On Thursday, July 30, John McGuire — the congressman for Virginia's 5th District — went on Newsmax's Wake Up America Early to talk about Anthony Fauci.
Here is what he said, word for word:
"I don't know if you heard about the BLT sandwich using human fetus baby parts in the vaccine when they could have used ivermectin. But maybe they're helping Big Pharma get rich."
That's a sitting member of Congress. On the House Oversight Committee. Saying the COVID vaccine contained pieces of babies.
Let's take it one piece at a time
The vaccine did not contain human fetal parts. Not "probably not." Not "there's a debate." FactCheck.org went through this years ago: neither fetal cells nor fetal tissue are present in any of the vaccines. Cell lines that originated from fetal tissue decades ago were used in the lab during development and testing — the same cell lines used to test ordinary medicines like acetaminophen. The vaccines themselves are purified. No new abortions were involved in any part of it.
The "BLT" thing isn't a sandwich, and it has nothing to do with vaccines. McGuire appears to have picked up a garbled version of something Sen. Joni Ernst said the day before at the Senate's Fauci hearing. She was talking about "humanized mice" — lab mice researchers nicknamed BLT-L mice because they carry human liver, thymus, and lung tissue, so scientists can study infectious disease in something closer to a human immune system.
Research mice. Not an ingredient. Not in the shot. McGuire heard "BLT," pictured a sandwich, and put it on television.
Ivermectin does not treat COVID. This isn't a matter of opinion either. The federally funded ACTIV-6 trial tested it on thousands of patients — first at a standard dose, then at a higher dose for six days — and published the results in JAMA. No benefit. Not on symptoms, not on hospitalizations, not on emergency room visits.
So in two sentences, McGuire got three separate things wrong, and every one of them was checkable before he opened his mouth.
Why this is not just an embarrassing clip
It would be easy to laugh this off. Don't.
McGuire sits on the House Oversight Committee. That committee's entire job is to investigate — to look at evidence, weigh it, and tell the public what's true. A member who cannot tell the difference between a lab mouse and a vaccine ingredient is not equipped to evaluate anything, and he is voting on our health care anyway.
And he has been voting on our health care.
McGuire voted for the One Big Beautiful Bill knowing that more than 35,000 Virginians in his own district could lose their health coverage. Nine rural health clinics in Virginia were flagged as at risk of closing. Augusta Medical Group already shut three of them ahead of the cuts.
That is the real health care story in Virginia's 5th District. Thirty-five thousand of his neighbors losing coverage. Clinics closing in small towns where the next-nearest doctor is an hour away.
He has time for a Newsmax hit about fetus sandwiches. He does not have time to explain that.
He doesn't take the questions
When a Charlottesville station tried to ask him about rising health care costs, McGuire dodged.
He does not hold in-person town halls. He holds telephone town halls with pre-screened questions. In April 2025, constituents got so frustrated they held an "empty-seat town hall" — a thousand people showed up to an event their own congressman skipped. In December 2025, protesters were still demanding that he meet them face to face about health care costs and grocery prices.
There's a pattern here, and it isn't stupidity. It's a choice about audiences. In front of a friendly cable host, McGuire will say anything. In front of the people who have to live with his votes, he says nothing at all.
The rest of the record
This is the same John McGuire who, as a Virginia state senator in 2024, was the only vote against banning child marriage — the lone "no" in a 39-to-1 decision. Asked why, he explained: "We need more families. If a young man and a young girl get pregnant, they need to have a marriage."
He also has a 0% lifetime score from the League of Conservation Voters.
A man who believes a lab mouse is a sandwich ingredient is now helping decide whether 35,000 of his neighbors keep their doctor. That's not a punchline. That's the job he asked for, and the one he's up for re-election to keep.
Source
Chris Graham, "John McGuire thinks COVID vaccine was a 'BLT sandwich of fetus baby parts'", Augusta Free Press, July 31, 2026. Photo: The Old Major / Shutterstock, via Augusta Free Press.
