A Republican senator investigating Dr. Anthony Fauci’s old government phone says newly uncovered messages about COVID-19 vaccines and pregnancy could open the door to a much larger examination of how federal health officials handled the pandemic.
According to Fox News, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said the messages released this week are significant because they provide a rare look at private discussions among some of the nation's top health officials during the rollout of the vaccines.
"I think this is the tip of the iceberg," Johnson told Fox News Digital.
One message from January 2021 showed Fauci raising a theoretical concern about whether the fever and inflammatory response that could follow a second mRNA vaccine dose might affect pregnancies during the first trimester.
"Since many people have significant cytokines storm and fever after the 2nd dose, this theoretically could be associated with miscarriage in the 1st trimester," Fauci wrote in a discussion with then-CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky and Dr. Vivek Murthy.
The message has become a focal point for Johnson, who said it warrants examination alongside the public guidance issued by federal health officials at the time.
Johnson, who leads the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, obtained Fauci's former government phone with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., from the Department of Health and Human Services.
The lawmakers are examining communications from Fauci's time as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, with Johnson saying the investigation is focused on whether private conversations differed from the messaging delivered to the American public.
Johnson also pointed to a 2021 study involving pregnancies following mRNA vaccination. He offered his own interpretation of the study's reported numbers, arguing that the data deserved closer scrutiny.
The study's figures, however, do not by themselves establish that vaccination caused the reported miscarriages, and Johnson's calculation has been disputed by the way the study's data were structured.
The phone investigation comes as Paul separately seeks consequences for Fauci after he repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment rights during congressional questioning.
Paul has since referred a contempt matter involving Fauci to the Justice Department.
Johnson said investigators are being selective about what they release, noting that the phone contains personal information that is not relevant to their work.
For Johnson, the broader question is whether Fauci and other officials communicated privately in ways that differed from what they told the public.
"This is going to take time," Johnson said. "But there are, I'm sure, way more to come."
He described the newly released message as an early indication that the phone could contain additional material investigators believe warrants public attention.