Ousted Public Health Commissioner Fires Back At Lamont, Geballe

CONNECTICUT — As an investigation of the state’s coronavirus response in nursing homes is set to begin, ousted Connecticut public health Commissioner Renée Coleman-Mitchell says she will not be made the scapegoat for the "state's failure."

“I have little confidence that I will be interviewed to speak about my intimate knowledge of the facts. I have yet to be contacted,” she said in a statement through her lawyer . “I feel I may be implicated as the culprit behind the state's failure. I will not have it!”

In an interview with Patch, Coleman-Mitchell said her May 11 firing by Gov. Ned Lamont was an “ambush."

“I was taken by surprise. I was shocked. Just shocked.”

Coleman-Mitchell said she was told that day by Chief Operating Officer Josh Geballe to expect a “routine call at 8:30 p.m.”

On the call, she said she was told the state would “be going in a different direction and it had ‘nothing to do with my work.’ My initial reaction was, ‘What does this mean?’ What they meant was I was not going to be commissioner. I was in shock. I was hurt, to say the least. I still feel the anger and grief today that I felt on May 11.”

But far earlier, in March, she said Geballe, a former technology industry executive, told her she would no longer “be the face of public health.”

On March 2, she had appeared with Lamont, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Surgeon General Jerome Adams in an update on the coronavirus crisis as seen in this YouTube video.

“He sent a clear message: I’d no longer be the face of the department. It also became clear to me that he had an agenda,” she said, adding that Geballe told her, “Do not say that I spoke to you about this.’ My voice, my leadership was completely nullified. He really wanted to make it clear they wanted to make history, and I was not going to be a part of that.”

On May 12, on MSNBC’s "The Rachel Maddow Show," the host said, “Today in Connecticut, the Democratic governor there, Ned Lamont, fired the state health commissioner, blaming her for Connecticut being too slow to address the virus in nursing homes in that state.”

“In Connecticut, nearly 60 percent of the coronavirus deaths in the case happened in nursing homes. Connecticut is not alone there. They're one of more than a dozen states where a majority of deaths have been nursing home deaths,” Maddow said, according to an MSNBC transcript. “But this is the first state that I know of where they fired the state health director for it.”

Similar remarks were shared on CNN, Coleman-Mitchell said.

But in a media statement May 12, the day after her firing, Lamont was quoted as saying of Coleman-Mitchell, “Her service over the last year has been a great deal of help, particularly in the face of the global COVID-19 pandemic that has brought disruption to many throughout the world. I thank her for her advocacy on behalf of the health and safety of our residents, and for being a dedicated partner in service to the State of Connecticut.”

Mitchell-Coleman said she was again stunned and angry.

“This is the most humiliating situation that I have dealt with,” she said. “And then I was indicted by the media on national level. I was fired by the governor. This was a way to erase my contributions.”

Lamont's office declined comment for this story.

Hired in 2019, Coleman-Mitchell left Washington state and returned to Connecticut

Coleman-Mitchell moved from Washington state to take the job in Lamont's Cabinet in 2019. She previously had been with the state Department of Public Health in 1986, serving in several roles until 1994.

Her lawyer, Eric Brown, said Coleman-Mitchell had given up her life in Washington to return to her home state and then was summarily dismissed without benefits, severance — nothing.

“As commissioner, she’s ineligible for unemployment. She picked up her life, moved from Washington state, and then she was dismissed without warning and with no good reason. She was at the pinnacle of her career,” Brown said.

“After, she was promised benefits, severance pay, and then they reneged while acknowledging the good work she did," her lawyer said. "We tried to negotiate with the governor’s office, and they refused. They still refuse because they know they're wrong. But they don’t want to acknowledge they're wrong. It’s political.”

Coleman-Mitchell and Brown said she was discriminated against by Lamont and Geballe, saying there were “a number of incidents,” but she did not elaborate.

But worse was that, as the state’s chief health officer during a public health crisis, her message that the pandemic was “spreading like wildfire” in nursing homes was not heeded, she said.

"I was silenced."

Coleman-Mitchell said she was silenced by Lamont and Geballe when she advocated for nursing home visitation to be banned.

"I tried many times to have conversations to restrict nursing home visits — it was clear that it would spread like wildfire based on what we [she and other states' health commissioners met and spoke about] knew was going on in Washington state," she said. "But it fell on deaf ears. I was silenced."

And then, after a White House Coronavirus Task Force and state health commissioners' news conference or meeting, Coleman-Mitchell said she called Lamont.

"I called him directly. I said, 'Sir, you have got to hear me. We have to do nursing home restrictions.' He said, 'Renee, calm down. Calm down. I’ll talk to my staff, but it will not look good politically to shut down nursing home visits.'"

She also said she was removed as the "face of the DPH on March 10" by Geballe in a phone call. And then was told by Geballe “not to say anything about it."

And she said that “at this point,” her public health staff was “not answering to me, they were answering to the COO.”

“I said then, we need to mitigate what’s going to happen in congregate facilities, like nursing homes. But I also said then, and it was clear, that with any disease or outbreak, Black and brown communities are most impacted. I said from Day One we need to get the word out to our underserved communities. It fell on deaf ears. I said that’s where we should be focusing our efforts. None of those efforts ever came to fruition. They should have listened to their public health director. They did not.”

Brown said his client’s “public health response and her leadership was extraordinary. But when she advocated for people in vulnerable communities, she got roadblocks.”

"Everyone's said it's discriminatory."

Ultimately, she said, first she was silenced, and then she was dismissed.

"This historical practice of discrediting and erasing the noble contributions of Black leaders like myself is not acceptable and must end now," she said.

Coleman-Mitchell said she’s heard from many people, colleagues, friends and family who have, “come out of the woodwork to say, ‘What happened to you was completely wrong.’ Everyone’s said it’s discriminatory.”

A Change.org petition, "Redemption for Renee," has nearly 4,00 signatures. It demands Lamont provide Coleman-Mitchell with "a separation package you assured she would receive, including 12 months' salary, benefits and a letter of recommendation reflecting her 13 months of diligent service effectively addressing the multitude of public health crisis’s impacting ALL the residents of the state. Mitigating the erroneous leaks to the national and local press maligning Ms. Coleman-Mitchell’s stellar reputation."

Now, the married mother of two young adult children, both of whom attend Howard University, said the ordeal of her firing has “taken me time to get over the shock and grief."

"I loved what we did. But having a situation with a COO who took over in February, who totally usurped my responsibility, who shut me down, to have a COO with no public health experience to lead the state response was unbelievably challenging," she said.

"And to remove me, to fire me for no reason in the midst of the worst pandemic this country, this world, has ever seen is just a clear example of the bias that I’ve endured," she said. "It takes the wind out of you.”

Coleman-Mitchell said she has been grieving the loss of the job she loved.

“People have worked so hard on this pandemic. I worked incredibly hard. I was committed. Then, I’m out and publicly humiliated,” she said. “Mentally and emotionally, I’ve had to dig deep. But the work that I’ve done speaks for itself. This whole thing just came from a place of ugly.”

Renee Coleman-Mitchell stat... by Ellyn Santiago on Scribd