Merrick Garland Will Be Out for Back Surgery

It would appear that the White House has learned its lesson about cabinet members going on leave for surgery without notifying anyone.

On Monday, it was reported that Attorney General Merrick Garland is undergoing back surgery this weekend.

He will transfer his office authorities to a deputy prior to going in for surgery as well as the immediate aftermath.

Lessons Learned

Garland, 71, has the surgery scheduled for Saturday, and it is not being reported as anything major.

The report stated that the surgery is expected to last about 90 minutes, and it is being classified as “minimally invasive.”

As a back surgery veteran, I am going to guess that this is likely surgery for a disc-related issue, so he should not be down very long if my speculation is correct.

Garland is not expected to stay overnight, but his duties will be temporarily shifted to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco until he is able to resume working.

Garland is expected to return to work in about a week.

This notice comes on the tail of Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin scheduling prostate surgery without notifying the White House.

He was later hospitalized due to complications from the surgery, but again, the White House was unaware until after the fact.

There have since been calls from both sides of the aisle demanding Austin’s resignation, but the White House has stood firmly behind him on this.

After that happened, Biden officials said they were putting out new protocols for top officials who would be undergoing such procedures or who needed to temporarily assign their duties to someone else for the reason of being incapacitated.

While Garland was clearly following what we would assume were normal protocols, this does not excuse the fact that the Secretary of Defense went off the grid with international tensions at an all-time high, as well as being neck-deep in wars on two different fronts.

I am glad they got this straightened out, but Austin should still be forced to resign or face significant disciplinary actions.