Watch key moments from Cardi B’s testimony in court
Cardi B has been in the spotlight this week after taking the witness stand in Los Angeles to tell a court she did not attack a security guard who is suing her for assault.
The colourful US rapper is accused of cutting Emani Ellis’s cheek with a 3in (7.5cm) fingernail and spitting on her during an altercation outside an doctor’s office in 2018, leaving the guard “deeply traumatised”.
Cardi testified that Ms Ellis invaded her privacy by filming and following her against her will and telling someone on the phone about her appointment for a pregnancy that wasn’t yet public knowledge. There was a “verbal fight”, the star said – but she insisted it “didn’t get physical”.
During the evidence, various moments from the civil trial have gone viral, as have some of Cardi B’s comments and facial expressions on the stand.
The trial is expected to conclude next week. Here’s a round-up of what has happened so far.
‘I didn’t touch her’
The case revolves around Cardi B’s arrival for an obstetrics appointment, when she was four months pregnant with her first child.
The rapper told the court on Tuesday that when she stepped out of an elevator, Ms Ellis, who was working as a security guard in the building, told someone on the phone that the star was there, then followed her down a hallway.
The performer, whose real name is Belcalis Marlenis Almánzar, added that Ms Ellis appeared to record her on her phone and refused to “back up”, before a face-to-face “verbal altercation” ensued.
She admitted shouting an obscenity at Ms Ellis while telling her to “get out of my face”, adding: “We’re literally screaming at each other.”
Her lawyer noted how the star had “feared for her unborn baby” and also accused Ms Ellis of having “changed your story”.
A ‘hyper-sensitive’ scar
Ms Ellis earlier told the court she said the rapper’s name aloud out of excitement when she saw her, but didn’t tell anyone she was there and didn’t film her.
Ms Ellis claims the rapper accused her of trying to spread news about her being at the doctor’s office, then hurled insults and threats, and attacked her.
A plastic surgeon testified that he had treated Ms Ellis for a “hyper-sensitive” scar on her cheek, “most likely” caused by fingernails, after first examining her in 2022.
The doctor Cardi was visiting on the day of the altercation in 2018 and his receptionist also gave evidence, mostly backing up the rapper’s account by saying they didn’t see her hit Ms Ellis.
Ms Ellis sued the star in 2020 for assault, battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress as well as negligence and false imprisonment.
‘Like an SNL skit’
Getty Images
Cardi B had long black hair when she attended the trial on Wednesday
As the trial continued, videos and memes of Cardi B’s comments on the stand, and her animated facial expressions, were shared widely online.
“Cardi B in court today was like an SNL [Saturday Night Live] skit,” wrote one X user in a post that has been viewed more than six million times.
They posted a video in which Cardi B was asked by the attorney: “If you wanted to scratch or cut her face with your right or your left hand, if you wanted to do it, you could’ve done it, right? You’re not disabled?”
“But I didn’t because I had a baby inside me,” she responded.
The attorney replied: “Are you disabled? Yes or no?”
“At that moment, when you’re pregnant, I’m very disabled. Do you want me to tell you things I can’t do?” she said, prompting laughter in the courtroom.
‘Hello, I’m here’
In another section of the cross-examination, Cardi B said she was “very concerned” during the encounter with Ms Ellis.
“Why were you concerned?”, the attorney asks.
With an eye roll and a shrug, Cardi B exclaimed: “Because I’m pregnant! And this girl is about to f****** beat my ass. Hello?”
“Hello?” The attorney responded. “Hello, I’m here.”
Others shared videos of an exchange in which Cardi B was asked if she thought Ms Ellis was bigger than her.
“Absolutely,” Cardi B responded. When asked how she knew that, she gesticulated and pointed at her eyes, and shook her head incredulously. “I mean, look,” she said.
“I’m looking,” the attorney responded.
“You have her medical records, right?” Cardi B says.
“I don’t have anything,” he retorted.
