WASHINGTON—The last Assistant Secretary for Health at the Department of Health and Human Services was a man who identified as a woman and promoted the false claim that “gender-affirming” procedures are medically necessary for children. His replacement is a Catholic grandfather whose vigorous defense of freedom and the vulnerable has earned the Left’s scorn.
Admiral Brian Christine is a urologist from Alabama, a member of the American Urologic Association, the Sexual Medicine Society of North America, the International Society for Sexual Medicine, and the International Continence Society.
Last month, his office released a report on the risks of gender transition procedures for kids. That report found that puberty blockers, cross sex hormones, and surgeries have “significant, long-term” harms that are “too often ignored or inadequately tracked.” He is determined, he told The Daily Wire, to do exactly the opposite of what his predecessor did.
That would be Rachel (Richard) Levine, a transgender-identifying man whom the Biden administration put front and center to convey its commitment to radical gender ideology. Levine came under fire during his tenure for claiming to be the “first female four-star officer” and attempting to remove any age restrictions for transgender surgeries.
Brian Christine has different priorities.
On Friday morning, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ceremonially swore Christine in as the assistant secretary for health and the head of the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, pinning Christine with his insignia to recognize his rank as a four-star admiral.
“When President Trump and I asked Brian Christine to serve, we weren’t just checking a box,” the secretary said on Friday. “We were both convinced that we had found the leader who would be most able to revive and strengthen the uniform service.”
“Under Admiral Christine’s leadership, the core is entering a new era, one defined by readiness, transparency, integrity, and clinical excellence,” the secretary promised. “He will rebuild our alignment, the core’s alignment with sister agencies, restoring pride in the uniform, and sharpening our focus on preparedness and fitness.”
In an interview with The Daily Wire from his office in the Hubert Humphrey building in Washington, D.C., Christine explained that there are about 5,200 individuals in the commissioned corps of the public health service, commissioned by the president, who carry a rank. Christine, as an admiral, is one of them.
“We are the secretary and the president’s deployable healthcare force,” he explained. “We have physicians. There are nurses, there are engineers, even veterinarians, believe it or not, scientists who are part of the commission corps. We deploy to where the secretary, where the president feels that we are needed for public health efforts.”
“We have officers that work at the FDA, for instance. We have officers, a tremendous number, that work in the Indian Health Services … We have officers, 18 officers, that are at Guantanamo Bay providing the medical care for individuals in Guantanamo Bay. We have officers in the Federal Prison Bureau taking care of inmates, because they need medical care as well.”
Christine is ready to dive into a number of issues, but a main priority for him is to build up the commissioned corps, to increase morale, and make sure they’re ready to be deployed by the secretary. One way of doing this: launching his “Public Health Service Mission Fit,” an initiative to build a stronger Public Health Service and to support readiness in “physical fitness, mental wellness, sleep, and nutrition.”
“We want to be ready,” he shared. “I want my officers to be physically fit, to be mentally fit, to be emotionally fit, to be deployed, and to lead the charge on public health. One of my goals is to bring the commission corps more in line with the other uniformed services … it’s going to promote physical well-being. It’s going to promote physical challenges for my officers, physical fitness training twice a year, physical fitness standards that need to be met weekly required training.”
Christine is very excited about the plan (“He’s very fit, as you can tell,” joked Kennedy at the Friday ceremony as he discussed how Christine plans to promote fitness through his role). He plans to take his own public health service fitness test in the next few weeks, post the results, and challenge his officers to beat his score.
Levine, he said, did not promote physical fitness.
“This was not a priority for him,” Christine said, using the masculine pronoun “he” to refer to Levine. “It’s a priority for me. Our officers. We’re going to be challenging the other uniformed services. We’re going to be challenging them to put together teams. We’re going to put together physical challenges, fitness challenges, and we’re going to engage. We’re going to challenge them. We’re going to meet the other uniformed service members on the field of battle, and we’re going to be having competitions.”
Rachel (Richard) Levine speaks on September 19, 2024 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images for The Atlantic)
Undoing Levine’s push to promote so-called “gender-affirming care” for children is another main priority for Christine, who spoke at length of how radical this effort was.
“We’re righting those wrongs right now,” he said. “We’re focused on protecting our children. We’re focused on preaching the truth that a little boy is a little boy, a little girl is a little girl. You can’t change that.”
Christine is sympathetic to the struggles of children struggling with gender dysphoria and to the challenges their parents face. On a personal level, he believes in pastoral care from pastors or priests who can help support these kids, if their parents wish it.
“We’re focused upon telling parents there is hope for these kids who suffer with gender dysphoria,” he explained. “They do suffer. They need counseling. They need compassionate counseling and care and support.”
“We’re advocating for what’s best for children,” he said firmly. “We have science to back us up, clear science [showing] that the wrong way to treat these children are castrating chemicals and surgeries that reject their sex. That’s what Rachel Levine had pushed. We’re righting those wrongs right now.”
His confidence is bolstered by the knowledge that both the President of the United States and the Secretary of Health and Human Services are firmly behind this cause as well.
“President Trump and Secretary Kennedy are working to turn this country around. To make this country greater than it’s ever been, to make the country healthier. We in this office, we want to be and we are the tip of the spear for that. We’re here for the president. We’re here for the secretary, and we’re not going to back down.”
HHS sparked a backlash earlier this month by changing the name on Levine’s official portrait in the halls of the Humphrey Building — it formerly read Rachel Levine, but now reads Richard Levine. Under the Biden administration, Democrats and activists had widely celebrated that Levine was the first “transgender person to win Senate confirmation,” consistently describing Levine as a woman and heralding his wins as those of women.
Levine’s spokesman called the name change an “act of bigotry against her,” and Levine himself told NPR, “I’m not going to comment on this type of petty action.”
An HHS spokesman said that their “priority is ensuring that the information presented internally and externally by HHS reflects gold standard science,” telling outlets at the time: “We remain committed to reversing harmful policies enacted by Levine and ensuring that biological reality guides our approach to public health.”
Asked about the matter, Christine himself brushed the topic off.
“The bottom line is the name on that plaque is the name that that person was given at their birth on their birth certificate,” he said, adding, “We’re not focusing on that.”
What he is focused on is writing Levine’s wrongs. He believes that he brings the perspective of a main street physician to the role, one who truly understands healthcare.
“I want to help the American people understand that … it’s a new day for health care. Secretary Kennedy promotes science, transparency, honesty, integrity, promotes all the things that my predecessor and the prior president did not,” he said.
“It’s wonderful,” he responded, asked whether he finds the task daunting, “because we have the opportunity to do so much good. We have the opportunity to really help President Trump make America greater than it’s ever been and to help the secretary make America healthier than it’s ever been. Doing it with science and truth and integrity and honesty.”
Americans should expect to see Christine’s office continue to push back against gender ideology. Christine also says his office is heavily involved with the dietary guidelines, sharing that new guidelines will be released in January: “This is going to be taking the very best science and speaking to how we can improve our diets and how we can really make America healthy again.”
There’s more to come, he promised, vowing that his office will not be “taking our foot off the accelerator.”
As for any media backlash to these intended projects, Christine didn’t seem too worried.
“I believe we have the science and the integrity to back us up,” he said simply. “The secretary does. The president does. That’s fine. I’m in this role. I understood what I was getting into, right? And I’m proud to be here. I’m not afraid of that at all.”
“There’s always going to be individuals who have an axe to grind who don’t love our secretary, and they’re going to make up stories about him and produce fake news,” he added. “We’re going to tell the truth.”
