Biden set to name Rahul Gupta as US’ top drug policy official

Gupta will join a growing pantheon of Indian Americans in the Biden administration that begins with vice-President Kamala Harris and includes top health official Vivek Murthy, as the surgeon general.

US President Joe Biden is reportedly set to name Rahul Gupta as the country’s top drug policy official, adding another Indian American to a senior position in his administration.

Rahul Gupta is a primary-care doctor who served as top health official of West Virginia state. (Courtesy- Twitter)

Gupta, a primary-care doctor who served as top health official of West Virginia state, is slated to be named director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, a position that’s called the “drug czar”, a term coined by President Biden, who, as a senator, had also supported the creation of the office.

The office was created in 1982 to frame and coordinate national policy on combating substance-use disorders, including the response to an opioid crisis.

“President Biden’s nomination of Dr Rahul Gupta to be the first physician ever to lead the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy is another historic step in the Administration’s efforts to turn the tide of our nation’s addiction and overdose epidemic,” the White House said in a statement to The Washington Post, which first reported the move on Tuesday. He will have to be confirmed by the senate.

Gupta will join a growing pantheon of Indian Americans in the Biden administration that begins with vice-President Kamala Harris and includes top health official Vivek Murthy, as the surgeon general; Kiran Ahuja, director of the office of personnel; Vinay Reddy, head of Biden’s team of speechwriters; Vanita Gupta, No 3 at the department of justice as associate attorney general; and Neera Tanden, senior advisor to the president.

Politically, Gupta is an ally of Democratic senator from West Virginia Joe Manchin, who has emerged as a key US congress figure to the passage or holding up of the president’s legislative agenda. In an evenly split Senate, Manchin’s vote is needed to reach a 50-50 tally, and trigger Vice-President Harris’s tie-breaking vote. Coming from a deeply conservative state of West Virginia, the senator has tended to be more moderate than his other Democratic colleagues.