The Senate on Oct. 30 postponed a hearing that had been scheduled for Oct. 30 to vet President Donald Trump’s latest nominee to be surgeon general after she went into labor.
The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions postponed the hearing with nominee Dr. Casey Means, the committee said on its website.
“Congratulations to Dr. Means and her husband. There’s no greater reward than being a parent,” Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), chairman of the committee, wrote on X. “I anticipate rescheduling her hearing when she is ready.”
“We are very happy for Dr. Means and her family. This is one of the few times in life it’s easy to ask to move a Senate hearing!” the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the Office of Surgeon General, said in a statement on X.
Means didn’t respond to requests for comment by publication time.
Trump started his second term in January. He withdrew his first surgeon general nominee, Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, in May. Shortly afterward, he nominated Means to the post. It’s not clear why it took so long for a confirmation hearing for Means to be scheduled.
The surgeon general is known as America’s doctor and provides the U.S. population with health information, according to the government. The surgeon general is in charge of the 6,000 officers in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
Means graduated from Stanford University in 2009 and went on to obtain her medical degree from the Stanford University School of Medicine. She nearly finished a surgical residency before leaving to focus on reforming U.S. health care, according to her website.
Means spent several years in private practice in Oregon before cofounding Levels, a health testing company. She no longer sees patients, and her medical license is voluntarily inactive.
“Her credentials, research background, and experience in public life give her the right insights to be the surgeon general who helps make sure America never again becomes the sickest nation on earth,” a Health and Human Services spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email.
Trump has said that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recommended Means to him for the surgeon general post.
“Casey is the perfect choice for Surgeon General precisely because she left the traditional medical system—not in spite of it,” Kennedy said in a social media post. “Her leadership has inspired many doctors to reform the system and forge a new path away from sick care, which fills corporate coffers, and toward health care, which enriches all of us.”