MAHA infighting threatens to derail RFK Jr.'s health revolution

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s short time leading America's health agencies has already destabilized the uneasy alliance that vaulted him into President Trump's Cabinet.Why it matters: The "Make America Healthy Again" movement — a loose umbrella of vaccine skeptics, wellness influencers, and anti-pharma crusaders — was envisioned as a revolution against the medical establishment.But its attempt to integrate with the federal health apparatus — and the MAGA purists who comprise the backbone of Trump's base — has so far proven deeply dysfunctional.The big picture: The anti-establishment takeover of Health and Human Services — a sprawling agency that accounts for the largest share of domestic federal spending — has become one of the most chaotic experiments of Trump's second term.Trump has already been forced to pull two major health nominations — former Rep. Dave Weldon for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director and Fox News contributor Janette Nesheiwat for surgeon general — after scrutiny of their records.The Food and Drug Administration's top vaccine regulator, Dr. Peter Marks, abruptly resigned in March in protest of Kennedy's "misinformation and lies" about vaccines.As a measles outbreak spread in Texas, the White House became so frustrated by the lack of clear and fast communications by HHS that it set up a parallel press shop, as Axios scooped last month.Between the lines: Kennedy's top health picks include contrarians who are critical of the medical establishment — but unwilling to fully embrace the MAHA movement's more conspiratorial views on vaccines.National Institutes of Health director Jay Bhattacharya and FDA commissioner Marty Makary were brought in as high-profile critics of COVID-era orthodoxy who boast mainstream academic credentials.But neither man fully endorses Kennedy's most controversial positions, particularly on childhood vaccines and autism — making them targets for the anti-vaccine purists who view them as insufficiently radical. Anti-vaccine activist Mary Talley Bowden. Screenshot via XZoom in: Trump's nomination of nutrition influencer Casey Means to be surgeon general last week has become the latest flashpoint in the unraveling of the MAHA coalition.Means and her brother, White House adviser Calley Means, became key faces of Kennedy's movement after authoring a New York Times best-seller that railed against the food and pharmaceutical industries.Their message — that metabolic dysfunction and chronic illness stem from institutional corruption — helped popularize the MAHA brand among wellness influencers and libertarian-minded reformers.But Casey Means' nomination to be the face of public health messaging has drawn fire from all sides.Anti-vaccine activists argue she isn't sufficiently committed to Kennedy's views on vaccine safety, especially the more fringe beliefs he espoused before leading HHS.Kennedy's running mate, Nicole Shanahan, claimed she was promised that the Means siblings wouldn't get jobs inside HHS — and that "someone" is "controlling" Kennedy's decisions.The intrigue: Far-right conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer, who successfully lobbied Trump to fire national security adviser Mike Waltz and much of his team, has trained her eyes on the Means siblings.Loomer has openly mocked Casey Means as a "woo woo woman" who "literally talks to trees and spiritual mediums" — drawing backlash from Calley Means, who suggested Loomer was taking money from the medical industry.Kennedy has vigorously defended Means' qualifications, arguing that her popularity among "MAHA moms" poses "an existential threat to the status quo interests, which profit from sickness."The other side: Other top MAGA influencers, including Charlie Kirk, Donald Trump Jr. and Megyn Kelly, have praised Casey Means' appointment and emphasized the need for coalition harmony."If you merge MAHA and MAGA, it's like 1932," former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon said on his "War Room" podcast, predicting a political realignment on par with FDR's New Deal coalition."You govern forever."The bottom line: HHS will be at the center of major policy debates over Medicaid cuts, abortion access, vaccine policy, medical research and the future of public health infrastructure.But the deep divisions within its Frankenstein coalition are threatening to tear MAHA apart before those battles can even begin.

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