Republican congressional candidate Joe Mitchell told a crowd in Clive, Iowa, this week that if elected he will push for a seat on the House Oversight Committee specifically to scrutinize former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Mitchell made the pledge at a “Get Out the Vote Rally” hosted by MAHA PAC on October 28 in Clive, a Des Moines suburb, ahead of the November 3 midterm elections. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Republican gubernatorial candidate Zach Lahn, and other GOP candidates and advocates also spoke at the event.
Mitchell tied his position to a personal story about his grandmother, who he said was a healthy 93-year-old in 2022 before she was placed in a nursing home.
“And we send her to a nursing home, and they give her the COVID vaccine. Without anybody’s consent,” Mitchell said. “And they said there was a mandate here in the nursing home, so she went from a perfectly healthy 93-year-old to dead within two weeks.”
Mitchell said that experience is why he opposes Fauci’s handling of the pandemic. “I don’t know about you, but I’m not a big fan of Anthony Fauci. Are you?” he asked, prompting the crowd to shout “no.”
He went on to describe a conversation with a member of Congress serving on a steering committee who asked him which committee assignments he’d want if elected next Tuesday.
“And I said, ‘I want to be on oversight because I want to investigate the hell out of Anthony Fauci for what he did to this country,'” Mitchell said, drawing cheers from the crowd.
Mitchell noted that MAHA Action endorsed only 13 candidates nationwide, including himself and Lahn, and said he believes his refusal to accept corporate PAC money played a role in that endorsement.
“I’m the only Republican in the entire country running for Congress who’s not going to be taking corporate PAC money in D.C. Not a single dime,” Mitchell said. “So that means no money from BlackRock, no money from Pfizer, no money from Cisco, no money from these huge multinational corporations that have been running Washington for years.”
Mitchell said too many Washington politicians are “bought and paid for” by big pharma, big agriculture and big food, and that voters “don’t want those people dictating our lives anymore.”
Part of a Broader Push
Mitchell’s call for accountability comes amid a wider Republican effort to revisit Fauci’s role in the pandemic response. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) called in August for a “COVID reckoning,” accusing Fauci of helping fund gain-of-function research, covering up the virus’s origins, and pushing vaccines, saying he wants Fauci’s “reputation… completely destroyed.” Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX) has said officials who withheld pandemic information “ought to be held accountable” and that he wants to “see this guy go to jail.” Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Rand Paul (R-KY) has argued Fauci could face charges for lying to Congress and destroying records, though he noted those matters were covered by former President Joe Biden’s pardon.
The Race
Mitchell, a former Iowa state representative endorsed by President Donald Trump, faces Democratic state Rep. Lindsay James on November 3 for Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District, a seat current Rep. Ashley Hinson (R-IA) is vacating to run for U.S. Senate. Trump endorsed Mitchell in January, citing his work at the Department of Housing and Urban Development and his record as the youngest state legislator in Iowa history.
Mitchell has described James as “Left, FAR Left,” citing her position on taxpayer-funded medical care for prisoners. James has drawn scrutiny for a 2020 campaign website “confession” acknowledging she benefited from privilege as a “white, cis-gender, able bodied, middle class, college educated woman,” and for votes against Iowa legislation banning gender-transition treatments for minors, restricting school sports to biological females, and requiring parental notification for gender changes at school. She has also opposed Iowa’s 2022 flat tax law and called for repealing the Working Families Tax Cuts at the federal level.
During an October debate, James was pressed on missing 177 of 342 Iowa House votes since launching her campaign — more than half the votes taken in that span, including measures on property tax reductions and animal cruelty penalties — and did not directly answer why, according to Townhall.
