Dr. Mehmet Oz’s nomination to oversee the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will progress to the full Senate following a closed-door vote from the Senate Finance Committee to give him approval. 

Oz progressed along partisan lines, 14 to 13.

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If confirmed, President Donald Trump’s CMS nominee will oversee the largest payer for healthcare in the United States, providing insurance to more than 160 million people through Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, and the Obamacare insurance exchanges.

The person selected as CMS Administrator is usually not a household name. But Oz’s Emmy-winning television talk show and his career as a cardiothoracic surgeon at Columbia University make him one of the most well-known picks among Trump’s health agencies, aside from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Finance Committee Chairman Mike Crapo (R-ID) said in his opening statement that Oz’s background “makes him uniquely qualified to manage the intricacies of CMS.” 

Democrats withhold support over Medicaid cuts

Democrats on the committee criticized Oz, tying him to cuts to the Medicaid program outlined in the House GOP budget resolution passed in February. 

The resolution calls for slashing spending from the Energy and Commerce Committee’s jurisdiction by $880 billion, which analysts say can only be achieved through Medicaid cuts if Medicare reform is off the negotiating table. 

Much of Oz’s confirmation hearing earlier this month revolved around potential Medicaid reforms, such as work requirements for able-bodied enrollees without dependent children, a provision with bipartisan support among voters.

Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) called the potential reductions to federal spending on Medicaid a “tsunami of cuts” and highlighted that Oz would not commit to opposing cuts to the program should he be confirmed. 

“My colleagues who are trying to play down this threat or act like there’s some other way around it, it’s just not so,” said Cantwell. “It’s either bad math or bad faith.” 

Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) complimented Oz’s preparation for the CMS role, saying that he is “certainly more knowledgeable than Secretary Kennedy about the program that he’s tasked to lead.” 

But Warnock clarified that he could not vote for Oz because of the nominee’s support for work requirements.

In response to Democrats’ concerns about Medicaid, Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) indicated he has spoken with Trump and Republican colleagues about Medicaid reform and that the GOP is “here to save Medicaid” so that it is available for “the most vulnerable.” 

Marshall said that because Medicaid is a state-run program, it is implemented in 50 different ways, and some states are more responsible with the use of federal funding than others.

“I wake up every morning hoping to do what’s fair, to do justice,” said Marshall. “What’s being done in one state with Medicaid is simply unfair to what’s being done in Kansas. Some states are manipulating the system. They’re gaming the system.”

Republican opposition to Oz

The only Republican challenge to Oz’s confirmation appears to be from Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO). Hawley is not on the Finance committee, but he has pressured Oz to explain his past support for transgender medical procedures to treat minors with gender dysphoria. 

In 2010, Oz interviewed minors who had medically transitioned, as well as their parents, during the second season of his long-running talk show. Oz subsequently interviewed other minors who underwent medical transition and surgeons specializing in gender reassignment procedures. 

More than a decade later, during his Senate campaign in 2022, Oz had shifted his view on using medicine to treat gender dysphoria in children, even pledging to “protect children from experimental ‘gender transition’ procedures.” 

Hawley posted on social media Monday afternoon that Oz and his team did not respond to the written question Hawley sent on March 14 following Oz’s confirmation hearing. Hawley’s office directed the Washington Examiner to statements he has made to other reporters when asked if the Missouri Republican planned to vote for Oz.

White House Spokesman Kush Desai told the Washington Examiner that the administration is looking forward to “the Senate’s swift confirmation of Dr. Oz so he can join the rest of our all-star team at HHS working to Make America Healthy Again.”

“Every member of the Trump administration is working from the same playbook, President Trump’s playbook, to restore commonsense policies and put an end to left-wing ideological nonsense afflicting our government,” said Desai.