like Dr. Fauci has been muzzled. He’s not going to like the image this conveys.
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It's an announcement availability. He’s announcing, essentially, Operation Warp Speed, which is the administration’s official announcement of the objective to find a vaccine for the coronavirus by the end of the year. And he has appointed a former executive from GlaxoSmithKline, a pharmaceutical company, to head up the effort. In addition, he’s got some military people in there, the chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff. And they’re all making trips to the microphone to speak and to thank the president, talk about the great leadership, the great motivation that he is providing in this effort.
They just — and standing behind the president — this cannot be an accident. They stage these things. And standing behind the president, as the president’s speaking at the microphone — behind the president, as he's standing, his left shoulder, is Dr. Fauci.
Dr. Fauci’s wearing one of the biggest masks I have ever seen in my life. It goes all the way from the bridge of his nose almost down to his tie knot. There's about an inch of skin there on his neck that is exposed. And it — I mean, just a casual observer, when the president’s speaking, the only other person in the camera shot is Dr. Fauci, and it looks like he’s being muzzled. You can’t read his facial expression. Dr. Fauci has said, “Vaccine, well, may never be a vaccine — maybe 12 to 18 months at the outside, maybe.”
Fauci’s standing there listening to this commitment to come up with a vaccine by the end of the year — which is six months from now, seven months. And I would love — you can't — he’s not rolling his eyes, he's not — and he wouldn’t do that, he wouldn’t engage in a public display of doubt like that. But still, it’s a fascinating shot.
They keep moving the goalposts as to when we can reopen. First, they said we had to flatten the curve. We flattened the curve. They said, “Well, that’s not enough. Now we got to do X — we got to get more testing out there.” So then we got more testing than any country in the world. “That's still not enough, we need to do this.” And so when we did the next thing, and finished, that’s still not enough. “We can’t go out ’til there’s a cure. We can’t open up ’til there’s a vaccine.”
So at every stage where they have said we could relax some of these restrictions, we've met those requirements, and they still — the proponents of the lockdown want to stay locked down.
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President Trump at the White House Rose Garden just moments ago, talking about Operation Warp Speed, the attempt to get a vaccine developed by the end of the year.
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There he is. He’s alluding to herd immunity. It’s the last thing that Dr. Fauci wants to hear. So, Trump dances around it — while Fauci can’t say a word ’cause he’s muzzled in this gigantic mask, standing right behind — it’s probably unfair of me to characterize it that way. It’s just how it looked, you know? That's all it is.