Cardi B then smiled and flicked her hair. “I mean, I was 130lb at the time,” she said.
“So she’s overweight?” the lawyer asked. “Did you call her fat?”
“No. I was calling her a b****,” Cardi B replied.
Wig confusion – ‘Today it’s blonde and long’
Getty Images
Arriving at court on Tuesday, Cardi B had long blonde hair
Cardi B sported a range of different hairstyles for her court appearances this week, including a black pixie cut one day and long blonde locks the next.
“Yesterday you had black hair, short hair. Today it’s blonde and long. Which one is your real hair? Or are they both real?”
“They’re wigs,” Cardi B replied with a laugh and a coy look.
“OK. Sorry, I didn’t know that. It’s a good wig today, then,” the attorney replied.
He then moved on to Cardi B’s fingernails, asking her how long they were.
“Just your best estimate, I don’t want you to take a ruler to it,” he said.
“It has to be less than an inch,” she responded.
When asked whether they were pointy, she replied: “To me they’re not pointy, they’re like, circle.”
After establishing that the nails were, in fact, fake, a discussion then followed about how she removes them, and how easy it is to replace them.
While some people on social media were amused by line of questioning, others questioned whether it could be interpreted as racist or misogynistic.
“This lawyer 100% is trying to enforce a racist stereotype of a black woman asking about her hair and nails,” said one X user.
Another asked why the attorney asked those questions, saying: “Black and Latina women are always scrutinised for their hair.”
‘A fascination with celebrities’
Media lawyer Jonathan Coad says social media has “completely changed” how much prominence trials like this receive.
“Courts have always had drama. But before, these sorts of trials were just written about in the newspapers, the following day.
“Now, everything is played out in real time on social media. In America, they have cameras in courts, so you can actually watch it all happening,” he said.
“If you add to that the fascination we have with celebrities, then you’ve got absolutely ripping content.”
Mr Coad said Cardi B may well have been encouraged by her lawyers to use “all of her charm and persuasive power” in the witness box.
A jury trial is “essentially a popularity contest”, he said. “That’s what it becomes.”
Cardi B is best known for hits such as I Like It, Up, Bodak Yellow and WAP – a duet with Megan Thee Stallion.
The singer, who has three children, won a Grammy award in 2019 for her debut studio album Invasion of Privacy.
CDC upheaval pushes public health into ‘uncharted waters’
In less than a week, the public health sector has been plunged into chaosas leaders at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) leave the agency amid heightened political tensions with the Trump administration.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced Wednesday that Susan Monarez would no longer serve as CDC director. This was followed by the resignations of four top leaders at the agency:
Demetre C. Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases
Daniel Jernigan, director of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID)
Debra Houry, CDC Chief Medical Officer
Jennifer Layden, director for the Office of Public Health Data, Surveillance, and Technology
In an all-hands meeting following the resignations, the office that Jernigan had led signaled deep uncertainty about the future.
“These are uncharted waters,” said a senior CDC official during a Thursday all-hands meeting of NCEZID. “But we will do our best to navigate, to move forward, to do the work that we think needs to be done in the way that it needs to be done.”
Lawrence Gostin, a professor of global health law at the O’Neill Institute at the Georgetown University Law Center and director of the WHO Center on Global Health Law, said the shakeup has left the agency “weakened, gutted, and utterly dispirited.”
These developments follow a fatal shooting and mass layoffs at the agency, all of which in the past month.
For Democrats on Capitol Hill, the chaos is enough to call for HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s termination.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Friday that keeping Kennedy in the position would “make many more people sick and cause more deaths.”
“By keeping Robert Kennedy in charge of HHS, Trump is doubling down on his own failure. President Trump must admit his mistake and remove Kennedy now,” said Schumer.
Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) said, “President Trump must fire Robert F. Kennedy Jr. before he further endangers millions of American children, mothers, and families.”
