By CAP Action War Room

Dr. Vivek Murthy Confirmed As Surgeon General, With An Assist From Ted Cruz

After 517 days without the nation’s top doctor in place, the Senate confirmed Dr. Vivek Murthy to be surgeon general this afternoon by a vote of 51-43. This is an important victory for Americans, who now have a qualified public health leader and communicator-in-chief. It represents a defeat for the NRA — Murthy’s confirmation is the first time the NRA has been defeated on a scored vote since August 5, 2010. And it may not have happened without an unexpected gift from Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX).

On Friday, with the controversial government spending bill still not passed, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell thought they had an agreement to adjourn for the weekend and return Monday to vote on the so-called ‘Cromnibus’ bill. Under the deal, which required unanimous consent from all Senators, Republicans would also be able to vote Monday on a “constitutional point of order” to register their displeasure with President Obama’s immigration action. But Cruz and Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) refused to wait until Monday, demanding the symbolic immigration vote then. When Reid refused, they in turn refused to give their consent to adjourn, leaving the Senate in session over the weekend. This tactic, however, had an unintended consequence for the hard-line conservatives: it allowed Senate Democrats to speed up confirmation for a number of key Obama nominations whose fate was still in question, including Dr. Murthy. Now, the only thing Cruz and friends have to show for their supposed hardball is the confirmation of a surgeon general they opposed on false grounds.

Here at CAP Action, we have been hard at work advocating for the confirmation of Dr. Murthy. And to be sure, it was a diverse group of progressive advocates who pushed the Senate during this lame duck session into giving the surgeon general nominee a vote. But today, in the holiday spirit of giving, we wanted to make sure Sen. Cruz also got a message of our appreciation. So we sent him a teddy bear.

Give Sen. Cruz your thanks as well by sharing this graphic with your social networks! Share on Twitter or share on Facebook.

Let’s remember, this isn’t the first time Cruz has taken a stance with the unintended consequence of helping those he opposes. Last year, he led the charge to shut down the government over funding the Affordable Care Act. And for three weeks during the botched roll-out of HealthCare.gov, when the nation’s attention could have squarely been on the mistake, it instead was also focused on blaming Cruz and his fellow conservatives for a government shutdown that cost $24 billion.

(Speaking of which: today is the last day to enroll in affordable health coverage on the exchange staring January 1! You could save money by shopping around.)

BOTTOM LINE: America now has the qualified surgeon general it needs. Many strong advocates played an important role in making it happen, but we also owe our gratitude to Ted Cruz for the important role he played as well. So Senator Cruz, our sincere thanks.

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A few years ago, I was fortunate enough to visit the U.K. Prime Minister’s residence at 10 Downing Street. During a tour of the residence, we were shown a painting of an elegantly dressed woman. “Of course, you know Lady Lovelace,” we were told.

Imagine our surprise to learn that we were staring at a portrait of the woman who is considered to be the world’s first programmer. Our group had never heard of her.

Ada Lovelace’s experience remains all too familiar: So many of the breakthrough contributions of women in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields continue to go untold, too often fading into obscurity.

Join us in doing something to change that: Listen to women from across the Obama administration share the untold stories of women who’ve inspired us.

Then add an untold history of your own, and make a commitment to share these stories in any way you can to help inspire more young women and men to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and math.

Women were central in the early teams building the foundation of modern programming. They unveiled the structure of DNA. Their work inspired new environmental movements and led to the discovery of new genes. It’s past time to write their stories permanently into history, so they can stand side by side with the extraordinary men like them who have used their technical and innovation skills to bring needed solutions and discoveries to our world.

And here’s what’s worth noting: Telling and sharing these stories will actively help create more of them in the future.

Research shows us that a key part of inspiring more young people to pursue careers in science and technology is simply sharing the stories of role models like them in these fields who have had a significant impact on our world.

Stories like that of Rosalind Franklin, whose research was essential for revealing the structure of DNA. There’s Katherine Johnson, who calculated key flight trajectories during the Space Race. The ENIAC team — six young women “Computers” who were the first digital programmers in America. Or Navy Rear Admiral Grace Hopper, who first developed computer languages and a compiler to translate them into machine code.

If you don’t know those names, it’s time to learn: Take a look at our interactive audio hub — and then listen, share, add, and commit.

You just might inspire the next Ada Lovelace.

Thanks,

Megan

Megan Smith
U.S. Chief Technology Officer
The White House
@USCTO