Trump calls his new FDA pick ‘Dr. Heidi.’ Patty Murray calls her a ‘far-right, anti-abortion extremist’

Dr.

Heidi Overton, a top White House aide, has been picked to lead the Food and Drug Administration , President Donald Trump announced Wednesday.

Overton is a medical doctor and deputy director of the White House Domestic Policy Council who has worked on several of Trump’s second-term health initiatives.

She has become a trusted administration figure and a champion of the Republican president’s goals.

If confirmed by the Senate, she would have to balance a raft of competing priorities, including Trump’s fixations, the anti-regulatory interests of traditional Republicans and the anti-corporate posture of Health Secretary Robert F.

Kennedy Jr.

Those challenges dogged the tenure of the previous FDA head, Dr.

Marty Makary .

He resigned in May, leaving behind unfinished projects such as work on ultraprocessed foods, antidepressants and COVID-19 shots.

Referring to her as “Dr.

Heidi” in a Truth Social post, Trump said Overton was a smart and respected “rockstar” who would deliver on his priorities of faster cures, innovation, lower drug prices and more wins for Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement.

Kennedy posted on X that Overton has “exceptional judgment, professionalism, discipline and an unwavering commitment to the American people.” Overton has promoted Trump’s health priorities Overton attended medical school at the University of New Mexico and has a doctoral degree in clinical investigation from Johns Hopkins University, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Before joining Trump’s second administration, she was the chief policy officer at the America First Policy Institute, a conservative think tank.

In recent months, she has appeared with the president to announce major projects, including some of his “most favored nation” deals with drug companies to lower prices to those of other developed countries and his recent vaccine order that sought to split the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine into three separate immunizations — against the advice of medical groups.