President Joe Biden’s nominee to lead the National Institutes of Health will need at least one Republican vote to advance after Sen. Bernie Sanders — angry that Biden isn’t doing more to lower drug prices — said Tuesday he’d oppose her.

“Dr. Monica Bertagnolli is an intelligent and caring person, but has not convinced me that she is prepared to take on the greed and power of the drug companies and health care industry and fight for the transformative changes the NIH needs at this critical moment,” the Vermont independent said in a statement.

“I intend to vote NO at her confirmation hearing on Wednesday,” Sanders said.

However, Sanders said he would not try to sway the votes of other members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee he chairs. “This should be a vote of conscience,” he said.

Seven of the 10 Democrats on the committee — Sens. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) either issued statements or told POLITICO that they planned to vote in favor of Bertagnolli.

The others either did not respond or did not say how they would vote.

Because Democrats have a one-seat majority on the panel, Bertagnolli will need at least one Republican vote to proceed to a floor vote and none have said they support her publicly.

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) said he planned to vote against the nomination. Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) told POLITICO “I’d probably lean toward no right now.” Other Republican members have not indicated how they will vote.

Kaine said he expected that Bertagnolli would get Republican votes because the GOP’s third-ranking senator, Wyoming’s John Barrasso, had introduced her during her nomination hearing.

The White House did not immediately respond to POLITICO’s request for comment.

The National Cancer Institute director’s nomination to lead NIH has been in limbo since spring, when Sanders vowed to oppose Biden’s health nominees until the White House took more actions on reducing drug prices. In September, Sanders relented, agreeing to schedule Bertagnolli’s hearing after the federal government struck a deal with biotech company Regeneron that included a reasonable pricing clause for a Covid therapy it’s developing with federal assistance.

During her confirmation hearing last week, Bertagnolli told Sanders she would work to broadly ensure the benefits of NIH research are affordable and available, but would not commit to a specific plan to address drug pricing.

On Monday, two days before the committee vote, Sanders called for an investigation into the NIH. In a letter to the Health and Human Services inspector general, he urged an investigation into an exclusive patent license for an NIH-developed cervical cancer treatment that the agency proposed granting to a company with ties to a former NIH employee.

The most recent NIH director, Dr. Francis Collins, smoothly sailed through his confirmation process and was unanimously confirmed without a hearing in 2009. The agency has been without a director since December 2021, when Collins stepped down from the role.

WASHINGTON — House Republicans on Tuesday elected Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the No. 3 in the party, as their speaker nominee after five rounds of ballots that pointed to a precarious path forward.

The internal party election came after Republicans cast aside Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, the second party nominee for speaker, who was unable to win the majority of votes needed to be elected to the top job.

Emmer, 62, of Delano, Minn., has served since January as the party’s whip, responsible for counting and securing the votes to pass the speaker’s agenda. He was the highest-ranking Republican in the race and has been endorsed by ousted Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

A mainstream conservative who voted to certify President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory and supported a stopgap spending bill last month to avert a shutdown, Emmer has pitched himself as a unity candidate. Several hard-right conservatives, including a handful who voted to oust McCarthy, have signaled their support for the Minnesota Republican.

But he could still face trouble securing a majority of votes on the House floor, where just a small clutch of defectors could doom his election. Republicans emerging from the closed-door meeting Tuesday said that an internal roll call vote showed that as many as 25 lawmakers said they would not support Emmer.

Rep. Rick W. Allen of Georgia told CNN that he could not support Emmer because of his vote in 2022 in support of a bill codifying federal protections for same-sex couples.

And some hard-right Donald Trump supporters outside Congress have sought to block Emmer from winning the speaker’s gavel, claiming he has been insufficiently supportive of the former president.

A former college hockey player and coach, Emmer served two terms as chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee.

This article originally appeared in the New York Times.

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Harvard students need not apply at Regan Communications Group.

George Regan, chairman and founder, is refusing to hire Harvard University students whose organizations signed on to a letter blaming Israel solely for the deadly attacks by Hamas.

Regan will also pose a hiring ban on anyone who protests against Israel. Regan Communications Group employs over 100 people in 12 offices across the United States including its headquarters in Boston, as well as offices in New York City, Palm Beach, FL, Providence, Rhode Island, New London, CT, Charleston, SC, and Cape Cod.

“As a human being, I was appalled and outraged by the October 7th sneak attack and massacre of innocent men, women and children (many of them babies) in the nation of Israel at the hands of the terrorist group Hamas,” Regan said in a statement.

“I have had the great privilege to travel to Israel on many occasions with Robert and the late Myra Kraft and Abe Foxman, former national director of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and I found both the country and its people among the most beautiful and kind on earth. I have also spent many years working with the ADL and have grown to understand the anti-semitism that my Jewish and Israeli friends face on a daily basis. I stand firmly and unequivocally behind Israel and its response against the terrorist group Hamas,” he added