The Trump administration is facing rare bipartisan pushback
for firing the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC), amid turmoil at the US’ top infectious disease agency that prompted
dozens of staff to walk out of its headquarters in protest on Thursday.
The White House has said Susan Monarez, who was confirmed as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just a month ago, was fired as she was “not aligned with the president’s agenda” – only for Monarez to refuse to depart. The official’s lawyers have said that, as a Senate-confirmed appointee, only Donald Trump himself can remove her….
Monarez was reportedly fired by Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US
health secretary, for refusing to remove agency officials and committing to
restricting proven vaccines....
“We are witnessing a full-blown war on science, on public health, and on truth itself,” (Senator Bernie) Sanders said. “In just six months, Secretary Kennedy has dismantled the vaccine review process, narrowed access to life-saving Covid vaccines and filled scientific advisory boards with conspiracy theorists and ideologues.”
As explained by Trump chronicler Michael Wolff, Mr. Kennedy was nominated for Health and Human Services secretary so that Donald Trump, responsible in his first term for Operation Warp Speed, could shore up the anti-Covid vaccine portion of his base. He is as much a public health menace as Senator Sanders maintains and the upheaval at the CDC ratches up the danger. Things turned silly, generously speaking:
The Trump administration shows no sign of backing down, however. In a press briefing on Thursday, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, criticized one of the departing CDC officials for using the term “pregnant people” in his resignation letter.
“I understand there were a few other individuals who resigned after the firing of Ms Monarez,” she said. “One of those individuals wrote in his departure statement that he identifies pregnant women as pregnant people, so that’s not someone we want in this administration anyway.”
The official, Demetre Daskalakis, resigned from his position as director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the CDC on Wednesday, accusing the administration of using the agency to “generate policies and materials that do not reflect scientific reality and are designed to hurt rather than to improve the public’s health”.
Daskalakis responded to Leavitt’s remarks in an interview on CNN. “I find it outrageous that this administration is trying to erase transgender people,” he said.
“I very specifically used the term pregnant people, and very specifically added my pronouns at the end of my resignation letter to make the point that I am defying this terrible strategy at trying to erase people and not allowing them to express their identities.
“So I accept the note from the press secretary and I counter that with: I don’t care.”
This is just such a stupid argument. Speaking of which...
Call me crazy, but if you tell me men can get pregnant, you have ZERO credibility with me on anything to do with health.
— Scott Jennings (@ScottJenningsKY) August 29, 2025
Why would I listen to a word you say if you fail basic biology?
Once again, I find myself being screamed at for taking the top side of a 97-3 issue 🤷♂️ pic.twitter.com/xnJgJrJiyK
Jennings began by complaining "I just have to say, he did use the term 'pregnant people.'" In the interests of parsimony, I will, uncharacteristically, keep it short: "pregnant people" is a silly term.
The phrase is "pregnant women" or, in some instances, "women who are pregnant." And that goes aside from the issue of whether it is currently, or will be in the future, possible for men to get pregnant.
Demetre Daskalakis, the CDC official with the great surname, should have made his remarks without invoking "pregnant people," which served only to give Karoline Leavitt an opportunity to twist the issue and stir up more hatred and divisiveness. It was a shout out to the anti-LGBTQIA portion of the GOP basis, valuable because it's an issue which Trump, he of the whatever is in the Epstein files, does not want to deal with.
If Jennings had merely called for clear and unambiguous language shorn of political correctness, he would have been sensible. However, as someone wishing and hoping that the Big Guy in Washington will give him a blessing for a Senate run to replace the retiring Mitch McConnell, the Kentuckian couldn't leave it at that once Leavitt idiotically commented that because Daskalakis "identifies pregnant women as pregnant people, so that's not someone we want in this administration, anyway."
Host Abby Philip is somewhat disingenuous but in relevant part correct when she rhetorically asks Jennings
Are you serious- that of all the things we're talking about here- immunization, vaccines, autism, research on communicable diseases, on cancer. Are you- are the most concerned about someone's use of the word "people?" That's the most important issue?
Actually, Jennings was concerned about the phrase "pregnant people," rather than the word "people," and he has a right to be. Still, Philip came very close to the heart of the problem fundamental to Jennings' objection. All these matters- immunization, vaccines, autism, communicable diseases, cancer, and research on these and others- are far more important than language.
Or at least in this case. Jennings responds to Philip "because you were just complaining about the politicization of science and I can't think of- I can't think of politicization of science more than that."
Yes, he can. Daskalakis would have been politicizing science if the issue had been transgenderism. However, in his bold and thorough (nine paragraphs, 115 lines) emailed resignation letter, Daskalakis addressed that issue only once, citing "the recklessness of the administration in their effort to erase transgender populations." His only reference to "pregnant people" came in a different context.
Which is to say: the LGBTQIA issue was peripheral to his resignation and "pregnant people" nearly irrelevant. Yet, it was central to Jennings and Leavitt. Long gone are the days when conservative Republicans railed against "political correctness"; a good thing, too, because that's exactly what those two are leaning upon when they get bent out of shape with the use of a term, "pregnant people," largely incidental to the topic. Science wasn't being politicized; language was being politicized, and even I don't consider that a crime.
There also was a time when the right believed in merit, or at least claimed to do so. Yet, here was the press secretary for a Republican president maintaining that the spoken word, a reference to "pregnant people," disqualified someone for a job; and a GOP strategist arguing that someone who uses the wrong language is proof he is ignorant on other, unrelated subjects.
On the other hand, Karoline Leavitt seems to be back conspicuously displaying a cross, so she is on God's side and right about everything and I'll deny I ever criticized her.
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