Senators expressed their concerns about Weldon to the White House, and his nomination was pulled just an hour before a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing was set to begin.
The White House decision to abandon Weldon’s nomination represents a rare setback for the Trump administration, which has been able to wrangle Congress to confirm all of the president’s Cabinet picks, with the exception of his first choice for attorney general, former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), who withdrew from consideration in November amid bipartisan criticism.
What went wrong for Weldon: Multiple senators pointed to Weldon’s past comments and views that were highly critical of vaccine safety.
During his time in Congress and in the years since he left office in 2009, Weldon has raised questions about the safety of vaccines and their potential links to autism, a claim that has been debunked by numerous studies.
“Some of us who had some concerns with [Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s] previous statements got past that because we believed that scientists running some of these three-letter health agencies are going to be driven by data, are going to be driven by science,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) told reporters.
Tillis said Weldon’s “past comments have raised enough questions” to sow doubts whether policies at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would be driven by science.
Kennedy is also a longtime vaccine critic and expressed similar views to Weldon’s but was confirmed with near-unanimous GOP support.
But the political risk in opposing Weldon was minor. Kennedy has a major popular following as the face of the "Make America Healthy Again" movement, as well as the personal support of President Trump.
Weldon is an ex-congressman who was practicing medicine in relative political obscurity before Trump tapped him to lead the CDC, reportedly at the behest of Kennedy.
Weldon’s downfall was also driven by a general lack of preparation, sources said.
His meetings with senators, where he was meant to discuss his priorities for the job and convince lawmakers he was up to the task of running CDC, went poorly.
One source described a meeting with Senate staff members where Weldon did not know the authorities of the CDC director and was not able to articulate his vision or priorities for the agency.
When pressed on his apparent lack of preparation, Weldon indicated he had been too busy transferring patients out of his medical practice in case he was confirmed, they added.
