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--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Jessica Mendoza.
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--:-- Jessica Mendoza: It's Monday, May 12th. Coming up on the show, the business ties of RFK Jr.'s Maha Inner Circle.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Before we dive in, a quick word from our sponsor. LifeLock monitors millions of data points a second. If you become a victim of identity theft, they'll fix it. Guaranteed, or your money back. Save up to 40% on your first year at lifelock.com/slash podcast. Terms apply.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Last week, President Trump nominated Dr. Casey Means to be Surgeon General. Means is a wellness influencer and, along with her brother, a prominent advocate for Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s "Make America Healthy Again" movement.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: WSJ's Christina Peterson reports on how Means's nomination makes her the latest figure from the lightly regulated wellness industry who has been elevated by Kennedy.
--:-- Christina Peterson: What's up? Nice to meet you guys. Thanks for having us, Joe. Thanks for coming here. I'm all happy, but this is not a happy subject. I don't know.
--:-- Christina Peterson: Back in October, podcaster Joe Rogan featured a brother and sister duo on a show. People want to be healthy. There's a huge system rigged against them. Casey and Callie Means are big in the wellness space. Casey, the sister, is a medical doctor. The brother, Callie, is a former food lobbyist. They each co-founded startups related to health.
--:-- Christina Peterson: People know that something's not right, and people know that this health issue is the tip of the iceberg. Casey Means is one of the more influential figures in the Make America Healthy Again movement.
--:-- Christina Peterson: That's our colleague Christina Peterson. She's been covering the Maha movement closely. She kind of came to prominence last year when she and her brother wrote this book called Good Energy that is sort of examining the root causes for why America is not as healthy as it should be.
--:-- Christina Peterson: Last week, President Trump nominated Casey Means to be Surgeon General, a powerful role inside Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Department of Health and Human Services.
--:-- Christina Peterson: Means' nomination has put her in the national spotlight, making her the latest and now most prominent Maha influencer, elevated by Kennedy's political rise.
--:-- Christina Peterson: The rise of RFK, he's now the nation's most powerful public health official, has created avenues in which some of these figures stand to profit.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Jessica Mendoza.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Before he took office as HHS secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. gave a forceful statement to Congress. We will remove financial conflicts of interest from our agencies. We will create an honest, unbiased, gold-standard science at HHS, accountable to the president, to Congress, and to the American people.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Kennedy has presented himself as the antidote to business interests becoming entangled with the nation's health care. He's called out conflicts of interest between the government and big food companies and big pharma.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: As he's pushed to get those industries out of government, he's surrounded himself with people from another industry with growing influence.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: A lot of the most influential Maha figures have businesses in the wellness industry, which is a little more lightly regulated.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And people that I've talked to have raised some concerns that their close alliance with RFK kind of makes it seem like the government has backed the wellness industry, that they have this sort of imprimatur of the government, when that's not necessarily the case.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Some of these companies are sort of catering to health optimization, people who want to really learn a lot about their health and optimize everything they can do to be healthier and live longer.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And that's just a little bit of a different emphasis than sort of traditional public health.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: One recent public display of the ties between RFK Jr. and the wellness industry was at a press conference in April.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Let's join me in welcoming him, a warrior for America's children, RFK Jr.
--:-- RFK Jr.: Thank you, Governor Morrissey.
--:-- RFK Jr.: At the Health and Human Services building, Kennedy announced plans to phase out some artificial food dyes.
--:-- RFK Jr.: And we are going to get rid of the ties. And one by one, we're going to get rid of every ingredient and additive in school and food that we can legally address.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: It had the vibe of almost a campaign event. Tons of people wearing Maha hats, apparel.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: When RFK was speaking, people held up their phones to film him. It really had almost like a concert rock star vibe more than a typical health policy press conference.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And it was packed. There were tons of people.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Some of the guests Kennedy brought to the press conference were more traditional, like the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Others were less so.
--:-- Vani Hari: Hi, I'm Vani Hari. I'm a food activist and author, a fellow Maha mom.
--:-- Vani Hari: Vani Hari, who is known as the food babe, she is someone who has long championed getting rid of certain dyes and additives out of certain foods.
--:-- Vani Hari: And she is the co-founder of a company called Truvani, which makes protein powder, supplements, and snack bars.
