{"id":22463,"date":"2026-07-30T22:53:51","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T17:53:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=22463"},"modified":"2026-07-30T22:53:51","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T17:53:51","slug":"senate-panel-approves-cdc-nominee-controversial-hhs-pick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=22463","title":{"rendered":"Senate panel approves CDC nominee, controversial HHS pick"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/ykmEOWeidtXq7RRHzo8Gyn9Xk_0=\/0x74:5061x2920\/1366x768\/2026\/07\/23\/1784816409401.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The Senate health committee approved the nomination of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/15\/trump-cdc-nominee-senate-confirmation\" target=\"_blank\">Erica Schwartz<\/a> for Centers for Disease Control director Thursday, a step toward refilling the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/02\/18\/nih-jay-bhattacharya-cdc-director\" target=\"_blank\">depleted ranks<\/a> of the Trump administration&#8217;s health care leadership.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The committee also approved the nomination of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/live-updates\/2026\/07\/15\/congress\/health-emergency-preparedness-nominee-walks-back-comments-skeptical-of-vaccine-safety-00999404\" target=\"_blank\">Sean Kaufman<\/a>, who&#8217;s in line for assistant secretary for preparedness and response and had been in trouble because of past <a href=\"https:\/\/www.statnews.com\/2026\/07\/10\/sean-kaufman-hhs-nominee-past-statements-question-vaccine-safety\/\" target=\"_blank\">anti-vaccine statements<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Why it matters:<\/strong> The votes showed Republicans, at least, are still willing to accept the administration&#8217;s assurances about the nominees even though committee chair Bill Cassidy has made it clear <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/05\/06\/rfk-cassidy-louisiana-primary\" target=\"_blank\">he&#8217;s uneasy<\/a> with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.&#8217;s policies.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<ul>\n<li>The narrow committee endorsements put both nominees in line for votes to be confirmed by the full Senate, which have yet to be scheduled.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>By the numbers:<\/strong> Schwartz was approved 12-10, while Kaufman was approved 12-11.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Driving the news: <\/strong>Cassidy said he got a few concessions from HHS to justify his support for Kaufman, including promises of &#8220;key personnel changes and better oversight to ensure that science and not ideology is driving decision making.&#8221;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;Mr. Kaufman has said some pretty stupid things and irresponsible things regarding immunization. He has owned up to that in his conversations with me,&#8221; Cassidy said.<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;I am assured that if he is confirmed, he will not be involved in vaccine policy.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Cassidy warned that &#8220;there will be future leverage points for this committee over future appointees if these commitments are not kept.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Between the lines: <\/strong>Neither nomination was a slam dunk. The votes were supposed to happen last week, but they had to be postponed because Republicans couldn&#8217;t get enough senators to show up for the vote \u2014 and because they had more questions about Kaufman.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Context:<\/strong> Schwartz faced tough questioning during her July 15 confirmation hearing over whether she could steer clear of political interference and chart a course for the beleaguered public health agency.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>While she vowed to &#8220;never betray the science&#8221; and rebuild trust in the CDC, Schwartz hedged on whether she would tell Congress if she was told to adopt &#8220;unscientific&#8221; or harmful policies, saying she didn&#8217;t believe either President Trump or Kennedy would do that.<\/li>\n<li>Schwartz was Trump&#8217;s third nominee to lead the CDC, following Susan Monarez, who was fired after less than a month in the role claiming she was dismissed for refusing to rubber-stamp Kennedy&#8217;s vaccine policies.<\/li>\n<li>The former deputy surgeon general was viewed as a less polarizing pick than some of Trump&#8217;s past health nominees. Public health experts have said she&#8217;d face challenges stabilizing an agency that&#8217;s lacked a full-time political leader for almost a year and is beset by morale and staffing problems.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Senate health committee approved the nomination of Erica Schwartz for Centers for Disease Control director Thursday, a step toward refilling the depleted ranks of the Trump administration&#8217;s health care leadership. The committee also approved the nomination of Sean Kaufman, who&#8217;s in line for assistant secretary for preparedness and response and had been in trouble&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22464,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/ykmEOWeidtXq7RRHzo8Gyn9Xk_0=\/0x74:5061x2920\/1366x768\/2026\/07\/23\/1784816409401.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}