Laura Loomer, a right-wing provocateur and distinguished supporter of President Trump, has set her sights on Dr. Casey Means, the physician-turned-wellness influencer who Trump tapped as his new nominee to be U.S. surgeon normal on Wednesday.
In a sequence of posts on social platform X that started shortly after Trump’s announcement, Loomer accused the president’s advisers of poor vetting and attacked Means’s background.
“This is honestly insane,” she wrote in a single publish Thursday morning. “I do not believe for one second that Donald Trump made this decision. I refuse to believe it.”
Loomer went on to label chronic-disease entrepreneur Means, a detailed ally of Well being and Human Companies (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the “Make American Healthy Again” — or MAHA — motion, a “Marxist tree hugger.”
“PRESIDENT TRUMP’S PICK FOR US SURGEON GENERAL CASEY MEANS SAID SHE PRAYS TO INANIMATE OBJECTS, COMMUNICATES WITH SPIRIT MEDIUMS, USES SHROOMS AS ‘PLANT MEDICINE’ AND TALKS TO TREES! SHE ALSO DOESN’T EVEN HAVE AN ACTIVE MEDICAL LICENSE,” Loomer wrote between two purple alert emojis.
Trump introduced Wednesday that he had pulled his nomination of Dr. Janette Nesheiwat to grow to be surgeon normal, amid questions over her credentials, and changed his preliminary decide with Means.
“[Means’s] academic achievements, together with her life’s work, are absolutely outstanding,” Trump wrote in a publish on Reality Social concerning the swap. “Dr. Casey Means has the potential to be one of the finest Surgeon Generals in United States History.”
Loomer, who was extensively credited with Nesheiwat’s downfall in addition to the firings of a number of nationwide safety aides final month, shortly shifted her assaults to the brand new surgeon normal nominee.
“This is so embarrassing for the Trump administration. They chose a social media influencer who sells supplements who didn’t even support Donald Trump to be the US Surgeon General,” she wrote in one other publish. “Who is doing the vetting?????”
“There is something rotten in the Trump vetting operation,” she added within the thread.
Loomer has tagged the social media accounts of Trump, Vice President Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and a number of conservative influencers in varied posts towards the brand new surgeon normal nominee.
Kennedy, in a publish Thursday morning on X, championed Trump’s nomination of Means, saying she “was born to hold this job.”
“She will provide our country with ethical guidance, wisdom, and gold-standard medical advice even when it challenges popular orthodoxies. She will be a juggernaut against the ossified medical conventions that have helped make our people the sickest in the world at the highest cost per capita,” he wrote. “Casey is a breath of fresh air, and we can’t wait for her to get started.”
HHS spokesperson Kush Desai, in an announcement shared with The Hill, echoed the Well being chief’s protection.
“Over 77 million Individuals resoundingly re-elected President Trump to smash our nation’s damaged establishment and restore American Greatness – and that features Making America Wholesome Once more,” Desai said. “Dr. Casey Means has the perfect steadiness of elite credentials with out the luggage of being beholden to a corrupt healthcare system that has profited from America’s continual illness epidemic.”
The White Home did not instantly reply to The Hill’s request for remark.
Calley Means, the nominee’s brother who works for HHS, defended his sister in an internet publish directed at Loomer, highlighting her background as a “Stanford educated physician” and her efforts “to inspire others to leave the medical system and reform it.”
“She is the single best person in the world on connecting the dots behind our chronic diseases crisis — and her reason for existence is to help President reverse these trends,” he wrote. “She worked to encourage [Kennedy] to support Trump and we went on Joe Rogan with the specific intention to convince undecided MAHA voters to support Trump.”
Loomer has demonstrated her skill to affect prime degree White Home staffing selections up to now. She met with the president within the Oval Workplace a day earlier than the administration fired a number of White Home Nationwide Safety Council workers members in early April.
The fitting-wing advocate has additionally confronted backlash for entertaining 9/11 conspiracy theories and spreading anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim rhetoric. She traveled with Trump aboard his marketing campaign jet final fall on journeys to New York and Pennsylvania to mark the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist assaults.
Requested about her position in his political sphere final fall, Trump stated, “Laura is a supporter. I don’t management Laura; she’s a free spirit.”
Up to date at 11:23 a.m. EDT.
