Joe Biden's blanket pardon of Dr. Anthony Fauci covers federal crimes committed between January 1, 2014, and January 19, 2025. Every last one of them. It does not, however, cover the state of Florida.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier just announced a state-level investigation into the former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director — and there's not a single thing that presidential pardon can do about it.
"Fauci's lack of candor to Congress is unbelievable," Uthmeier said. "My office is launching an investigation into Dr. Fauci. It's past time we get the truth of what happened during COVID."
The announcement came after Fauci's diary had been released showcasing the former top doctor's obsession with being famous and showing how he believed one thing in private but said the opposite in public, especially when it came to the lab leak theory, closing the schools, and masking.
The move was cheered by other state prosecutor's after Dr. Fauci refused to answer every singel question in his Wednesday hearing. Senators asked his what color his tie was and if he could tell them what color the carpet was, but to every question Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right not incriminate himself.
Fauci's invocations of the Fifth Amendment carries its own implications. Contempt of Congress can carry a one-year jail term, and while a pardon might theoretically cover past instances, it can't pre-pardon future testimony. Every time Fauci sits in front of a microphone under oath, he's operating without a net.
Here's how the legal architecture works. A presidential pardon is a federal instrument. It shields the recipient from federal prosecution. State attorneys general operate under state constitutions, state criminal codes, and state jurisdiction. Biden's pardon doesn't reach into Tallahassee any more than a Florida fishing license works in Montana.
The investigation will focus on pandemic-era policies that shuttered small businesses and closed schools across Florida — the kind of sweeping decisions that affected millions of people and were driven, in large part, by Fauci's guidance from Washington. Governor Ron DeSantis pushed back harder than any governor in the country during the lockdowns. Now his state's attorney general is following up with subpoena power.
The "pardon solves everything" crowd skipped a few pages in their constitutional law textbook. Federal pardons have always been limited to federal offenses. That's not a loophole — it's the design. The framers built a system where power is distributed, and no single act from Washington can shut down accountability at every level of government. Federalism, as it turns out, has teeth.
Some legal commentators will inevitably argue that a state investigation is political theater — that Florida is overreaching. That's an interesting position to take about an attorney general exercising the exact jurisdiction his office was created to exercise, investigating conduct that affected every resident of his state.
Biden signed that pardon like he was closing a book. Uthmeier just opened it back up to a chapter Biden forgot existed.