Trump and Obama’s White House Physician Was Quietly Demoted by the Navy for Misconduct on the Job: Report
Ronny Jackson, a presidential physician turned pro-Trump congressman, has been deceitfully calling himself a retired Navy rear admiral despite getting demoted following a probe into his White House behavior
Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty
Ronny Jackson with Donald Trump during a Veterans Affairs Department "telehealth" event in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC on Thursday, Aug 03, 2017.Texas Rep. Ronny Jackson — a retired naval officer who served as the president's physician under Donald Trump and Barack Obama — was retroactively demoted by the Navy in 2022 for misconduct during his White House tenure, according to a new Washington Post report.
But despite the quiet title change, from retired Navy rear admiral to retired Navy captain, Jackson has continued going by his former rank on his congressional website.
“As a retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral with nearly three decades of military service," the site reads, "I understand the commitment and sacrifices made by servicemen and servicewomen to serve our country.”
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Anna Moneymaker/Getty
Ronny Jackson during a hearing with the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic on Capitol Hill on July 11, 2023In 2021, a Department of Defense investigation concluded that Jackson mistreated colleagues during his time with the White House Medical Unit, including making "sexual and denigrating statements" about a female subordinate. The DoD also said he drank alcohol and took Ambien while on duty as the president's physician.
Related: Former Top White House Doctor Denigrated Female Co-Worker and Drank on the Job, Report Finds
The DoD recommended in its report that the Navy should take appropriate action against Jackson — who at that point had already retired from service and launched his congressional career — but news of next steps were not made public.
Now, the Post cites sources who say that Jackson, 56, was retroactively demoted to retired Navy captain after the report came out, and no longer receives the amount of pension afforded to retired rear admirals.
Katherine L. Kuzminski, a military policy expert at Center for a New American Security, told the Post that Jackson should know better than to continue characterizing himself as a retired admiral. “While it is possible that others will mistakenly refer to him as ‘Admiral’ in perpetuity," she told the outlet, "he himself should not make that mistake."
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In 2021, Jackson — who has become a fierce Trump ally in Congress — slammed the report that claimed his misconduct on the job, calling the allegations a "political hit job" and accusing the DoD report of reexamining "false allegations from my years with the Obama Administration because I have refused to turn my back on President Trump."
PEOPLE has contacted Jackson’s congressional office for comment about the previously undisclosed title change.
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