HHS changed the name of transgender health leader on her official portrait

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: NPR

December 5, 2025 5:38 PM ET


As you walk down a particular hallway on the seventh floor of the Humphrey Building in Washington, D.C., you'll find a line of photographic portraits of all the people from years past who have led the Public Health Corps at the federal Department of Health and Human Services.

Only one of those portraits is of a transgender person: Adm. Rachel Levine, who served for four years as President Biden's assistant secretary for health. She was the first transgender person to win Senate confirmation, and her portrait has been displayed in the hallway since soon after she was confirmed in 2021. The role is a four-star admiral position in charge of the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service.

Levine's official portrait was recently altered, a spokesperson for HHS confirmed to NPR. A digital photograph of the portrait in the hallway obtained by NPR shows that Levine's previous name is now typed below the portrait, under the glass of the frame.

Levine responds

"During the federal shutdown, the current leadership of the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health changed Admiral Levine's photo to remove her current legal name and use a prior name," says Adrian Shanker, former deputy assistant secretary for health policy in the Biden administration who worked with Levine and is now her spokesperson. He called the move an act "of bigotry against her." Levine told NPR that it was an honor to serve the American people as the assistant secretary for health "and I'm not going to comment on this type of petty action."

Read more: https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/12/05/nx-s1-5633282/transgender-rachel-levine-portrait-hhs

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What the actual fuck?

We need to get into the mode adopted by the FDR generation, where after FDR was elected, the GOP was removed from a House majority for 40 years.

Dr. Levine was PA's Health Director and I watched all of her pressers during the onset of the pandemic until Biden nominated her for HHS, and she left us when she was confirmed. The GOP hasn't ceased misgendering her time and time again, both while she worked for the state and later the federal government.

[Irish_Dem]

1. One of the things that truly belongs to a person is their name, and the nazi bastards will steal that too.

[Walleye]

3. I agree it is the least amount of respect we can show and it's easiest

The least we can do is call a person by their name, like calling a party by its name. The Democratic Party, for example.

[Irish_Dem]

4. The powerful and wealthy plaster their names everywhere.

The rest of us cannot even be addressed by our correct name.
Or are called derogatory names.

[Walleye]

5. Yes, or deliberately mispronounced, repeatedly

Maga are only happy when everybody else is miserable

[Irish_Dem]

6. They are nasty pieces of work.

[blue_jay]

42. I feel same way about. use of the phrase Democrat party versus Democratic

Conversations with people who are not capable of showing respect from the beginning are not worth having. They are not conversations. They are people coming in with an agenda and not made in good faith, they don't care about your perspective, data or ideas. If the party is called the Democratic party and you refuse to acknowledge that, you are not operating in good faith, you are trying to dominate the conversation from the outset.

[Walleye]

2. I watched a briefings from Pennsylvania during the pandemic as well

I thought she was very good put things in terms so we could understand. She showed honesty and seemed very likable, these assholes! I wonder when Mike Johnson will decide to change the name of our congresswoman, Sarah McBride.

[Irish_Dem]

7. Maybe the MAGAs will just call all women stupid and piggy.

Seems to be how they see women.

[Walleye]

8. Sure, why not they'll do whatever makes them feel good. There's nothing stopping them.

They have lost the ability to distinguish between right and wrong. That’s a problem.

[Irish_Dem]

16. The new morality. Bad is now good.

Good is bad.

Greatest moral collapse in US history.

[Walleye]

17. Exactly. I used to think that the civil rights and Vietnam era with the most stressful in my lifetime

But now is much much worse. We’re in a war, these guys think, but nobody’s shooting at us.

[Irish_Dem]

24. Oh yes much worse than the 60's/70's.

This is much more serious.

Our entire way of life is at risk, our freedom, Rule of Law, US Constitution,
Congress, Courts, etc., etc.

We are certainly in US Civil War II.

There is ongoing regular shooting, set up by the GOP and Putin, via the NRA and gun rights nuts.
Putin funded this movement to encourage Americans to kill Americans

And of course we now have Trump destroying healthcare, vaccines, insurance, medical professionals, etc.
People will die.

So we are at war and there are deaths.

[Walleye]

29. I am so disappointed in my fellow Americans. I have lost my faith.

[Irish_Dem]

30. I agree. Total moral collapse of the American people.

Only one third of Americans oppose the evil we are living through.

One third loves all of the wrong doing, the other third doesn't give a damn.

[Walleye]

36. That sounds about right mathematically. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been able to prevail in that election.

[Irish_Dem]

37. This was the voting breakdown.

One third MAGA.
One third Dem.
One third didn't vote.

[Walleye]

38. So it's only 2/3 of my fellow Americans I have to be severely disappointed in

[Irish_Dem]

39. The majority of Americans have let their country down.

Irresponsible, uniformed, self centered people.
One third full of hatred, anger and violence.
Others don't even care enough about their country to vote.

[sakabatou]

9. Of course they had to dead name Levine.

[Botany]

10. How petty.

From the little I have read and heard about Ms. Levine is that both in PA and in her work for the
American people @ HHS is that she was very good.

[Walleye]

18. Yes, she is. I watched her every day in her briefing during the pandemic on the Philadelphia TV stations.

She was excellent. I am so tired of this deliberate cruelty.