“If Trump does not remove Kennedy before this kook fully unleashes his crackpot conspiracy theories on America’s vaccination efforts, Trump will bear the responsibility for the unnecessary and preventable illnesses and deaths that result.”
Programming note: The Hill’s healthcare newsletter will not publish on Labor Day. See you Tuesday!
Welcome to The Hill’s Health Care newsletter, we’re Joseph Choi and Alejandra O’Connell-Domenech — every week we follow the latest moves on how Washington impacts your health.
The White House quickly named a new leader of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pushed out Director Susan Monarez this week. Jim O’Neill, a senior Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) official with deep ties to President Trump donor Peter Thiel, will take over the agency amid an exodus of its leadership and panic across the public …
Related video: Changes Atop the CDC CVS Health does not currently plan to offer the updated annual vaccine COVID-19 vaccine in more than a dozen states, citing the current “regulatory environment” after the updated shots receiving approval for high risk groups this week. A spokesperson for CVS said in a statement that “based on the current regulatory environment,” the pharmacy chain will not offer COVID-19 …
The Texas House has advanced a bill that would allow private citizens to sue prescribers, makers and distributors of abortion pills inside and outside the state. A revised version of Texas’s H.B. 7 passed the state Legislature’s lower chamber in an 82-48 vote Thursday night during Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) second special session. It is now on its way to the state Senate. Under the bill, almost anyone can sue a distributor …
NYC Legionnaires’ outbreak linked to two city-run buildings, including Harlem Hospital
NEW YORK (AP) — A New York City hospital and another city-run building were sources for a deadly outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease in Harlem that killed seven people and sickened dozens of others, health officials announced Friday. The New York City Health Department said bacteria from cooling towers atop Harlem Hospital and a nearby construction site where the city’s public health lab is located matched samples from some of …
Do you like the S&P 500 Index ($SPX)? Of course you do! I’m assuming that because you’ve seen it rise continuously for about a decade, with only a few sharp-but-brief pullbacks along the way.
I’ve been scouting, analyzing and investing in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) since there were ETFs. So, it takes a lot for me to get pumped up over one of them. And when I do, as with the iShares Top 20 U.S. Stocks ETF (TOPT), it’s a big deal.
The appeal of this ETF to me is less about immediate gratification, although it’s still hanging in nicely after a big runup since its debut 10 months ago. It is the utility of it, versus the broader, but not necessarily more effective, SPDR S&P 500 Trust ETF (SPY) and other ETFs that track the full S&P 500.
The simple point here is that while the S&P 500 sounds diversified, that benefit is not nearly as effective as traders might think. For years, the S&P 500 has been driven by a dominant factor: big stocks getting bigger, to the point where a small fraction of SPY’s 500 holdings actually influence its performance.
So, why not also devote some attention to those very drivers of the S&P 500. Specifically, the 20 largest stocks. They drive the returns.
There are ETFs that track the top 50, top 100 or top 200 S&P 500 stocks. So there are gradients here. But in this article, I’m cutting to the chase, to the core of the matter.
The top 20 have been the profit-makers, and if the market continues to be a case of the giants getting bigger, and the rest just tagging along, TOPT is a must-follow. It is now for me.
TOPT has no 12-month return yet, but there’s a lot to be learned from the fact that it has outperformed SPY over multiple time frames so far. Most significant to me is the year to date. That’s because we had such an awkward and historic drop and recovery.
In the environment we are in, and could be in for a while, the simplicity and edge in knowing exactly what you own with TOPT is a rare advantage for traders.
www.barchart.com
Let’s compare the top 20 holdings of SPY and TOPT and see why.
Here’s SPY’s top 20. The allocations per stock quickly drop off in size.
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For TOPT, these top-20 holdings are, by definition the whole fund, but for some cash and one extra position which is likely still there due to TOPT’s rebalancing rules. It is still very top-heavy, but just knowing that these market leaders are what you own allows us to track why TOPT is moving as it is.
