The Influential Adviser Helping Shape Kennedy's Policies

New York Times

22-05-2025

Calley Means says he knows firsthand that America's food and pharmaceutical industries are corrupt. As a former lobbyist, he argues, he once helped corrupt them.
Mr. Means, 39, has emerged as a key figure in the Make America Healthy Again movement. He is a top adviser to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and coordinated a presidential commission report that will be published Thursday on the causes of chronic disease among children. That report is expected to touch on some of the movement's top priorities, including environmental toxins, ultraprocessed foods and corporate influences over our health.
Corporate influence has long been a talking point for Mr. Means, who has rapidly risen from an obscure health care entrepreneur to an influential figure shaping the White House's health priorities. (It was Mr. Means who suggested to Mr. Kennedy that he consider joining forces with President Trump last summer.) He is a fixture on Fox News and on popular podcasts, where he often discusses rising rates of issues such as infertility, depression, diabetes and obesity.
He is the co-founder of Truemed, a startup that helps people funnel their flexible savings account dollars toward products like weights, saunas and supplements. Mr. Means has said making it easier for people to purchase these types of products could help prevent disease.
Mr. Means, who does not have any formal medical training, has used his experience consulting for companies like Coca-Cola and the pharmaceutical industry to call out what he sees as insidious tactics that harm American children. For example, he has said that he worked to ensure sugar taxes failed, on behalf of soda companies.
He argues that the health care industry profits from sick children and frequently describes the American public as being on a pharmaceutical 'treadmill,' arguing that the health care system pushes the public toward prescription medications rather than prioritizing diet and exercise.
While many scientists and doctors agree with the movement's focus on the health of American children, some have bristled at what they see as an overly simplified picture of complex causes of chronic disease.
At times, Mr. Means has also flouted conventional medical guidance, posting on Instagram that children should drink 'more raw milk and less juice' (the Food and Drug Administration has warned against raw milk) and writing on X that Covid vaccine mandates are a 'war crime, particularly for kids.' He has also called water fluoridation 'an attack on lower income kids,' citing research linking high levels of fluoride with lower childhood IQ. The science around the potential cognitive effects of fluoride at levels found in American drinking water is still unsettled.
Mr. Means declined to comment for this article.
Mr. Trump recently said he would name Mr. Means's sister, Dr. Casey Means, as his nominee for surgeon general. Dr. Means also co-founded Levels, a wearable glucose monitor company.
The siblings co-wrote the book 'Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health,' which blames ultraprocessed foods, pesticides, sedentary lifestyles and other issues for a range of chronic diseases. The book also focuses on their mother, who died just 13 days after she was diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer in 2021. The pair write that their mother's doctors suggested treatments that would have kept her away from her family in her final days, given pandemic precautions.
'Good Energy' became a best seller. The Means siblings took ideas once closely aligned with the left — such as reducing environmental toxins — and framed them in a way that resonated with conservatives who were already skeptical of the health care system. The siblings' appearance on Tucker Carlson's podcast last August became Apple's most-shared episode of 2024. Soon after, the siblings appeared on the 'The Joe Rogan Experience' podcast to talk about their book, the food industry and corporate corruption.
Lately, Mr. Means has found a new platform: a government news conference. Onstage at a recent F.D.A. event announcing a federal push to phase out common food dyes, Mr. Means reflected on the MAHA movement's progress: 'These are things that a year or two years ago would have been absolutely out of the question.'