Jim O’Neill selected to lead HHS alongside RFK Jr. as deputy

President-elect Trump’s choice for deputy secretary of Health and Human Services is Jim O’Neill, an investor and historically close associate of billionaire Peter Thiel, the president-elect said Tuesday.

“I am very pleased to nominate Jim O’Neill to serve as the Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services to work alongside Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” Trump said in a Tuesday statement. “He will oversee all operations and improve Management, Transparency, and Accountability to, Make America Healthy Again.”

Trump also said in the statement that O’Neill, alongside Kennedy, “will fight in unison to ensure every American, and especially our most precious resource, our children, will live long and healthy lives and, Make America Great and Healthy Again!”

The Washington Post reported Monday about Trump’s preference for the deputy HHS secretary role going to O’Neill.

The president-elect had previously considered O’Neill for the role of head of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as he headed into his first administration in late 2016, according to reporting from Bloomberg.

O’Neill has also held roles as managing director at Thiel’s Mithril Capital Management and principal associate deputy secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services during former President George W. Bush’s administration. 

In a 2014 speech, O’Neill called for pushing against the FDA’s mission to consider the efficacy of drugs in its decision to approve them. He said that the agency should only consider drugs’ safety.

“We should reform FDA so that it’s approving drugs after their sponsors have demonstrated safety and let people start using them at their own risk, but not much risk of safety,” O’Neill said. “But let’s prove efficacy after they’ve been legalized.”

Experts voiced concerns at his remarks, saying they demonstrated a lack of knowledge about the FDA’s review process and that separating the questions of safety and efficacy is impossible.