Indian Americans Vivek Murthy and Arun Majumdar Among Likely In Biden’s Cabinet: Reports


Two eminent Americans from India, including former US surgeon general Vivek Murthy, are among potential cabinet picks in the upcoming Biden-Harris Administration, according to media reports.

Murthy, who is currently the chief Indian-American adviser to President-elect Joe Biden on Covid-19, is a possible choice for the post of Secretary of Health and Human Services and Stanford University professor Arun Majumdar for the post of Secretary. of Energy. The Washington Post and Politico said in their reports Tuesday that it mentions a list of possible elections for various cabinet-level positions in the Biden administration.

Murthy, 43, is currently one of the co-chairs of the Covid-19 transition advisory council. He has been a close associate of Biden on coronavirus issues.

Similarly, Majumdar, a professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford who served as the first director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, has been one of Biden’s top advisers on energy-related issues, according to reports.

“The office, which is an incubator for nascent energy technologies, has enjoyed bipartisan support in Congress, which may bode well for its chances of being confirmed by the Senate,” reported The Washington Post.

Other potential names for the Secretary of Energy include Ernest Moniz, former Secretary of Energy; Dan Reicher, an academic at Stanford University and Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, a former undersecretary of energy.

To replace Alex Azar as Secretary of Health and Human Services, two other potential names are Mandy Cohen, secretary of the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, and Michelle Lujan Grisham, governor of New Mexico.

Murthy was one of the public health experts who frequently informed Biden about the pandemic during the campaign, according to reports.

Murthy became the 19th US Surgeon General in late 2014, just over a year after his nomination by President Barack Obama.

His nomination had been delayed in the Senate for just over a year, in large part due to his view that gun violence poses a threat to public health.

Read more | Former US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy May Land Key Role in Biden’s Administration

During his tenure, he issued a landmark report on drug and alcohol addiction, calling it “a moral test for America” ​​and placing it among the reports that his predecessors had drawn up to draw attention to other major threats to public health. such as tobacco use, AIDS, the need for physical activity.

Since leaving the government, he has written and spoken about loneliness.

He was a vice admiral in the corps in charge of the United States Public Health Service and is trained in internal medicine.

Majumdar is the Jay Precourt Provostial Professor at Stanford University, a faculty member of the Departments of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering (courtesy), and co-director of the Precourt Institute for Energy, integrating and coordinating activities research and education at the seven schools and the Hoover Institution at Stanford. He is also a professor in the Department of Photonic Science at SLAC.

In October 2009, Majumdar was nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate to become the Founding Director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E), where he served until June 2012 and assisted ARPA. -E to become a model of excellence. and innovation for government with bipartisan support from Congress and other stakeholders. After leaving Washington, DC and before joining Stanford, Majumdar was vice president of energy at Google, where he created several energy technology initiatives, especially at the intersection of data, computing and the electrical grid.

President-elect Joe Biden has said his cabinet would be the most diverse in history.

.