President-elect Joe Biden has chosen Democratic California Attorney General Xavier Becerra as his nominee-designate to head his Health and Human Services Department, a crucial post amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo was speculated to be on Biden’s shortlist before she publicly refuted the rumors during a press conference.
“I am not going to be President-elect Biden’s nominee for HHS secretary,” she told reporters last week.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham was also reportedly in the mix at the urging of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. The group is pressing Biden to promote Latinos to his Cabinet or high-level administration posts after the two-term vice president and 36-year Delaware senator promised to assemble a diverse team that “reflects the country.”
Becerra, a former California congressman of Mexican American descent, is one of the lead attorneys general defending the Affordable Care Act as Republican counterparts question the healthcare law’s constitutionality before the Supreme Court.
The New York Times first reported Biden’s decision Sunday. A transition spokesman didn’t immediately respond to the Washington Examiner’s request for comment.
Biden’s HHS secretary is anticipated to work closely with his expected COVID-19 response coordinator, Jeffrey Zients, and his floated pick for U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy. The coordinator role will likely be modeled on incoming White House chief of staff Ron Klain’s job when he was former President Barack Obama’s Ebola czar.
“He will have a COVID coordinator who works in the White House, who has direct access to him. And we’ll be briefing him daily and otherwise as needed,” Klain told MSNBC of Biden.
Biden’s HHS announcement follows his convening of a COVID-19 task force, co-chaired by Murthy, former Food and Drug Administration commissioner Dr. David Kessler, and Yale University internal medicine professor Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith.