[Botany]

21. A friend of mine who is a PhD and does medical research and is from PA had a colleague that worked

with her @ Penn State (I think) and he told me that people soon forgot about her being Trans
because she was so good @ her job and just saw her as a friend and a talented person.

This is just petty bullshit that says more about the people who saw fit to change her name
to please a crazy man and bigots than about her.

[BumRushDaShow]

23. She was a pediatrician by speciality

and that expertise came in handy when it came to COVID and children, where so many dismissed any impact on the young, after which the later variants ended up devastating to a number of them.

[RandiFan1290]

11. This type of discrimination is OK with the 'centrists'

They see it as 'normal'

[LymphocyteLover]

13. I'm not sure if centrists see it as normal but they sure as heck don't seem to give a damn about it

and will try to find some mealy mouthed middle ground between being an absolute anti-trans bigot and being accepting of trans people

[Walleye]

19. Gavin Newsom said we should back off on this stuff

He is totally wrong. If we don’t stand up for the persecuted minorities, who will? That is our job.

[LymphocyteLover]

12. Levine was a great public servant and this is absolutely disgusting, fucking Nazis at work

[IronLionZion]

14. Trans people are an easy target for MAGA bullies

they like to punch down on people who won't hit back.

[BumRushDaShow]

20. When they were messing with her here in PA

she punched back.

[GiqueCee]

15. The GOP...

... is defined by petty malice and bigotry. Their deification of a bag of rat shit like Charlie Kirk tells you all you need to know about conservative "values".

[FakeNoose]

22. You know what? Just take down ALL the photos - no more names or photos displayed, PERIOD

There ... fixed it! This is why we can't have nice things.

[BumRushDaShow]

25. Well they ripped out Dr. Fauci's mural

And the pettiness and craven attitude, lives on.

[3825-87867]

26. In that case...from now on, we all need to refer to DJT as

DRUMPF!

From:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/society-culture-and-history/history/family-name-drumpf-the-origin-story-of-donald-trump-and-his-ancestry/ar-BB1riAXW

Story by Oleksandra Bashchenko
Donald Trump's family has German roots. His grandfather, Friedrich Drumpf, was born in 1869 in the village of Kallstadt, Germany.
(snip)
In 1885, Friedrich emigrated to the United States to avoid military service in Germany. (How apropos!)

Any time he is mentioned, the change should be made.
President Drumpf
Idiot Drumpf
The Drumpf Ball(less) Room
The Drumpf Whatever
etc. ad infinitumAnd it needs to be used in public.

The same with Vance.
J.D. Bowman/Hamel/Vance
They are ashamed of their heritage so we should never let them forget it. If they claim it was legally changed, then refer to the change they made for Levine and go right on using Drumpf.

As for Vance:

from wikipedia:


James Donald Bowman: His original name, reflecting his biological father's name.
James David Hamel: After being adopted by his mother's third husband, his mother changed his name to remove his biological father's surname and to use his uncle's first name, David.

Final Name Change

J.D. Vance: He adopted his maternal grandparents' surname, Vance, in April 2013, shortly before graduating from Yale Law School. This name change was significant for him as it connected him to his family heritage.

Or we can simply call them Asshole 1 and Asshole 2!

[2MuchNoise]

27. It's juvenile.

[underpants]

28. Their NAME, their legal NAME, not just their title? Well Trump did a picture of an auto pen

god these people are not just petty but thoroughly petty. Their appointees across agencies find things like this mostly I’d guess to impress Trump.

[BumRushDaShow]

31. It's done to trigger a reaction

It's what grade school bullies do.

[twodogsbarking]

32. Every day in Pa during peak covid she appeared with Gov Tom Wolf. The gave an update.

Concise and helpful.

[BumRushDaShow]

34. During that time

I would stream the state's Dr. Levine daily (and then weekly) briefings, Philly's Health Commissioners (initially Dr. Tom Farley's and later, Dr. Cheryl Bettigole's) daily (and then weekly) briefings, and the Montgomery County weekly briefings (lead by County Commissioner Dr. Val Arkoosh, who eventually became the state's Secretary of Human Services).

In some cases, the briefing times were overlapping so I had 2 streams going.

ALL of that was helpful in getting through those early days.

[Prairie Gates]

33. Pronouns were only the warm up; now they're against Proper Nouns

(I mean, they have been committed to renaming from go, but this is a new level.)

[dlk]

35. Acting out like mean tweens

These are emotionally delayed and stunted people.

[Irish_Dem]

40. These are small, mean minded, petty, cruel people.

[IbogaProject]

41. Deadnaming it is a specific assault on a transitioned person

Typically happens in family situations but here it is being done under the auspices of us all. Most of our Native Americans have a catchall third category called Twin Spirit, whom they don't just acknowledge but give them a role where they are counselors in relationship disputes. I personally know a masculine woman who is actually XY chromosomes but has some other gene that alters the response to hormones. She was born with mix genitals, Drs and family unilaterally altered her to match being female. She identifies as Intersex, as she is literally betwixt and between the two formal genders. She had the foresight to not go X gender on her passport and is listed F still. But unless this information is given freely how is any of that our business? It isn't, and it is a distraction from the greed of the top 1%.

[pat_k]

43. I'd sue to have my legal name restored.

Push back on everything -- from War crimes to petty bigotry.

Fucking EVERYTHING.

[Skittles]

44. crazy disrespectful

WTF is wrong with these fucking repukes. UGH!!!!!!!!!!!