In the midst of a deep crisis: Trump's choice for FDA Commissioner
Dr. Heidi Overton, a senior health policy advisor at the White House, is expected to lead the FDA. The appointment comes about three months after the resignation of Dr. Marty Makary and in the midst of a leadership crisis at the agency, which has lost more than 3,000 employees over the past year.
President Donald Trump is expected to appoint Dr. Heidi Overton, a senior White House official, as the next Commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), sources familiar with the matter told several media outlets. The appointment comes as the FDA faces an acute crisis, with more than 3,000 employees, including division heads, having left in the past year.
If confirmed, Dr. Overton will continue a decades-long tradition of appointing physicians to lead the agency. She would succeed Dr. Marty Makary, who resigned last May under heavy pressure from the White House following a turbulent tenure marked by mass layoffs and public disputes with pharmaceutical companies and lawmakers.
Who is Heidi Overton?
Dr. Heidi Overton is a physician by training and currently serves as Deputy Director of the Domestic Policy Council at the White House, where she has played a central role in formulating the administration's health policy. She holds a medical degree from the University of New Mexico, completed a general surgery residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital, and earned a doctorate in clinical research from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
During Trump's first term, she served at the Office of American Innovation and later as Chief Policy Director at the America First Policy Institute. Notably, Overton and her predecessor, Makary, have a long-standing professional relationship; in 2017, they co-authored an opinion piece in the BMJ journal regarding the opioid crisis.
Criticism from the MAHA movement
Despite strong support within the White House, her appointment may raise concerns among supporters of the "Make America Healthy Again" (MAHA) movement, led by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Some are wary of her involvement in earlier White House decisions that distanced the administration from the more controversial parts of Kennedy's agenda, particularly regarding vaccines.
Sources familiar with the dynamics suggest it remains to be seen how Overton and Kennedy will work together if she moves from the White House to the FDA, which is formally subordinate to the Department of Health. Last week, Overton stood behind Trump as he signed an executive order calling for the reduction of the childhood vaccination program and the splitting of the MMR vaccine into three separate doses—a move experts say could take years to implement.
If Trump officially nominates Overton, it will trigger a confirmation battle before the Senate Health Committee, which is expected to be as turbulent as the recent confirmation of CDC head Dr. Erika Schwartz.
