Big shakeup at the CDC results in suits filed against Trump

The last 24 hours or so at the CDC have been rather interesting.

When CDC Director Susan Monarez was confirmed, I was very worried about conflict between her and HHS Secretary Kennedy.

It did not take long to happen, with Monarez being asked to resign a month in, declining, and now fighting Trump with a Biden-family attorney.

Fired

Reports started to surface on Wednesday that Monarez had resigned her position, but she had apparently only been asked to resign.

She declined, at which point she was reportedly terminated, but she is fighting that as well, which I will get more into in a second.

More important right now is the why, as she is claiming that the CDC is being politicized.

She is also not alone, as several other high-ranking officials in the CDC have decided to walk.

Mass Exodus

Demetre C. Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases; Daniel Jernigan, director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases; CDC Chief Medical Officer Debra Houry; and Jen Layden, director of the Office of Public Health Data, Surveillance and Technology, have all decided to leave.

Daskalakis shared his resignation letter, where her referred to “pregnant people” instead of pregnant women or mothers, and railed about Trump trying to exterminate the transgender community.

I found that particularly interesting because when I was in school, science taught us about two genders, based on your chromosomes. In other words, this was not something that changed merely because someone feels like a woman or a man.

His letter went on to say, “I am not able to serve in this role any longer because of the ongoing weaponizing of public health.”

He’s back

Abbe Lowell, who defended Hunter Biden, is now all over the news. He was recently hired by fired Federal Governor Lisa Cook, and Monarez has also retained him to defend her position.

This is a problem for Trump, as it was fairly predictable that Monarez was going to be a problem with Kennedy, so I am not sure who recommended her or why Trump moved forward with her nomination.

She clearly supported vaccines, and I would think that would be a basic question to ask if she was going to be working hand-in-hand with Kennedy.

Keep in mind, this whole mess got started when Kennedy announced that the FDA had changed its rules on who was eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, limiting it to high-risk individuals. And while this was taking place, it was announced that COVID is breaking out again, mostly among the southern states, such as Texas, that have pushed back against the vaccine. This, my friends, is what I like to call a hot mess.