The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Susan Monarez was fired on Wednesday by the Trump administration after she refused to resign from her position.
“When CDC Director Susan Monarez refused to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives and fire dedicated health experts, she chose protecting the public over serving a political agenda. For that, she has been targeted,” said her lawyers, Mark Zaid and Abbe Lowell.
“Dr. Monarez has neither resigned nor received notification from the White House that she has been fired, and as a person of integrity and devoted to science, she will not resign,” added the attorneys.
The White House then announced Monarez had been fired.
“As her attorney’s statement makes abundantly clear, Susan Monarez is not aligned with the President’s agenda of Making America Healthy Again. Since Susan Monarez refused to resign despite informing HHS leadership of her intent to do so, the White House has terminated Monarez from her position with the CDC,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said.
After the news of Monarez’s firing became public, several other top CDC leaders announced they were also stepping down.
Among those who quit: Dr. Debra Houry, the chief medical officer; Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases; Dr. Daniel Jernigan, the director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases; and Dr. Jen Layden, director of the Office of Public Health Data, Surveillance and Technology.
“I am not able to serve in this role any longer because of the ongoing weaponizing of public health,” Daskalakis wrote in a letter.
Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime anti-vaccine activist, has been a controversial figure to lead the agency. He has cut $500 million in contracts focused on developing mRNA vaccines, which the scientific community and former government officials disagree with.
