Secretary of Health and Human Services RFK Jr. attempted to calm the MAHA masses after new CDC director nominee Susan Monarez was attacked online for messages tweeted by a previous director.
In a Tuesday X post, RFK Jr. urged, “X posts that erroneously attribute Biden-era tweets supporting masks, lockdowns, vaccine mandates, etc. to my @CDCgov Director nominee, Susan Monarez, have understandably provoked agita within the MAHA movement.”
He added, “I handpicked Susan for this job because she is a longtime champion of MAHA values, and a caring, compassionate and brilliant microbiologist and a tech wizard who will reorient CDC toward public health and gold-standard science. I’m so grateful to President Trump for making this appointment.”
MAHA alleged that Monarez had promoted vaccinations and masking under the official X account for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention prior to becoming its acting director. The tweets in question sparked outrage as RFK Jr.’s ”Make America Health Again” supporters questioned her beliefs.
In response to the backlash, a note was added to the CDC director’s bio: “Posts prior to 1/20/25 were from former CDC directors.”
President Donald Trump selected Monarez to officially lead the center as director on Monday, less than two weeks after withdrawing his first nominee David Weldon, a physician and former Florida Republican Congressman. Trump reportedly withdrew Weldon’s nomination out of concern that he would not receive enough Senate votes to be confirmed.
In a post to Truth Social, the president wrote: “Americans have lost confidence in the CDC due to political bias and disastrous mismanagement,” but Monarez would work with RFK Jr. to “prioritize Accountability, High Standards, and Disease Prevention to finally address the Chronic Disease Epidemic and, MAKE AMERICA HEALTHY AGAIN!”
If confirmed, Monarez would be the first non-physician to lead the department.
Under her leadership, the department has already scrubbed HIV-related content from their website in an effort to erase any kind of “gender ideology,” according to a memo from NBC News.
Though a judge ruled that the deleted webpages must be restored, many of the pages now have a banner at the top reading: “Any information on this page promoting gender ideology is extremely inaccurate and disconnected from the immutable biological reality that there are two sexes, male and female.”
Yet much of MAHA has remained dissatisfied with the Trump administration’s pick, with social media commenting to express their lack of faith in Monarez.
“How is she a long time champion of MAHA values? That doesn’t seem to be what the evidence shows. I want to believe you, but this pick seems well outside of the realm of what the movement stands for,” wrote one X user.
Another shared told their over 100,000 followers on X that Monarez is “quite literally the OPPOSITE of the MAHA agenda.”
They added, “Just to recap, the lady who Trump just put in charge of public health at the CDC is 100% PRO mRNA, and 100% PRO AI Transhumanist takeover of our health.”
Echoing the concerns of other commentators, the X user wagered, “Either we are getting seriously played, or someone around Trump is somehow forcing or encouraging him to pick absolutely TERRIBLE candidates to fulfill an agenda. Or both.”
Monarez’s nomination comes on the heels of a measles outbreak across the country, with RFK Jr. addressed the outbreak and called vaccination against infection a “personal choice.”
