Monarez confirmed as CDC director after the withdrawal of Trump’s first candidate

The Senate confirmed the choice of President Donald Trump to direct the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention after his first choice had difficulty obtaining support.

Susan Monarez, a long -standing element in Washington who assumed management positions in a certain number of government public health positions, was confirmed Tuesday by the Senate, crossing another position on the long and growing number of candidates awaiting confirmation.

Monarez was confirmed on a 51 at 47 Party line vote.

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President Donald Trump appointed Dr. Susan Monarez to lead the CDC. (Getty Images | Us Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

In her career of about two decades at DC, she was deputy director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health within the Ministry of Health and Social Services and in roles at the White House, including at the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Security Council.

She is the first director of the CDC to undergo the confirmation process of the Senate after a new law changed the requirement in 2023. Before its confirmation, Monarez had been acting director of the CDC since the beginning of this year.

But Monarez, who has a doctorate. In microbiology and immunology, was not Trump’s first choice to lead the public health agency, which is responsible for protecting Americans from public health threats.

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The Campus des Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta is observed on Wednesday June 25, 2025. (Photo / mike stewart)

Trump called on Monarerez in March shortly after withdrawing his appointment from Dr. David Weldon, a former member of the room, after he was clear that he could not obtain enough votes from the Senate Republicans to cross the finish line.

He praised Monarez’s references and accused the Americans of “losing confidence” in the CDC.

“Dr. Monarez will work in close collaboration with our great secretary for health and social services, Robert Kennedy Jr,” he said on social networks at the time. “Together, they will favor responsibility, high standards and disease prevention to finally treat the epidemic of chronic diseases and make America healthy!”

But the questions also persist on how Monarez and the secretary of health and social services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. could work together.

During her confirmation hearing last month, the Democrats of the Senate burned Monarez to find out if she agreed with Kennedy’s positions on vaccines. Kennedy has long been frank on his skepticism concerning vaccines, in particular COVVI-19 vaccines.

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. arrives at the Ministry of Health in Argentina to meet the Minister of Health Mario Lugons in Buenos Aires, Argentina, May 26, 2025. (Reuters / Pedro Lazaro Fernandez)

The CDC has been affected by thousands of staff and resignation cuts and subject to changes in vaccine policy – including Kennedy’s decision to withdraw the COVVI -19 from the vaccine calendar for pregnant women and healthy children – in the past six months.

“I think vaccines save lives. I think we have to continue to support the promotion of the use of vaccines,” said Monarez during his confirmation audience.

Its confirmation also comes while Kennedy, in his budget request for HHS, is looking for an oblique bar funding for the CDC by almost 50%, or about 9.2 billion to $ 4.2 billion, for the next financial year.

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But Kennedy clearly said in a post X at the time of his appointment that he supports Monarez to hold the position.

“I sorted on the Susan aspect for this work because she is a long-standing champion of Maha values, and a caring, compassionate and brilliant microbiologist and a technological assistant who will redirect the CDC to public health and standard sciences,” he said. “I am very grateful to President Trump for having taken this appointment.”

And an HHS spokesman told Fox News Digital: “Once Dr. Monarez confirmed, the secretary is looking forward to working with her to advance common sense policies that will make America again healthy.”