In April, the museum—which is located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin—released its first Dr. Fauci figurine. Although the museum made 42,020 copies of the figure, it quickly sold out becoming the best-selling bobblehead in the museum’s history.
The museum is now selling two new Fauci figurines on pre-order: one $25 figurine shows him smiling and wearing either a red- or blue-tie, and a second $30 figurine shows him making a facepalm gesture, something he appeared to do at an early White House coronavirus briefing after Republican President Donald Trump mentioned “the Deep State Department”—Fauci claimed he was only trying to discreetly eat a throat lozenge.
The facepalm Fauci figurine will have 2,020 copies available for purchase.
The museum will donate $5 from the purchase of every seven-inch tall Fauci figurine to the American Hospital Association’s “Protect the Heroes Campaign” to support the 100 Million Mask Challenge, a campaign to rapidly produce personal protective equipment (PPE) on a large scale for U.S. health care workers on the front lines of the ongoing coronavirus epidemic.
The original Dr. Fauci Bobblehead raised over $200,000 towards that effort. The museum’s additional sales of figurines depicting Coronavirus Task Force co-member Dr. Deborah Birx, former Director of the Ohio Department of Health Dr. Amy Acton, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and the Essential Hero series (featuring figurines of Black and white healthcare workers) raised $70,000 for the effort as well.
A Bobblehead is a collectible figurine with a head that is often oversized in comparison to its body. The head is often connected by a spring or hook that causes the head to bounce if it’s tapped or gently jostled.
Fauci gained notoriety after the epidemic began for publicly contradicting the president’s assertions about COVID-19 including Trump’s assertion that antimalarial drugs can possibly treat coronavirus and Trump’s repeated claims that the virus will disappear by itself at some point.
Admirers have publicly approached Fauci, offering praise and requesting his autograph. He has also become a target of suspicion on right-wing websites such as The American Thinker which referred to him as a “deep-state Hillary Clinton-loving stooge” and The Gateway Pundit which accused him of trying “to destroy the U.S. economy based on total guesses and hysterical predictions.”
