President Donald Trump’s pick for surgeon general cleared a major hurdle Wednesday as the Senate health committee voted to advance her nomination to the floor.
In a 12-11 party line vote, Nicole Saphier — a former Fox News contributor and radiologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York — took a step closer to becoming the nation’s top doctor. The move marks Trump’s third attempt to fill the role. The nomination of Casey Means, who is influential in the Make America Healthy Again movement, stalled in the Senate earlier this year, and Trump last year withdrew the nomination of Janette Nesheiwat.
The 12-11 vote on Saphier also included two other health nominees.
During a hearing earlier this month, Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana), a physician who chairs the panel, repeatedly questioned Saphier on her views on vaccines. She said that she does “not believe childhood vaccines cause autism” after Cassidy initially accused her of leaving wiggle room in her response.
Under questioning from Cassidy, Saphier said she did not believe the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine to be lethal, calling it “our greatest tool for combating measles infections.” Last month, Trump said that the combined MMR shot could possibly be “quite lethal” without citing scientific evidence.
The vote included advancing the nomination of Timothy Westlake, Trump’s pick to head the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, which leads policy efforts on mental health and addiction. He is a board-certified emergency physician. It also included one more health nominee, Mary Lazare to be assistant secretary for aging.
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