‘Wellness influencer’ Casey Means heads to confirmation hearing
The U.S. Senate is holding a confirmation hearing today for wellness influencer Casey Means, the Trump administration’s pick for surgeon general.
By Dan Vergano edited by Lewis asked.
Snow falls on the U.S. Capitol on February 23, 2026 in Washington, DC
Heather Diehl/Getty Images
Wellness influencer Casey Means, who left his medical residency to pursue alternative medicine, will appear before a U.S. Senate today. confirmation hearing on his appointment as US Surgeon General. Her initial hearing, scheduled for October 30, 2025, was delayed due to the delivery of her first child.
Last May, President Donald Trump nominated Means to serve as “Doctor of the Nation“, a role best known for his high-profile health advisories. The surgeon general also heads a uniformed public health corps whose members serve in agencies such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Means, 38, was named after the Trump administration withdrew his initial appointment as a Fox News contributor. Janette Nesheiwat for the position following reports that she had made misleading statements about his medical training and military service.
“[Means’s] his academic achievements, as well as his life’s work, are absolutely remarkable,” Trump said in a social media post announcing his appointment.
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Means are popular wellness influencer allied with the head of the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. She argued that many diseases, such as such as diabetes, cancer and Alzheimer’s diseasecome from poor diet, insomnia and lack of exercise – which she says ultimately affect cellular function in a “mitochondrial dysfunction» theory of illness.
She is expected to face questions about finances conflicts of interest on links with companies that sell nutritional supplements and its role in thefunctional medicine” company she co-founded, Levels, which markets glucometers to healthy people. (The American Academy of Family Physicians temporarily stopped granting continuing medical education credits in functional medicine in 2014 after finding that some of its treatments were “harmful and dangerous.” Courses that teach clinicians how to perform specific techniques are still prohibited.) Means said in a government filing last September that she would resign from her advisory position at Levels if confirmed as general surgeon.
The Senate is also expected to question Means on his views on vaccines. Republican senator and doctor Bill Cassidy of Louisiana has increasingly expressed concerns about HHS’s actions to reduce prices recommendations on childhood vaccines. Means, meanwhile, echoed Kennedy’s skepticism about vaccines. recent statements.
Trained as a physician at Stanford University School of Medicine, Means resigned from her medical residency as an ear, nose and throat surgeon in 2018 to co-found Levels. Means’ brother, Calley Means, with whom she co-wrote the bestselling nutritional advice book Good energy: the surprising link between metabolism and unlimited healthrecently resigned as an advisor to Kennedy at the White House. His mandate was marked by conflict of interest issues. Casey Means criticized the food and pharmaceutical industries for underestimating the role of a healthy diet in disease prevention, a classic Trump administration argument: “Making America Healthy Again” movement.
Bloomberg reported last October that in his testimony at the hearing, Casey Means plans to say: “My professional background has prepared me to become an innovative, unifying and practical leader focused on reversing chronic disease.
Former Trump administration surgeon general Jerome Adams and American Public Health Association executive director Georges Benjamin criticized Means for does not have an active medical license or board certification, and they argued that it overestimates well-being as a cure for illness. His approval of unpasteurized raw milk despite his proven adverse effects on health and its focus on mitochondrial diseases resonates similar rhetoric from Kennedy.
“Casey Means has more influence than a doctor,” says Mariah Wellman of Michigan State University, who studies the credibility of influencers in the wellness industry. Means is a “great example” of an online entrepreneur using a medical degree to establish credibility while expressing himself outside the confines of his training, she adds.
“I worry that Means is not helping to make Americans healthy and is instead pursuing her own goals of becoming more popular online and making more money — exactly what she says she often struggles with,” Wellman said.
The confirmation hearing will begin at 10:00 a.m. EST.
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