Fox News anchor Neil Cavuto rallied to the defense of Dr. Anthony Fauci on Tuesday, saying conservatives’ attacks against the nation’s top infectious disease expert are unfair and lamenting that Fauci has been “vilified” like “Lex Luthor.”

Cavuto’s full-throated defense of Fauci could be seen as a not-so-subtle swipe at his Fox News colleagues who have led the charge in denigrating the public health expert over the past year.

During a Senate hearing on Tuesday morning, Fauci lashed out against Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) after the Kentucky lawmaker accused him of lying to Congress about his personal involvement in funding so-called gain-of-function research in Wuhan. Fauci, who has tangled with Paul several times throughout the pandemic, told the senator that he didn’t know what he was talking about.

Describing the spat between Fauci and Paul as a “circus,” Cavuto then turned to Dr. Bob Lahita of St. Joseph University Hospital, who has worked with Fauci in the past. Cavuto asked if the right-wing “pile-on is fair” against the director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

“No, I don’t, Neil. I don’t think the pile-on is fair,” Lahita replied, adding that Fauci is “a very professional man” and “very ethical.”

Agreeing with Lahita’s assessment that Fauci’s medical advice has been trusted across several presidential administrations, Cavuto bemoaned that Republicans and conservatives have made Fauci into a cartoonish villain.

“He has been vilified to the point that you’d think he was Lex Luthor,” the Fox anchor sighed. “I don’t know how productive that is.”

Cavuto continued: “What might have been missed and the source of all of this, I get that. But to make him the target of attacks, I think that a lot of this has to go back to his departure from the former president, Donald Trump at the time. But whatever is behind it, I don’t see it being constructive.”

Lahita heaped further praise on Fauci, calling the chief Biden medical adviser “an excellent doctor” while saying “it’s unfortunate that we have to attack an individual who has such an important role in our society.”

“At his core, he’s a good man, a good doctor,” Cavuto concluded.