I think that information advantage is critical in ETF investing, and it is why I prefer more concentrated equity funds.
TOPT’s chart looks a lot like SPY, but those top holdings have taken it higher on a percentage basis.
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Surprisingly or unsurprisingly, TOPT has options trading. I say that because nearly every ETF has some type of options capability. However, as is the case with TOPT, there’s practically no volume.
That doesn’t mean we can’t find reasonable options to consider. Like the one I found below. It is not a collar, it’s a protective put purchase.
www.barchart.com
While this could be used to try to profit from a market decline, I’m going to assume here that 100 shares of TOPT are owned, and that the put option purchase aims to take away the risk of major loss if this fall gets nasty.
Here’s the key to me: For just $1.40 a share, in this low volatility environment, TOPT can be hedged for nearly 3 months, at the current price ($29 per share). That’s 5% downside risk, and all the upside. There is no volume or open interest, so if you traded this particular contract, you’d be the first. But the underlying stocks in TOPT are so liquid, a market can be made, with reasonable spreads.
TOPT opens up a world of possibilities, from using it as a stock tracker, to adding emphasis to an S&P 500 portfolio, and even to hedge some of those top names. Ironically, this new ETF, which is a highly concentrated portfolio of top U.S. stocks, has a diverse set of applications for traders and investors.
On the date of publication, Rob Isbitts did not have (either directly or indirectly) positions in any of the securities mentioned in this article. All information and data in this article is solely for informational purposes. This article was originally published on Barchart.com
BOULDER, Colo. — Colorado introduced a sideline bathroom in its opening game against Georgia Tech for Deion Sanders, who was recently diagnosed with bladder cancer and needs to frequently use the restroom.
The portable privacy tent, which is being sponsored Friday by Depend undergarment, is next to the Buffaloes bench, so the Colorado coach won’t have far to go.
Earlier this month, Sanders wrote on social media about relying on Depend, which makes an undergarment for people with incontinence. He wrote: “I wasn’t joking! I truly DEPEND on Depend. Ain’t NO SHAME in taking care of yourself. NO SHAME in getting health screenings. And there certainly ain’t NO SHAME in needing added protection or using Depend to stay in the game. That’s not weakness – that’s WINNING.”
Depend responded to him: “No shame at all! We’re proud to help you stay in the game, Coach Prime.”
Sanders spent time away from the team this summer as he went through treatment for bladder cancer. His doctor said last month that he was cured. It was also revealed that a section of Sanders’ intestine was reconstructed to function as a bladder.
This will be Sanders’ third season in Boulder and first without his sons, Shedeur and Shilo. The Buffaloes finished 9-4 last season.
The White House is defending Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr after a chaotic week at the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) that led to calls for his removal.
On Friday, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller called Kennedy, also known as RFK Jr, “a crown jewel of this administration”.
Earlier this week, CDC Chief Dr Susan Monarez was fired because she was “not aligned with the president’s agenda”, the White House said in a statement, and was replaced by RFK Jr’s deputy Jim O’Neill.
At least three senior CDC leaders have since resigned over frustrations about Kennedy’s leadership and vaccine policy. The unease led to some lawmakers calling for his resignation.
Miller called Kennedy “one of the world’s foremost voices, advocates and experts on public health”, and said he is working hard to restore the credibility and the integrity of CDC, which is one of the world’s most foremost public health bodies.
Kennedy does not hold a medical degree and had a background in law before Trump tapped him to lead the department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The department oversees a variety of US health agencies, including the CDC.
The BBC reached out to HHS and representatives for Kennedy.
The wide-ranging layoffs include employees working on the government’s response to infectious diseases, including bird flu, as well as those researching environmental hazards and handling public record requests for information.
Since taking office, Kennedy, a vaccine critic, has made a number of funding cuts and changes to how the US recommends and regulates immunizations that have angered public health experts.
He previously helped run an anti-vaccine group, and has repeatedly stated widely debunked claims about vaccine harm.
