(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice for the contents of Anthony Fauci’s government-issued cell phones. The phones were provided to former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Fauci and later reportedly recovered by the FBI (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:26-cv-02812)).
The lawsuit was filed after the FBI failed to comply with a June 2025 FOIA request for:
All contents obtained from the government-issued cell phones of former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci, which were reportedly recovered by the FBI, as disclosed to podcaster Joe Rogan by FBI Director Kash Patel in the following interview: https://x.com/KyleSeraphin/status/1931056010313322693
The FBI claimed in October 2025 that the requested records were located in an investigative file exempt from disclosure under FOIA law enforcement exemption 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(7)(A).
Patel publicly disclosed that the FBI had recovered phones and other devices that Fauci used during the first Trump administration.
“We just had a great breakthrough this week on Fauci,” Patel told Joe Rogan during a June 2025 episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience.” Patel said investigators had been looking for phones and devices Fauci used during the first Trump administration and that “nobody had found it until two days ago.”
Patel cautioned that the devices might not contain everything investigators were seeking, saying, “Maybe it’s deleted, maybe it’s not,” but added that the FBI had found the devices and that the search was “of public importance.”
The FBI’s refusal to release the records comes as congressional scrutiny of Fauci and the federal government’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic intensifies.
On July 29, 2026, Fauci appeared before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee under subpoena. During the hearing, chaired by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), Fauci invoked the Fifth Amendment 111 times.
On August 6, 2026, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) transferred a copy of Fauci’s government-issued iPhone to the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which is chaired by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI).
Also on August 6, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee voted 8-5 to hold Fauci in contempt of Congress over his refusal to answer questions about his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and his past testimony to Congress regarding U.S.-funded “gain-of-function” research. The resolution directs Vice President JD Vance, in his capacity as president of the Senate, to certify the contempt report to U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro for potential prosecution.
“Americans have a right to know what the FBI recovered from Anthony Fauci’s government-issued phones and what those records reveal about his official activities during the Covid pandemic,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuits and investigations have uncovered much of what the public knows about many Covid-19 controversies:
In May 2026, Judicial Watch filed a post-hearing brief in a FOIA lawsuit on behalf of Open the Books, urging a federal court to compel the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to release unredacted records showing royalty-related payments to government scientists, including Fauci.
In April 2026, Judicial Watch sued the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) for records and communications of its employees with other government officials regarding coronaviruses, the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), and related Covid-19 research.
In March 2026, Judicial Watch sued the U.S. Department of Defense (War Department) for records on funding proposals submitted to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Biological Technologies Office prior to the Covid-19 outbreak. The Biological Technologies Office was launched in 2014.
In June 2025, Judicial Watch sued the Defense Department for all records regarding U.S. military personnel possibly contracting Covid-19 in October 2019 during the World Military Games in Wuhan, China. The lawsuit cited a December 2022 report issued by the Pentagon titled “Report to the Committees on Armed Services of the Senate and House of Representatives: 2019 World Military Games” which states that seven “service members who attended the games exhibited Covid-19-like signs and/or symptoms” during the time surrounding their attendance at the games.
In May 2025, Judicial Watch received records from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that revealed its plans to mandate Covid-19 vaccinations for 17 million health care employees and that only one of 4,682 claims for injuries and deaths due to Covid-19 “countermeasures” at the time was compensated.
Records uncovered in 2024 from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) through a FOIA request showed an April 2020 email exchange with several officials in the bureau’s Newark Field Office referring to a National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) grant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China as including “gain-of-function research” which “would leave no signature of purposeful human manipulation.”
Records from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) showed that a Pfizer study surveyed 23 people in 2021 to gauge reactions to its Covid vaccine booster before asking the FDA to approve it.
Records from the Health and Human Services included the initial grant application and annual reports to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) from EcoHealth Alliance, describing the aim of its work with the Wuhan Institute of Virology to create mutant viruses “to better predict the capacity of our CoVs [coronaviruses] to infect people.”
Health and Human Services records included emails of then-Director of the National Institutes of Health Francis Collins showing a British physicians’ group recommended the use of Ivermectin to prevent and treat Covid-19.
Records from Health and Human Services regarding data Moderna submitted to the Food and Drug Administration on its mRNA Covid-19 vaccine indicated a “statistically significant” number of rats were born with skeletal deformations after their mothers were injected with the vaccine. The documents also revealed Moderna elected not to conduct a number of standard pharmacological studies on the laboratory test animals.
Food and Drug Administration records detailed pressure for Covid-19 vaccine booster approval and use.
National Institutes of Health records revealed an FBI “inquiry” into the NIH’s controversial bat coronavirus grant tied to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The records also show National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) officials were concerned about “gain-of-function” research in China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2016. The Fauci agency was also concerned about EcoHealth Alliance’s lack of compliance with reporting rules and use of gain-of-function research in the NIH-funded research involving bat coronaviruses in Wuhan, China.
Health and Human Services records revealed that from 2014 to 2019, $826,277 was given to the Wuhan Institute of Virology for bat coronavirus research by the NIAID.
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases records showed that it gave nine China-related grants to EcoHealth Alliance to research coronavirus emergence in bats and was the National Institutes of Health’s top issuer of grants to the Wuhan lab itself. The records also included an email from the vice director of the Wuhan Lab asking an NIH official for help finding disinfectants for decontamination of airtight suits and indoor surfaces.
Health and Human Services records included an “urgent for Dr. Fauci” email chain, citing ties between the Wuhan lab and the taxpayer-funded EcoHealth Alliance. The government emails also reported that the foundation of U.S. billionaire Bill Gates worked closely with the Chinese government to pave the way for Chinese-produced medications to be sold outside China and help “raise China’s voice of governance by placing representatives from China on important international councils as high level commitment from China.”
Health and Human Services records included a grant application for research involving the coronavirus that appeared to describe “gain-of-function” research involving RNA extractions from bats, experiments on viruses, attempts to develop a chimeric virus and efforts to genetically manipulate the full-length bat SARSr-CoV WIV1 strain molecular clone.
Health and Human Services records showed the State Department and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases knew immediately in January 2020 that China was withholding Covid-19 data, which was hindering risk assessment and response by public health officials.
University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) records showed the former director of the Galveston National Laboratory at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB), Dr. James W. Le Duc warned Chinese researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology of potential investigations into the Covid issue by Congress.
Health and Human Services records regarding biodistribution studies and related data for the Covid-19 vaccines showed a key component of the vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech, lipid nanoparticles (LNPs), were found outside the injection site, mainly the liver, adrenal glands, spleen and ovaries of test animals, eight to 48 hours after injection.
Records from the Federal Select Agent Program (FSAP) revealed safety lapses and violations at U.S. biosafety laboratories that conduct research on dangerous agents and toxins.
Health and Human Services records included emails between National Institutes of Health (NIH) then-Director Francis Collins and Fauci, the director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, about hydroxychloroquine and Covid-19.
Health and Human Services records showed that National Institutes of Health officials tailored confidentiality forms to China’s terms and that the World Health Organization (WHO) conducted an unreleased, “strictly confidential” Covid-19 epidemiological analysis in January 2020.
Fauci emails included his approval of a press release supportive of China’s response to the 2019 novel coronavirus.
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