RALEIGH — President Joe Biden issued a press release June 16 officially announcing “his intent” to choose Dr. Mandy Cohen as the next director of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
Cohen served as the secretary for North Carolina’s Department of Health and Human Services under Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper. She oversaw the state’s COVID-19 response prior to her resignation in December 2021. In early 2022, Cohen went to work for Aledade, a company that describes itself as a “physician enablement company” working with “independent practices, health centers, and clinics” to improve care for their patients.
Though Cohen’s medical license lapsed in 2012 and she only practiced medicine for a few years before that, Biden said Cohen “is one of the nation’s top physicians and health leaders” and that she has “experience leading large and complex organizations, and a proven track-record protecting Americans’ health and safety.”
“As Secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Health and Human Services, Dr. Cohen developed innovative and nationally recognized programs that improved the health and lives of families across the state,” Biden’s statement reads. “Her leadership through the COVID-19 crisis drew bipartisan praise, as did her successful transformation of North Carolina’s Medicaid program and pivotal role in the bipartisan passage of Medicaid expansion.”
Biden’s statement also highlighted that Cohen served under the Obama administration as chief operating officer and chief of staff of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and as acting director of the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight.
Cooper reacted on social media by tweeting “Dr. Cohen is a strong leader and a problem solver who was uniquely qualified to lead @NCDHHS. @POTUS has made an excellent choice for CDC Director.”
When the news broke that Cohen was being considered, an email inquiry to Cohen and Aledade was answered by a public relations firm.
“Neither the company nor Dr. Cohen have a comment,” Ken Baer, CEO and co-founder of Crosscut Strategies, replied in an email to North State Journal.
North Carolina Republican Sen. Ted Budd led six senators and 22 House members in a letter to Biden opposing Cohen for the role that in part called her politically partisan as well as “unfit.”
“Dr. Mandy Cohen is unfit for the position,” wrote Budd and the other lawmakers. “Dr. Cohen has politicized science, disregarded civil liberties, and spread misinformation about the efficacy and necessity of COVID vaccinations and the necessity of masks, during her time as the Secretary of the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. She also has a history of engaging in partisan left-wing politics.”
The letter cites Cohen as a “proponent of unnecessary, unscientific COVID restrictions on school children” and points out she threatened legal action against school districts that didn’t comply with mask mandates.