Former CDC Chief Medical Officer Dr Debra Houry, one of the officials who resigned this week, told the BBC’s Newshour radio programme that Kennedy’s policies lacked scientific integrity.
“I am extremely worried that with continued resignations, terminations, retirements, all because of what’s going on through some of these policies, that we are not going to have the capacity to continue to do good science, to respond to an outbreak and to prevent chronic diseases,” she said.
She added that the worst case result of Kennedy’s policies is the disruption of the vaccine schedule for children, which could lead to the spread of “preventable diseases throughout the US again, like polio and measles.”
Several Democrat senators have called for Kennedy’s resignation, including Georgia’s Jon Ossoff – who called the health secretary a “quack” – and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
“Donald Trump knew Robert F. Kennedy Jr. would be a disastrous pick to lead health care in America and he nominated him anyway. Donald Trump made this mistake and now he must fire RFK Jr. immediately,” Schumer said in a written statement.
Several Republicans also expressed unease over the developments at the CDC, with Maine Senator Susan Collins saying there was “no basis” to remove Monarez from her position. She asked for a congressional hearing to examine what is happening at the agency.
Fellow Republican senator Bill Cassidy, who leads the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee – which vetted Kennedy’s appointment – said the panel would conduct oversight over the high-profile departures.
He also urged a delay on a vaccine advisory committee hearing scheduled for next month, saying there were allegations that the panel lacked a “scientific process”.
“If the meeting proceeds, any recommendations made should be rejected as lacking legitimacy given the seriousness of the allegations and the current turmoil in CDC leadership,” he said.
Robert F Kennedy Jr wrote an open letter to CDC employees after the removal of Monarez and the departure of several top officials, according to US media.
“I am committed to working with you to restore trust, transparency, and credibility to the CDC. Your daily efforts—often unseen—save lives,” he wrote.
“Reform does not diminish your work; it strengthens it. The American people are ready to believe in this agency again if we show them that integrity, accountability, and science guide every decision,” Kennedy added.
The health secretary also said that he wants to rebuild the CDC into “a guardian of America’s health and security.”
Social Security Chief Data Officer Charles Borges submitted a Friday resignation letter days after citing policy violations in a whistleblower report documenting the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) decision to upload sensitive data to a “vulnerable cloud environment.”
“Recently, I have been made aware of several projects and incidents which may constitute violations of federal statutes or regulations, involve the potential safety and security of high value data assets in the cloud, possibly provided unauthorized or inappropriate access to agency enterprise data storage solutions, and may involve unauthorized data exchange with other agencies,” Borges wrote in the letter submitted to Social Security Administrator (SSA) Frank Bisignano.
“As these events evolved, newly installed leadership in IT and executive offices created a culture of panic and dread, with minimal information sharing, frequent discussions on employee termination, and general organizational dysfunction,” he added.
Borges said executives and employees are afraid to raise concerns for fear of retribution or termination, while noting his requests for information tied to questionable activities have been “rebuffed or ignored by agency leadership.”
The SSA did not immediately respond to The Hill’s request for comment regarding the matter.
However, the former chief data officer said conditions were “intolerable” and often weighed on his physical well-being due to his inability to conduct data oversight at the agency.
“I cannot verify that agency data is being used in accordance with legal agreements or in compliance with federal requirements,” Borges said.
“The escalating and relentless daily stress of lack of visibility and exclusion from decision-making on these activities, silence from leadership, and anxiety and fear over potential illegal actions resulting in the loss of citizen data, is more than a reasonable employee could bear.”
In recent months, citizens across the country and Democrats have condemned DOGE’s efforts to collect personal data for undisclosed reasons.
Lawmakers argued individuals hired by the newly formed agency were not approved to access sensitive information without security clearance.
Some DOGE officials hired by former White House adviser Elon Musk were as young as 20 years old and granted viewing privileges for the purpose of combating “waste, fraud and abuse” as described by the Trump administration.
