UPDATED: 16 FEB 2022 06:58 PM EST
President Joe Biden has tapped two people to temporarily fill Eric Lander’s dual roles as the president’s top science adviser and the head of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the White House announced on Wednesday.
Biden named Alondra Nelson, the deputy director for science and society in the OSTP, as director of the office. The president also announced that Francis Collins, who retired in December from his role as director of the National Institutes of Health, would serve as his top science adviser and co-chair of the president’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Nelson and Collins will perform these roles until “permanent leadership is nominated and confirmed,” the White House said.
“These appointments will allow OSTP and the President’s Science and Technology agenda to move seamlessly forward under proven leadership,” the statement said.
The move comes after Lander stepped down last week following reports of his bullying and mistreatment of subordinates. POLITICO first reported the White House’s investigation into Lander, which found “credible evidence” that the OSTP head bullied Rachel Wallace, his then-general counsel. More than a dozen former and current OSTP staffers also described a toxic workplace under Lander. His resignation was the highest-profile departure from Biden’s team to date and the first Cabinet-level exit from the administration.
Collins announced plans to step down in October, after nearly three decades at NIH, including 12 years as its leader. The 71-year-old, a physician-geneticist, was the longest-serving NIH director and served under three consecutive presidents. After Collins’ retirement announcement, Biden called him “one of the most important scientists of our time.”
Nelson, who brings “social science expertise” to the director role, is a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study. She was previously a professor of sociology at Columbia University and president of the Social Science Research Council from 2017 to 2021. The White House announcement praised Nelson for her work overseeing some of the president’s directives announced during his first month in office, including Biden’s memorandum on restoring trust in government through a science-based approach to policy.
“In the selections of Dr. Alondra Nelson and Dr. Francis Collins, President Biden has doubled down on science,” the White House said. “The selections are responsive to the dual importance of a strong OSTP that can drive science and technology solutions to our greatest challenges — and the very specific attention the President wants to give to the creation of a new ARPA-H research and discovery agency, the building of support for a Cancer Moonshot 2.0, the search for a new head of NIH, and the broad advisory work of PCAST.”
Alex Thompson contributed to this report.
