A highly credentialed Black woman has made history at an agency in turmoil — and the central question is whether she will have the independence to lead it.
The Senate on Wednesday confirmed Dr. Erica Schwartz as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the agency mandated to protect Americans’ health from preventable threats. She’s the first Black woman to head the agency, and fills a critical public health position.
Schwartz takes over a CDC that has been without a permanent director for nearly a year and has endured significant staff reductions and leadership turmoil under the Trump administration. Her confirmation also comes amid questions about whether she will be willing to challenge Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on vaccines and other public health policies.
Confirmed on a party-line vote, Schwartz becomes the 22nd leader of the agency and the second Black American. Dr. David Satcher was the agency’s first Black director from 1993 to 1998. He later became the nation’s 16th surgeon general.
Schwartz brings an unusual combination of medical, legal and military experience to the job. She holds medical and law degrees and spent much of her career in the U.S. Coast Guard, where she oversaw a health care system of 41 clinics and 150 sick bays. She also served as deputy U.S. surgeon general.
The CDC was reputedly the gold standard in public health care and was known for helping to end the polio epidemic and all but eradicating measles from the U.S. and a significant part of the world. But under the Trump administration, the agency has lost more than a quarter of its workforce during rounds of mass firings, primarily aimed at new and temporary workers.
Five of the agency’s top-level staffers — including a Black health equity specialist—were dismissed after appearing on a right-wing “DEI Watchlist.”
Schwartz is the third nominee for CDC director in the past 18 months. Since then, there have been a series of HHS officials as acting CDC directors.
In a statement, Dr. Georges C. Benjamin, chief executive officer of the American Public Health Association, said Schwartz “possesses the medical background and public health knowledge” to lead the CDC after a tumultuous two years.
The agency “desperately needs stability, experienced leadership and a steadfast commitment to science” and Schwartz fits the bill, he said. The APHA, Benjamin added, will work with Schwartz “to rebuild trust in public health leaders” and “improve the public’s health by preventing and controlling diseases and injuries so that everyone can live their healthiest lives.”
Concerns about independence
Despite her extensive credentials, Schwartz’s nomination hit a speed bump last month when Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican, and other lawmakers pressed Schwartz on whether she would challenge Kennedy on vaccine policy.
Schwartz’s responses didn’t imbue confidence.
Though Benjamin’s statement gives Schwartz the benefit of the doubt, several public health advocates weren’t as heartened by her confirmation and the National Public Health Coalition opposed it.
Shaughnessy Naughton, president of the nonprofit 314 Action, has called Schwartz “a loyal foot soldier” for Trump and Kennedy — a worrisome assessment as “dangerous outbreaks spread across the country, threatening our schools, our farmers, and our children.”
The nation needs “public health leaders who are willing to stand up to Trump, RFK Jr. and their co-conspirators, and put science back in charge,” Naughton said in a statement. “Dr. Schwartz should have been a step in the right direction” but failed to differentiate herself from “the Trump agenda.”
“If she couldn’t answer basic questions honestly and directly before Congress, it’s difficult to imagine how she can serve effectively,” Naughton said. “Americans deserve a leader who will defend public health and follow the science, even when it’s politically inconvenient.”
As the nation confronts six foodborne illness outbreaks, including two outbreaks of cyclosporiasis food contamination that have sickened thousands and killed two Americans, the position of Food and Drug Administration commissioner is still vacant.
The previous commissioner, Marty Makary, resigned from the role in mid-May after serving for just 13 months. Kyle Diamantas, who had been the FDA’s Deputy Commissioner for Food, is currently serving as Acting Commissioner.
No formal nomination for FDA Commissioner has been sent to the Senate.