Nvidia (NVDA) shares are inching down this morning even though the chipmaker reported a solid Q2 and said artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure could hit as much as $4 trillion by 2030.
Investors are choosing caution in buying NVDA at current levels mostly because of three reasons:
Q2 data center revenue came in a bit shy of estimates
Future guidance wasn’t strong enough for some
NVDA stock is already trading at a premium valuation
However, the post-earnings pullback may be an opportunity for long-term investors to initiate or expand their positions in Nvidia stock, which is still up roughly 108% versus its year-to-date low.
www.barchart.com
According to Ben Reitzes, a renowned tech industry expert, NVDA stock could even “double from here, if not more” over the longer term.
His optimism hinges on the company’s dominant AI ecosystem and developer base, which he likened to Apple’s (AAPL) App Store advantage.
“You win the developers, you win the race,” Reitzes told CNBC in an interview today, adding the company’s platform is the most monetizable for AI applications, giving it a durable competitive edge.
On “Squawk Box,” the head of tech research at Melius also said Nvidia’s total addressable market (TAM) will surpass a whopping $600 billion by the end of this decade.
Ben Reitzes recommends sticking with Nvidia shares for the long term as sovereign AI initiatives in Europe and Middle East will meaningfully benefit the semiconductor giant as well.
On China, he remains cautiously optimistic, believing geopolitical tensions will ease and unlock significant further upside in NVDA shares moving forward.
“We’d be buyers on weakness,” the Melius expert concluded on CNBC.
According to him, Nvidia will likely see even stronger momentum in its fiscal Q4 since “we’re all systems go.”
Wall Street analysts are also keeping positive on Nvidia stock after its blockbuster Q2 earnings.
The consensus rating on NVDA shares remains at “Strong Buy” with price targets going as high as $250, indicating potential upside of another 40% from current levels.
www.barchart.com
On the date of publication, Wajeeh Khan did not have (either directly or indirectly) positions in any of the securities mentioned in this article. All information and data in this article is solely for informational purposes. This article was originally published on Barchart.com
A US appeals court has ruled that most tariffs issued by US President Donald Trump are illegal, potentially removing a foreign policy tool that Trump has used extensively during his second term in office.
The ruling affects Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs, imposed on most countries around the world, as well as other tariffs slapped on China, Mexico and Canada.
In a 7-4 decision, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit rejected Trump’s argument that the tariffs were permitted under his emergency economic powers act, calling them “invalid as contrary to law”.
The ruling will not take effect until 14 October to give the administration time to ask the Supreme Court to take up the case.
Trump had justified the tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), which gives the president the power to act against “unusual and extraordinary” threats.
Trump has declared a national emergency on trade, arguing that an imbalance is harmful to US national security. But the court ruled that imposing tariffs is not within the president’s mandate, and that they are “a core Congressional power”.
The 127-page ruling says that the IEEPA “neither mentions tariffs (or any of its synonyms) nor has procedural safeguards that contain clear limits on the President’s power to impose tariffs”.
The power to impose taxes and tariffs therefore continues to belong to Congress, the court ruled, and the IEEPA does not override this.
The court wrote that it is unlikely that when Congress passed the law, it was intended to “depart from its past practice and grant the President unlimited authority to impose tariffs”.
“Whenever Congress intends to delegate to the President the authority to impose tariffs, it does so explicitly, either by using unequivocal terms like tariff and duty, or via an overall structure which makes clear that Congress is referring to tariffs,” the judges wrote.
The ruling comes in response to two lawsuits filed by small businesses and a coalition of US states.
The lawsuits were filed after Trump’s executive orders in May, which imposed a 10% tariff on every country in the world, as well as “reciprocal” tariffs on dozen of countries. Trump’s declared the date to be America’s “liberation day” from unfair trade policies.
In addition to those tariffs, the ruling also strikes down tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China, which Trump argues are necessary to stop the importation of drugs and illegal migrants.
