Two Hours of Not Answering at the FDA Confirmation Hearing

Heidi Overton, President Trump's nominee to lead the Food and Drug Administration, went before the Senate health committee on Thursday to face questions about her stances on vaccines, flavored vapes, birth control and abortion, among other issues. According to Ars Technica, she spent nearly two hours stonewalling senators, even on softball questions. A nominee can reasonably decline to prejudge specific product decisions before confirmation; nobody expects an FDA hopeful to promise approvals in advance. Two hours of refusing even the easy questions is a different posture. It tells the committee that the most useful thing it will learn about how she would run the agency is whatever is already on the public record.