(The Center Square) – The White House has appointed Department of Health and Human Services Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill as interim director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, The Washington Post has reported.

The attorneys for its just-terminated director maintain she has not been fired and will not resign.

At a press briefing Thursday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said that President Donald Trump had fired former CDC Director Susan Monarez. Her lawyers continue to contest that

“WH @PressSec can say whatever she wants because thankfully free speech still exists in this country,” wrote Mark Zaid, one of Monarez’s attorneys, on social media platform X. “But it doesn't make her comments factually true, even when from a White House podium.”

Monarez is

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