Senate Finance Committee Should Not Have Advanced Mehmet Oz ’s Nomination

Following the vote by the Senate Finance Committee supporting the nomination of Mehmet Oz for the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), Public Citizen Co-President Robert Weissman issued the following statement:

“Mehmet Oz is fundamentally unqualified for the position of Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and should never have been nominated for the position based on his conflicts of interest alone. The Senate Finance Committee should have unanimously rejected his confirmation.

“Under Oz’s watch, could strip crucial health care services through Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act could be stripped from hundreds of millions of Americans. As he showed in his confirmation hearing, Oz would seek to further privatize Medicare, threatening access to care for tens of millions of Americans. Privatized Medicare Advantage plans deliver inferior care and cost taxpayers nearly $100 billion annually in excess costs.

“He also refused to commit to push back on efforts to slash Medicaid, which would harm access to care for millions – especially the poor and vulnerable – just so Trump and Musk can give tax breaks to their billionaire buddies.

“We need a CMS Administrator who believes in the importance of protecting crucial health programs like Medicare and Medicaid and would put patients ahead of corporate profits.

We can only hope that sanity prevails when Oz comes for a vote before the full Senate. No Senator should be fooled by the snake oil Oz is selling.”

Click here to read Public Citizen’s analysis on the impacts of expanding Medicare Advantage.