Trump’s nominee to lead FDA faces questions on vaccines, abortion in Senate hearing

(CNN) — Dr. Heidi Overton, President Trump’s nominee to lead the US Food and Drug Administration, broke with her boss on Thursday, strongly stating that the MMR vaccine was “not lethal” as Trump has claimed, and that it is safe, effective and “our best tool right now in the public health response to the measles outbreak.”

Overton is being questioned by the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee, who will vote on whether to advance her nomination.

In the first round of questions, HELP Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy, a Republican and doctor from Louisiana, pressed her on her recent involvement in Trump’s executive order on vaccines, which aims to scale back the number of vaccinations routinely recommended for children. It also prioritizes splitting up the measles, mumps and rubella, or MMR, vaccine into individual components and says they should be given at separate medical visits — an approach that vaccination experts say would decrease uptake of the vaccine and worsen the nation’s growing number of measles cases.

“Are there any vaccines on the US market right now which are unsafe?” Cassidy asked.

“Every vaccine on the US market right now are safe and effective according to the FDA,” Overton said.

Cassidy then asked what she would do if Trump asked her to do something that goes against science.

“I would give him my best advice, and I would follow the statutory requirements for the role of FDA commissioners regarding individual product determinations for safety and efficacy, and that would be what would guide every decision if confirmed to this role,” Overton said.

Overton’s path to nomination

Before her nomination, Overton has had a powerful but largely behind-the-scenes role in the second Trump administration, serving as deputy assistant for domestic policy, where she oversaw health initiatives for the White House. Thursday’s hearing will be one of the first opportunities for Americans to hear directly from her, and she will probably face tough questions on her support for vaccines as well as access to medication abortion and agency reform.

The last FDA commissioner, Dr. Marty Makary, resigned in May amid intense pressure from the White House. Kyle Diamantas, the acting commissioner who had been the agency’s deputy commissioner for food, repeatedly turned down the position, even when asked directly by Trump, a senior administration official with knowledge of the process previously told CNN.

Overton, a physician, graduated from the University of New Mexico School of Medicine and was a surgical resident at Johns Hopkins University, according to her LinkedIn profile. She’s board-certified in public health and general preventive medicine, according to the American Board of Medical Specialties. At age 37, she would be one of the youngest people ever to lead the FDA.

Overton joined Trump’s first administration as a White House fellow on the Domestic Policy Council during the Covid-19 pandemic. She later finished her Ph.D. in clinical investigation at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She was chief policy officer at the America First Policy Institute, a pro-Trump think tank; other institute staff who have been hired into high-level posts in the second Trump administration include Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins and former Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Overton also has experience as a patient. She recently told representatives from Breakthrough T1D that she lives with type 1 or juvenile diabetes, an autoimmune condition in which the body attacks its own insulin-producing cells in the pancreas. A number of promising cell therapies are in development to treat and potentially even reverse the condition, but progress in the field has been hampered in recent years by a backlog of cell and gene therapies at the FDA. As head of the agency, Overton would be in a position to streamline the process for biotech companies working on new therapies.

An op-ed published in Stat by two former FDA commissioners called her “the right pick in a difficult moment,” saying “Overton has hard work to do but has demonstrated the capacity to be that leader. She knows the challenges she’ll face and what it will take to secure the promise of better public health.”

Questions about nominee’s experience

As commissioner, Overton would be in charge of a behemoth of an agency. The FDA has about 16,000 staffers and a roughly $7 billion annual budget. FDA regulated products account for about 20 cents of every dollar spent by consumers. The FDA has been hit hard by the Trump administration’s reduction-in-force cuts, losing more than 4,600 workers since 2024, according to Office of Personnel Management data.

Despite her close ties to the White House, she isn’t a shoo-in for the role. Cassidy has said he was concerned about her limited experience.

“While I respect Dr. Overton’s experience as a physician, I have strong concerns about her nomination to be FDA Commissioner. Her lack of managerial experience does not prepare her well for leading a large organization that is already dealing with staffing and morale issues,” Cassidy posted on social media.

Cassidy also decried Overton’s participation in Trump’s recent “nonsensical” executive order on vaccines, which included a call to split the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine into separate shots given at separate medical appointments. Overton stood behind the president as he introduced the order and spoke afterward, explaining legal measures that were designed to force states to adopt the administration’s policies. Her participation, Cassidy said, calls into question her commitment to stand up for sound science and children’s health. “That alone is almost disqualifying,” he wrote.

Others went even further. Dr. Peter Lurie, a former FDA official who is now president of the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest, said Overton’s alignment with the president’s plans to scale back vaccinations for children and split some vaccines into separate shots should be “fully disqualifying.”

Lurie also voiced concerns about Overton’s lack of experience.

“The Food and Drug Administration has shed thousands of employees, including food safety inspectors, and is struggling to keep up with food recalls and outbreaks of foodborne illness. Despite efforts to frantically re-staff, this is an agency in crisis. This is no time for a commissioner who needs on-the-job training,” he said in a statement.

Although some may be skeptical of her qualifications, Overton clearly has the president’s support.

“Dr. Heidi has been a ROCKSTAR in my Administration, where she has worked directly with Secretary Kennedy, Dr. Oz, and team, to deliver on the MOST TRANSFORMATIVE Health Agenda in History. She is known to take on the HARDEST issues, and bring me solutions that work best for the Country… She is SMART and RESPECTED by all!” Trump said in a Truth Social post announcing her nomination last month.

Overton on the issues

As FDA commissioner, Overton would be in charge of the nation’s drug policy, including the agency’s approval of mifepristone, one of two medications taken to induce abortions, which is currently the subject of ongoing litigation.

One of the stated goals of Project 2025, a document created by the conservative Heritage Foundation that has become the basis of many of the Trump administration’s policies during his second term, is to more tightly restrict access to mifepristone or to revoke FDA approval for the drug altogether.

While at the American First Policy Institute, Overton cheered the US Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, calling it a “huge victory for life.” She’s also the author of policy brief that called medication abortions “dangerous to women,” despite decades of evidence showing that abortion medications are safe and effective, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

These views have already alienated some members of the HELP Committee.

“Heidi Overton is a far-right, anti-abortion extremist who has no business leading the FDA,” Sen. Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington, said on social media. “I will vote no.”

Her role in the White House had her working closely with US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., as well as with other government agencies.

But her work on some of president’s initiatives has also put her in the crosshairs of wellness influencers who accused Overton of crafting a February executive order that protects the supply of the weed killer glyphosate, or Roundup, and gives legal protections to its manufacturers, saying it is vital to national security.

The order was immediately blasted by the “Make America Healthy Again” movement as a betrayal of promises by Kennedy to curb the use of harmful pesticides in the US.

In August, Alex Clark, a conservative podcaster, “wellness girlie” and contributor to Turning Point USA, told her 166,000 followers on X to ask their senators not to vote for Overton to run the FDA.

“Heidi WROTE the disastrous glyphosate executive order this year. She has EXTENSIVE personal ties to Bayer. This is the OPPOSITE of what we were promised when the President said we’d be getting corruption out of our 3 letter agencies,” Clark posted.

Her post drew a response from the White House press office. “This is not true,” spokesperson Kush Desai wrote. “The ‘glyphosate executive order’ originated with the national security team.”

Overton was brought in at the end of the process, he said, and pushed “as many MAHA-minded edits as possible to a mostly-baked EO.”

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