Senate deserves a vote on Obama's FDA nominee

Robert Califf, the deputy commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, was a cardiologist and researcher at Duke University. He is also President Barack Obama's choice to head the FDA, the federal agency that regulates the industries that produce medicine, food, tobacco, cosmetics and other products.

Although Califf's nomination was approved with a unanimous voice vote on Jan. 12 by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, it is facing rough sledding with other senators.

Several have promised to stall the appointment for their own reasons. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, wants assurances from the FDA that genetically modified salmon will be labeled as such. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the Democratic presidential candidate, is concerned the nominee won't fight the pharmaceutical industry on drug prices. Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., says the FDA must take tougher action against the abuse of opioid painkillers.

Senators are entitled to object to White House nominees, but Murkowski, Sanders and Markey have gone further and placed holds on the appointment. A hold is a maneuver permitted by Senate rules that allows a single lawmaker to block a measure from receiving a floor vote.

It is often used as a partisan weapon, in which a senator from one party can hold hostage the appointment of a president from the other party. Last month, no fewer than 28 Obama nominees-for judgeships, ambassador posts, terrorism finance specialist and high-level State Department positions-were on ice in the Republican-led Senate, some of them via holds.

There may be sound reasons to reject Califf's promotion to the top FDA job. Some senators, for instance, consider him too cozy to the drug industry since he received $29,000 in fees, travel, meals and other payments from pharmaceutical companies while at Duke in 2014.

That's all the more reason for a floor vote, up or down-not a hold that keeps the Senate from doing the people's business.

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