The new acting commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration is facing pressure from the anti-abortion lobby after it emerged that Kyle Diamantas had previously been retained as corporate counsel for Planned Parenthood, despite strong support from the Trump administration and top leaders in the movement.Diamantas, 38, was previously the director of the Human Foods Program at the FDA and was selected to work as acting commissioner after President Donald Trump’s first FDA commissioner, Marty Makary, abruptly resigned this week. Almost immediately after his appointment was announced, anti-abortion activists began to peer into his past, finding at least one eyebrow-raising instance in his professional career for what conservatives view as an unsavory former client.Court documents reviewed by the Washington Examiner show Diamantas’s name appeared on at least six filings for a Florida Planned Parenthood affiliate in a land-use dispute that began in 2014, when a nearby medical practice sued to block Planned Parenthood from performing abortions at the site under deed restrictions barring outpatient surgeries. Diamantas’s name appears on related litigation filings in the case as recently as April 2016, when he was working at Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz.
Trump's FDA head faces calls to meet the moment on abortion pill regulation
Trump’s new FDA head faced pressure from anti-abortion groups over abortion pill regulation and past legal work for Planned Parenthood.