Friday’s ruling does not apply to tariffs imposed on steel and aluminium, which were imposed under a different presidential authority.
In May, the New York-based Court of International Trade declared the tariffs were unlawful, in a ruling that has separately been appealed by the White House.
The White House quickly named a new leader of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pushed out Director Susan Monarez this week.
The longtime Silicon Valley investor has been a top Kennedy deputy as the Trump administration has sought to enact its “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) agenda, while slashing staff and funding across health agencies.
Kennedy and the White House have said the CDC needs to align with the administration’s MAHA priorities and shift away from a focus on vaccines.
In his first public statement since being chosen, O’Neill, who does not come from a medical background, called the CDC the “beating heart of public health in America.”
“During the previous administration, CDC lost public trust by manipulating health data to support a political narrative. The Trump administration is rebuilding trust and refocusing CDC on its core mission of keeping America safe from infectious disease,” O’Neill wrote on social platform X.
“We have invested in new screening technology to detect infections from foreign travelers, stopped the Texas measles outbreak, and ended the misuse of the childhood immunization schedule for Covid vaccine mandates,” he added.
“We are helping the agency earn back the trust it had squandered. I look forward to working with CDC’s dedicated team and announcing additions to the senior leadership in the weeks ahead.”
O’Neill served during the George W. Bush administration as principal associate deputy secretary at the HHS, before beginning his career as a tech investor. Prior to joining the second Trump administration, he was managing director at Thiel’s Mithril Capital Management and also served as CEO of the Thiel Foundation.
He was confirmed as deputy HHS secretary in June, about a month before Monarez was confirmed by the Senate. It’s unclear how long O’Neill might remain in the interim CDC role or whether he’s a candidate for the permanent position.
Like Thiel, a libertarian who has long advocated restrained government intervention, O’Neill has similarly called for a laissez-faire attitude toward federal regulation.
In a 2014 speech, O’Neill called for pushing against the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) mission to consider the efficacy of drugs in its decision to approve them, saying the agency should only consider safety.
“We should reform FDA so that it’s approving drugs after their sponsors have demonstrated safety and let people start using them at their own risk, but not much risk of safety,” O’Neill said at the time.
As Bloomberg reported in 2016, O’Neill advocated creating a freer market for health care products and services.
“Basically, because there’s not a free market in health care, people are suffering very significant health consequences that in a free market they would not suffer,” O’Neill said, arguing it would drive down prices and increase innovation.
The MIT Technology Review reported in June that O’Neill is deeply embedded in the “longevity” community, people who wish to extend the human lifespan. Thiel is also an ardent longevity enthusiast. O’Neill was on the board of the anti-aging nonprofit foundation SENS Research Foundation.
O’Neill’s interest apparently extends to the point of achieving “immortality.”
“You can tell a lot about an era by listening to what people whine about,” O’Neill said in the same 2014 speech he advocated for less FDA regulation. “If we invest wisely in life extension technologies, in 40 years, we’ll all be able to annoy our friends with complaints like ‘immortality almost never works.’”
The watchdog group Accountable US said in a statement Friday that O’Neill’s deep ties to Thiel and medical companies presented too many areas of conflict for him to be acting CDC director.
“If made acting Director of the Trump CDC, Jim O’Neill would be in a prime position to ensure favorable outcomes for several medical industry startups he’s been financially linked to that have direct business before HHS and the CDC,” Accountable.US Executive Director Tony Carrk said.
“How can American patients be sure that proper vetting of these companies would take place on O’Neill’s watch and that public health will be a higher priority over the profits of his former clients?” Carrk continued. “They can’t.”
Trump has yet to personally comment on Monarez’s ouster or the leadership crisis unfolding at the CDC. Attorneys representing Monarez resisted her ouster, saying only Trump had final say on her removal.
The White House said Monarez was pushed out for not being fully aligned the MAGA agenda. Her lawyers say she refused to “rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives.”
Getty Images
Getty Images
