In the end, “Good Energy” wasn’t enough.
Dr. Casey Means, US President Donald Trump’s second candidate for Surgeon General, rose to prominence in 2024 through a platform of podcasts and social media – supported by inner peace, clean eating and metabolic health. But she failed to meet the more basic expectations of America’s top doctor.
In a Truth Social post on Thursday, Trump acknowledged that Means did not have the votes needed for Senate confirmation. He placed the blame on the chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions: Senator Bill Cassidy, who did not support Means’ nomination, was a “very disloyal person.”
Trump’s third candidate
Trump presented Dr. Nicole B. Saphier as his new nominee, calling her a “STAR doctor” and “INCREDIBLE COMMUNICATOR” who will make America healthy again – the motto of the beleaguered movement led by Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. It is Trump’s third nomination for surgeon general.
Saphier is a radiologist at a satellite office at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Monmouth, New Jersey, and a commentator on Fox News. She earned her medical degree from Ross University School of Medicine, a private medical school based in Barbados.
How closely she is actually connected to the MAHA movement remains unclear. Last year, in an interview I conducted as part of my research into the rise of Casey Means and her brother Calley, Saphier said of MAHA: “Do I think it’s the ultimate solution that will save the health care system? No, I don’t think so.”
Skepticism about the movement
Saphier added that it is very easy for MAHA to criticize the health system “if you don’t do it day in and day out [darin arbeitet]” like she does. “I wouldn’t want to work in any other health system in the world,” she said. “You can support the MAHA movement without endorsing every aspect of it.”
The failure of Means’ nomination is a setback for the MAHA movement, whose supporters had advocated for her confirmation. Saphier may have expressed some doubts about whether MAHA is a panacea for American medicine, but she herself has tried to claim the phrase “Make America Healthy Again” as her own.
In April 2020, Saphier published a book called “Make America Healthy Again: How Bad Behavior and Big Government Caused a Trillion Dollar Crisis.” The book is a critique of the American health care system and promotes “concrete solutions” to improve public health – such as reducing sodium consumption.
Trying to brand MAHA
Saphier had already tried to trademark the phrase “Make America Healthy Again” in June 2019, before her book was published, and submitted an application to the United States Patent and Trademark Office – as ROLLING STONE exclusively reports.
But Saphier wasn’t the first in line. In August 2019, the Patent and Trademark Office notified her that her application had been stayed due to a “previously filed, potentially conflicting application.” This came from Gildardo Fullen, a man who worked for a construction company in California – but his application lapsed. “Make America Healthy Again” would have fallen to Saphier, but her application was also abandoned in September 2021 because she did not submit the required documents on time. (Fullen did not respond to a request for comment.)
In my interview with Saphier last year, she explained to me how the trademark registration had slipped her mind: “With the Covid pandemic and absolute chaos, three children – that wasn’t on my to-do list.” She added, “Would I have liked a little thank you? RFK Jr. is considered a father [von MAHA]then I would probably be the mother. Is that worth much to me? My day-to-day work involves telling people that they have cancer – it puts such things into perspective.”
Means loses her chance
Ultimately, Saphier lost the brand – and Means lost her chance at the office of surgeon general after her unusual career seemed increasingly less viable in the light of a Senate hearing.
Means co-authored the bestselling book Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health with her brother Calley Means. Calley Means is now working as a special advisor to Secretary of Health and Human Services Kennedy. In a high-profile Senate committee hearing in February, she touted a “great national cure” that would make “healthy living the easiest choice.”
The same senators had previously voted for Kennedy as Secretary of Health and Human Services – ushering in a year of explosive measles outbreaks, the chaotic dismantling of America’s vaccination infrastructure, and the spectacle of a minister doing pull-ups in airports while headlines like this swirled around the media – from the New York Post: “RFK Jr. once cut off the penis of a dead raccoon for ‘later examination’ while out with the family.”
Unease about Means’ candidacy
Given all this, one could argue that the unconventional is in vogue right now.
Still, an unease weighed on Means’ nomination: She refused to clearly state her support for childhood vaccinations; she had dropped out of her surgical fellowship shortly before graduation and did not have an active license to practice medicine. And as ROLLING STONE previously reported, Means promoted unsafe wellness products containing lead and cadmium in her Good Energy newsletter and received sponsorships from those brands.
Senator Angela Alsobrooks, Democrat of Maryland, said Means “didn’t get the votes she needed because she simply wasn’t qualified.” She is “the only person ever nominated for this office without an active license to practice medicine. She refused to take a clear stance on vaccinations, and her promotion of unsafe products was the biggest hoax of all.”
Saphier’s training as a possible point of contention
Means did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Saphier is Trump’s third candidate. The first, Dr. Janet Nesheiwat, a fellow Fox News commentator, withdrew her candidacy last May after it was revealed that she had falsely claimed to have graduated from an American medical school when she actually received her degree from a Caribbean school.
Saphier’s medical training could still become an issue in the confirmation hearings. Dr. Vin Gupta, a practicing pulmonologist and medical officer in the US Air Force Reserves, says: “This is a president who ran with America First. We’ve heard it over and over again. But he’s nominating to be America’s top doctor a doctor who wasn’t trained in America. I think that should matter. Qualifications matter.” He adds: “Caribbean medical schools have known quality issues” – a reference to Saphier’s degree from a college in Barbados.
Saphier and a representative from the Department of Health and Human Services referred inquiries to the White House. White House spokesman Kush Desai called Saphier an “accomplished physician” who will be a “valuable asset to President Trump and will work tirelessly to implement every aspect of his MAHA agenda.”
