President Donald Trump has announced his nomination of Dr. Erica Schwartz, a retired Coast Guard rear admiral with deep ties to his first presidential administration, to serve as the permanent director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), filling a leadership vacancy that has stretched on for months.
Schwartz, who brings a multi-disciplinary background to the role, holds a medical degree from Brown University, a law degree from the University of Maryland and a master’s in public health, and spent 24 years in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. During Trump’s first term in office, she served as deputy surgeon general, but departed government service after the 2020 election when the incoming Biden administration passed her over for the acting surgeon general post.
In a post shared on his Truth Social platform, Trump praised the nominee, writing, “It is my honour to nominate the incredibly talented Dr Erica Schwartz, MD, JD, MPH, as my Director of the CDC. She is a star!”
The CDC has operated without a Senate-confirmed director since the September ousting of previous leader Susan Monarez, who was removed just under one month into her tenure following high-profile clashes with U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over his approach to vaccine policy. Monarez later detailed her ousting in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, saying she was fired for refusing to automatically approve vaccine recommendations from a new advisory panel Kennedy stacked with prominent vaccine skeptics. Since Monarez’s departure, National Institutes of Health Director Jay Bhattacharya has filled the role on an interim basis.
Schwartz’s nomination marks the second attempt by the Trump administration to fill the top CDC post. Trump’s first pick, former Florida Congressman Dave Weldon, a longstanding vaccine critic, saw his nomination withdrawn earlier after it became clear he lacked the Senate support needed for confirmation.
The CDC has undergone sweeping upheaval since Kennedy took the helm of the Department of Health and Human Services, including large-scale staff firings and a major restructuring that Kennedy has framed as a necessary effort to cut back on what he calls “bureaucratic sprawl”. Kennedy’s controversial overhauls to national vaccine policy have sparked widespread alarm among the scientific community, including many current and former CDC staffers. A number of senior officials resigned in protest following Monarez’s ousting, and in March a federal judge issued an order blocking the majority of Kennedy’s vaccine policy changes from taking effect.