Senate committee advances Klomp as HHS No. 2

A key Senate committee Thursday advanced the nomination of Chris Klomp to be deputy secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), setting him up for a later floor vote for confirmation.

The Senate Finance Committee voted 15-12, with Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) joining all Republicans.

Klomp is already a powerful senior adviser to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. He has led negotiations over “ most favored nation ” drug pricing deals between the Trump administration and pharmaceutical companies, and he has been actively involved in high-profile hiring decisions.

“Part of my responsibility is to enable the smooth operations of the department. I’m responsible for personnel, among other things,” Klomp said last week during his confirmation hearings across both the Finance Committee and Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. “My job is to make sure that we have everything.”

During his hearings, Klomp was questioned about vaccines and how he would respond to Trump and Kennedy’s often untrue statements on the subject.

“I want somebody who’s going to stand up to the lies,” Senate Finance Committee ranking member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said.

Wyden on Thursday said Kennedy lied when he pledged he would not do anything to restrict access to vaccines or discourage people from taking them. Wyden said Klomp was “complicit” in those lies.

Wyden also pressed Klomp to disclose details about the drug pricing agreements he helped negotiate.

The deals are expected to exempt drugs from certain Medicare price deductions, as well as to protect the companies from tariffs. In exchange, the companies agreed to sell certain drugs to Medicaid at the same price as peer countries. But the details have remained secret.

“All I have received are excuses and misrepresentations,” Wyden said.