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A little over a month after the Senate confirmed Susan Monarez to head the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), she’s been removed from the role. The shakeup is the latest in a series of major disruptions to the beleaguered public health agency.

First reported by The Washington Post and citing multiple officials in the Trump administration, the news was confirmed by Ars Technica following a request to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which pointed to a post on its official X account. The statement said:

Susan Monarez is no longer director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We thank her for her dedicated service to the American people. @SecKennedy has full confidence in his team at @CDCgov, who will continue to be vigilant in protecting Americans against infectious diseases at home and abroad.”

The post does not elaborate on the reasons for the change in leadership. However, The Washington Post reported that the U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an outspoken anti-vaccine advocate, had been pushing Monarez over her handling of COVID-19 vaccines, including asking her to reverse approvals of them. Monarez resisted, unwilling to overrule the CDC’s vaccine advisory committees without their consent. Kennedy reportedly then asked her to resign, accusing her of not upholding Trump’s agenda.

Monarez declined, after which she reached out to Senator Bill Cassidy (R-La. ), who had been instrumental in Kennedy’s own Senate confirmation earlier this year after obtaining written assurances from him. That led to a confrontation, after which administration officials told Monarez she would have to either resign or be fired.

Monarez’s lawyers, Mark Zaid and Abbe Lowell, took to social media to publish a statement that her client had not resigned and that the White House had not issued any formal termination letter to her. “Her ouster came after she refused to rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives and fire dedicated health experts,” the statement said. “She chose protecting the public over serving a political agenda.” Zaid later told Ars Technica that as of 8:15 p.m. ET on August 27, Monarez had not received any official termination letter.

Trouble at the Public Health Agency

Monarez’s Senate confirmation was seen as a breakthrough after she was approved by a 51–47 vote on party lines at the end of July. She became the first CDC director ever to be subject to Senate confirmation after a 2022 law mandated that she should be. Kennedy himself administered the oath of office on July 31. He praised her “unimpeachable scientific credentials” and said he was “looking forward to restoring credibility to the CDC under her capable leadership.”

Her credentials were hard to dispute. The former deputy director at the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) under the Biden administration, Monarez has a PhD in microbiology and immunology. She also served at the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), the Department of Homeland Security, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and the National Security Council, among other institutions. She had also served as acting director of the CDC earlier this year before stepping down in order to receive a formal nomination from Trump.

The CDC has welcomed her appointment as well. Jennifer Nuzzo, a senior scholar at Brown University’s School of Public Health, called Monarez “a loyal, hardworking civil servant who leads with evidence and pragmatism.” Georges Benjamin, the head of the American Public Health Association, said the same of her research skills and management experience.

Her tenure ended, however, amid the major turmoil inside the agency. The CDC has been losing staff by the hundreds via layoffs and buyouts, and many of its programs have been cut or otherwise hamstrung. Kennedy has done little to help morale, often making factually incorrect and harmful claims about COVID-19 vaccines, calling them “the deadliest vaccine ever made,” and once referring to the CDC as “a cesspool of corruption.”

In fact, only a week before Monarez was allegedly ousted, a man fired nearly 500 rounds at the CDC campus. The August 8 shooting, carried out by a man radicalized by vaccine misinformation, saw about 200 shots hit six different buildings at the CDC. The shooter had previously blamed vaccines for his own health issues, and he targeted the CDC specifically.

Reports of Monarez’s ouster have led to new resignations inside the CDC. Stat News has confirmed the departures of three high-ranking officials: Daniel Jernigan, director of the National Center for Emerging Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, CDC’s Chief Medical Officer Deb Houry, and Demetre Daskalakis, who led the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

In a departure letter, Daskalakis wrote, “I am not able to serve in this role any longer because of the ongoing weaponization of public health.” Houry wrote that science “should never be censored or subject to political interpretations.”

Separately, Politico reported earlier in the day that Jennifer Layden, the head of the Office of Public Health Data, Surveillance, and Technology, also resigned.

In many people’s eyes, inside and outside the CDC, it’s a new low for an agency that once stood for evidence-based public health. The latest episode is part of a long list of resignations, political interference, and a crisis of trust at a time when the public health challenges continue to mount.