Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-ME) makes remarks during a hearing in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on July 09, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Breakthrough T1D)
Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine said the Trump administration’s firing of the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Susan Monarez late Wednesday warrants congressional oversight, echoing bipartisan leaders of the Senate committee dealing with health policy.
“While I recognize that the CDC Director serves at the pleasure of the President, I am alarmed that she has been fired after only three weeks on the job,” Collins said in a statement.
Monarez reportedly refused to sign off on changes to vaccines or the firing of other agency leaders from Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s hand-picked panel of vaccine advisers before she was ousted on Wednesday via a social media post made by HHS, which oversees the CDC. Earlier that day, Kennedy announced that the Food and Drug Administration restricted eligibility for COVID-19 vaccines.
When asked whether she stands by her vote to confirm Kennedy, Collins told Maine Morning Star that she doesn’t expect to agree with any cabinet official’s decisions all of the time, regardless of party.
“I do not agree with Secretary Kennedy’s approach to the vaccine advisory committee,” Collins said, referring to Kennedy ousting the entire 17-person committee who he replaced with his own picks, which she said “is likely to weaken the independent and professional recommendations of the committee.”
“But, I do believe that he has some valid points about ultra-processed foods and their impact on obesity and the health of many Americans,” Collins added.
The Maine Democratic Party was quick to accuse Collins of hypocrisy.
“RFK Jr.’s crusade to undermine science and American health was well-documented and his anti-vaccine, anti-science views have been clear for years – and yet Collins voted to confirm him anyway,” spokesperson Tommy Garcia said in a statement Thursday. “Now, her false outrage at his partisan firings at the CDC is falling flat to Mainers who will hold her responsible for supporting him.”
Collins voted to confirm Monarez, who was sworn in as director on July 31. The senator called Monarez “a highly capable scientist who brought a wealth of experience to the agency.”
Collins also raised alarm about the resignations of other senior CDC officials, allegedly in protest of Kennedy’s broader policy moves.
“Her departure has triggered the immediate resignation of four long-time experts at the agency, who will not be easily replaced, and who are respected worldwide,” Collins said.
Collins said she spoke with Monarez Wednesday night and agreed with Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy — chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, who posted on social media that the firing “will require oversight by the HELP Committee.” Cassidy also voted to confirm both Monarez and Kennedy, the latter after Kennedy made several assurances to him about maintaining vaccine policy.
Hours after HHS wrote on social media that Monarez was no longer running the CDC, her attorneys posted that she hadn’t been fired or resigned, but didn’t announce whether they plan to sue the Trump administration.
“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,” Mark S. Zaid and Abbe David Lowell wrote. “For that, she has been targeted. 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.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a briefing that Trump had every right to fire Monarez and that he expects to pick a new nominee “very soon.”
“Her lawyers’ statement made it abundantly clear themselves that she was not aligned with the president’s mission to make America healthy again,” Leavitt said.
Monarez was President Donald Trump’s second choice for CDC director. He originally selected former Florida U.S. Rep. Dave Weldon to run the CDC shortly after he secured election to the Oval Office in November. But the White House pulled Weldon’s nomination in March, after it appeared he couldn’t secure the votes needed for confirmation.