--:-- Vani Hari: And she was extremely enthusiastic to be talking about the FDA's announcement that it was phasing out certain food dyes.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: It was just kind of striking to have some people on stage who were later praised by Kennedy.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Thanks, Vani Hari, who's been an extraordinary leader.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: The day after that press conference, Hari did a joint CNN interview, sharing top billing with the FDA commissioner.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: She'd already starred with other Maha moms in a video shared on the official White House ex-account.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: The Make America Healthy Again movement is the strongest movement in America because it contains moms.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So she's someone that they've really turned to to help amplify their message.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And they don't typically identify her company, but she has a very vigorous online presence, and it does seem like this is giving her even more visibility.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And so all of these connections, does it violate any ethical rules or any laws?
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Probably not. Some of these situations operate in a little bit of a gray zone.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: People who are coming into government do have to declare all of their financial investments.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Sometimes the government asks them to divest of certain stocks.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: They generally cannot keep receiving a salary from the outside.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Hari is not a government employee, so she can advocate on behalf of RFK Jr.'s movement while still running her health and wellness business.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: But Christina says perception matters in government.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Ethics experts say most of the time the government doesn't want to give the impression of even the appearance of a conflict of interest.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So that's why they would typically avoid things like that that could give the impression of using the public office for private gain.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Another person in the same bucket as Hari is Dr. Mark Hyman, another wellness startup founder that Christina noticed was in that same press conference in March.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: I'm a lifelong advocate for addressing chronic disease through food.
--:-- Dr. Mark Hyman: Hyman sells a variety of supplements and nutrition books.
--:-- Dr. Mark Hyman: He also owns a membership-based health program called Function Health.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: RFK Jr. said he's known Hyman for 20 years.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: He talked about how he and Mark Hyman have long been friends.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: He gave a shout-out to Mark Hyman's book.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Mark Hyman says in his book, The 10-Day Sugar Detoxed Eye, which I'll give a plug to, It was a very good book.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: He talks about it.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So there were just some kind of unorthodox elements of having business owners who didn't talk about their businesses, but stand to benefit from some of these policies and from, at a minimum, being on stage with RFK Jr. and being praised by him.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Hyman's company, Function Health, closed a funding round in February that valued the company at $2.5 billion.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: That's up from $191 million in June of last year, according to data from PitchBook.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Hari and Hyman said they've been working on food and nutrition issues for years, and Hyman said he attended the April press conference as a private citizen and a practicing doctor.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Hari said that Health and Human Services, quote, has been a revolving door to the food and pharmaceutical industry and never given a voice to advocates and mothers like me until now.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Christina, I just want to understand something.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: You know, a lot of people might remember Joe Biden also had influencers in his orbit and even in the White House.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: How is what we're seeing here different?
--:-- Christina Peterson: I think what is unusual that we're seeing is this sort of intertwining of the Maha universe with HHS.
--:-- Christina Peterson: And not all of this is in ways that raise eyebrows.
--:-- Christina Peterson: Some of it is just that there is a very devoted community of Maha moms as they called and advocates.
--:-- Christina Peterson: But I think where people are concerned is where they do enter into the official agency activities and are featured in their press conferences or their official communications.
--:-- Christina Peterson: That's where I think things get a little blurry, according to ethics experts.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And the concern specifically is, are you using government, the public office, to benefit individuals or businesses?
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: A spokesman for the HHS said, quote, It appears that the Wall Street Journal is taking issue with private citizens exercising First Amendment rights.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Christina says that there are Maha influencers who are getting official roles in the government.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: That's after the break.
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--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Trump's new pick for Surgeon General, Casey Means, touts views shared by many Maha supporters.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Here she is on Tucker Carlson's podcast.
