Democrats use FDA hearing to protest agency job cuts

By Ben Leonard

Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee slammed Republicans for holding a routine hearing on the FDA’s regulation of consumer products amid HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s sweeping layoffs of the agency’s workers and his ousting of its top vaccine regulator.

“Rome is burning and we’re talking about sunscreen,” Health subcommittee ranking member Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) said about the hearing, which focused on the FDA’s regulation of over-the-counter products like antacids, painkillers and cold medicine.

About 10,000 of the agency’s 80,000 workers were laid off late Monday as part of a reduction in force impacting staff across the agency, including at the Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and National Institutes of Health. And late last week, Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaccine activist, and FDA commissioner Marty Makary agreed to push out top FDA vaccine official Peter Marks as they seek to overhaul the agency.

Democrats’ protest of the moves at HHS comes amid broader tensions on the committee over the Trump administration’s swift moves to overhaul the federal government, including the major cuts undertaken by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative and congressional Republicans’ plans to make cuts to Medicaid.

While noting that President Donald Trump campaigned on making government more efficient, Energy and Commerce Chair Brett Guthrie (R-Ky.) said he agreed with DeGette that oversight is important.

“We’re going to make sure these things are done and done correctly,” Guthrie said.

Tuesday’s hearing was not the first time Energy and Commerce Democrats have tried to redirect the public’s attention. Last month, they hijacked a markup convened to adopt the committee’s oversight plan to advance their message, forcing votes on more than 100 doomed amendments on thorny issues such as preventing spending cuts to Medicaid.