Anthony Fauci’s Washington
The Atlantic examines the personal diaries of Dr. Anthony Fauci, suggesting they reveal a self-absorbed culture within Washington D.C. The piece highlights the political fallout as the diaries are used by critics to challenge Fauci's credibility regarding the pandemic.
Why it matters
The article reflects ongoing political polarization surrounding public health figures and the scrutiny of government officials' private records.
His diary seems to confirm everyone’s worst suspicions about D.C. as a cesspool of self-regard.
Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Anastasiia Zhuravel / Getty; CSA Images / Getty; Drew Angerer / Getty July 31, 2026, 9 AM ET Share Save Meeting your heroes can be demoralizing. Reading more than 1,000 pages of their personal diary can be worse. Or, alternatively, totally riveting, at least in that rubbernecking-at-a-car-crash kind of way—the car crash, in this case, being one of most storied careers in the history of American science.
That’s been my takeaway after cringing my way through the pandemic-era musings of Dr. Anthony Fauci, which the former chief of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases inexplicably saved on a government server.
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