--:-- Casey Means: All aspects of modern American society are rigged against the American patient to get us, you know, addicted to food, allusioned to pharma.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Means got her medical degree from Stanford University, though she didn't finish her residency afterwards.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And she doesn't have an active medical license.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: She's pushed to overhaul the country's food and health systems, driven by a deep distrust of America's pharmaceutical and food industries.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: She's questioned medical expertise and vaccine mandates.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Means' embrace of many of these Maha ideas started after her mother died of pancreatic cancer.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Casey Means writes in her book about how when their mother was dying in 2021, she was angered by the doctors who were pushing surgical interventions on her mother when she wanted more to preserve her quality of life.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And so she felt that that was an example of the medical establishment not giving good advice to patients and not putting their wishes first.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Casey Means also owns her own wellness business.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So Casey is a co-founder of a company called Levels that is a subscription-based app that connects to wearable glucose monitors.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Levels can be used for many things, whether it's AI-powered food logging, whether it's tracking your macros.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Christina also found that Means has investments and ties with other companies and people who are close to Kennedy's inner circle.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: For example, she's an investor in Dr. Mark Hyman's company Function Health.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And Hyman, in turn, is an advisor on Casey Means' company Levels.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Being the nation's top doctor and having investments in the health field could be perceived as a conflict of interest.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So someone like Casey Means, if she is confirmed by the Senate, would have to divest from her companies and some of these investments to become Surgeon General.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: That's typically what happens.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: But this administration has been a little different, and they haven't always been as scrupulous about some of these matters as previous administrations have been in some of the gray zone areas.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: I think typically when people enter government, they are generally expected to leave their outside financial interests.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: They can resume having jobs in the private sector after their stint in government is done.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: For example, there are some members of Kennedy's senior staff who have retained stock investments in specific companies.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And ethics folks that I spoke to said it would frankly just be cleaner and less complicated if they sold those stocks.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So there's an intertwining of some of these businesses that makes it hard to say I'm not going to make any decisions that affect this company.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So that the reason that typically people say it's just easier if you don't have those assets for your time in government.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: But it is clear that if confirmed as Surgeon General, Casey Means' profile would rise.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: The Surgeon General is tasked with providing health advice.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: I think we've seen them sometimes really embrace that as a bully pulpit and be able to push certain messages out to the public.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So in this instance, you know, she already has a following, but this would for sure give her a broader audience.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And Casey's brother, Callie, is also working with the administration as a top aide to Kennedy.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: He's what's called a special government employee in health and human services, which means that he gets to be involved in HHS decisions without having to divest, though he can't be involved with decisions that affect his financial interest.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So Callie Means has been a top Kennedy aide since the summer.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: He is the co-founder of a company called TruMed, whose affiliated doctors can affirm that wellness products are medically necessary so customers can buy them with health savings accounts.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Which is interesting.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: I mean, would you, can that be characterized as a conflict of interest at all?
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: I mean, I think I would have to defer to like a lawyer on that.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: But it is, I mean, he is a special government employee, so the rules are a little different for him.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And he, you know, HHS has said that everyone has abided by the ethics laws.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Callie Means declined to comment.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Casey Means didn't respond to requests for comment.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Casey Means has faced criticism for not finishing her residency or holding an active medical license.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: That's uncommon for a Surgeon General.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Kennedy is standing by her nomination.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Well, what's interesting is that he's really pushed back on this idea that she's not qualified because she didn't, for example, complete her surgical residency.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And he has said, well, that's what makes her the best person for this job, that she has been a skeptic and that she didn't just swallow the traditional medical orthodoxy.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: She said, if we're really going to heal people, if we're healers, we can't just be making our life about building new procedures.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: We actually have to figure out new approaches to medicine.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And that's the kind of leadership that she's going to bring to our country.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So he's really leaning into that as part of his defense.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So Christina, what struck you most as you were reporting this story?
--:-- Christina Peterson: I think what struck me the most was that RFK really has emphasized over and over again how much he wanted to weed out all conflicts of interest.
--:-- Christina Peterson: So he really has made that a central core of his messaging.
--:-- Christina Peterson: And so that's why it does strike me as interesting that so many people who do have companies in the health and wellness space are involved in his administration one way or another.
--:-- Christina Peterson: And it may not be a full conflict of interest, but the experts that I spoke to said it does at least give the appearance of some intermingling of interests.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So RFK's rise and the attention to the Make America Healthy Again movement generally gives people involved in this space more of a bigger audience, more attention to these issues.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: And then a few people do stand to benefit from having particular attention from RFK and a particular boost in visibility by doing public events with him.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: So what happens next? I mean, how likely is it that Casey Means becomes the next Surgeon General?
--:-- Christina Peterson: I think it's probably likely that she gets confirmed.
--:-- Christina Peterson: Most of the president's nominees have gotten through the Senate, with a handful of exceptions.
--:-- Christina Peterson: So I think that there has to be a pretty compelling reason for Republican senators to vote no, and I'm not sure I see that at this point.
--:-- Jessica Mendoza: Thank you.
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