The U.S. Senate on Thursday narrowly confirmed California Attorney General Xavier Becerra as President Biden’s health secretary, filling a key position in the administration’s coronavirus response and its ambitious push to lower drug costs, expand insurance coverage and eliminate racial disparities in medical care.
The 50-49 largely party-line vote — with just one Republican supporting his confirmation — makes the 63-year-old Becerra the first Latino to head the Department of Health and Human Services. The $1.4 trillion agency encompasses health insurance programs, drug safety and approvals, advanced medical research, substance abuse treatment, and the welfare of children, including hundreds of Central American migrants now arriving daily at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Becerra has been California’s attorney general since 2017. He sued the Trump administration 124 times on a range of policy issues, earning the ire of conservatives. Before that, he represented a Los Angeles-area district in the U.S. House for 24 years.
A lawyer, not a doctor, his main experience with the health care system came through helping to pass the Obama-era Affordable Care Act and defending it when Donald Trump was president.
Becerra comes from a working-class Mexican American family; his father was in road construction and his mother was a secretary.
“I understand the enormous challenges before us and our solemn responsibility to be faithful stewards of an agency that touches almost every aspect of our lives,” he said recently at his confirmation hearing. “I’m humbled by the task, and I’m ready for it.”
Leading Republicans have dismissed Becerra as unfit. But the American Medical Association and the American Hospital Association supported his nomination. A powerful drug industry lobby, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, congratulated Becerra on his confirmation and said it looks forward to a collaborative working relationship.
But to Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, “the distinguishing feature of this nominee’s resume is not his expertise in health, medicine or administration — that part of the resume is very brief. What stands out are Mr. Becerra’s commitment to partisan warfare and his far-left ideology.”
Although Becerra was reliably liberal in his nearly quarter-century stint in the House, he was not seen as a left-wing firebrand. His issues were education, immigration and equal treatment for minorities. His profile was of a low-key insider who could work with Republicans.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, said GOP arguments against Becerra “almost verge on the ridiculous.” Schumer said Republicans “complained loudly that he had no direct experience as a medical professional, even though Republicans voted in lockstep” to make pharmaceutical executive Alex Azar health secretary under Trump.
The Biden administration’s COVID-19 response is already in high gear, directed out of the White House. Biden has signed his $1.9 trillion relief bill into law and agencies are making announcements almost daily. But having a health secretary in the mix will make a big difference, said Kathleen Sebelius, who led HHS during much of President Barack Obama’s administration.
“Many of the assets that will be important to this effort are in HHS, and he’ll have the key coordinating role within the department,” Sebelius said. “It adds a force multiplier and expertise to the efforts already under way.”
