UPDATE (March 19, 2025, 5:11 p.m. ET): This post has been updated with additional details.
In Donald Trump’s second term, his first humiliating personnel fiasco came early on: He chose former Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz to serve as attorney general, and the scandal-plagued Floridian withdrew from consideration after just eight days. The second came soon after: Trump chose a different Florida Republican, Chad Chronister, to lead the Drug Enforcement Administration, and he withdrew after three days.
The list has now grown to three, as another Republican from Florida exits the stage. NBC News reported:
The White House has withdrawn the nomination of former Rep. Dave Weldon, R-Fla., whom President Donald Trump had chosen to serve as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a senior administration official said. The development came just before Weldon was set to testify at his Senate confirmation hearing at 10 a.m. ET before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
The news was first reported by Axios.
There’s been no official explanation for why Weldon’s nomination collapsed, at least not yet, but for those concerned about public health and scientific integrity, the withdrawal is welcome news.
As we discussed late last year, Trump chose a variety of controversial figures for key public health positions, but Weldon was one of the toughest to defend. As far as the president was concerned, the CDC should be led by a longtime opponent of vaccines, who refused to abandon false theories, even in the face of overwhelming evidence.
As the nation addresses serious challenges related to bird flu and a measles outbreak, among other public health threats, the idea of a far-right former congressman who believes bizarre things about vaccines was, to put it mildly, unsettling.
As for why the White House agreed to pull the plug on the misguided nomination, NBC News reported that he simply didn’t have the votes to even clear committee in the Senate. Why some Senate Republicans were comfortable with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist with his own ridiculous beliefs about science, medicine, and public health, who is now health and human services secretary — but not Weldon is unclear. Asked for his reaction to the developments, Weldon told The New York Times, “It is a shock, but, you know, in some ways, it’s relief.” Oddly enough, I had roughly the same reaction to the demise of his nomination.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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