HHS changed the name of transgender health leader on her official portrait⁠80%

By Selena Simmons-Duffin⁠0%

12/5/2025, 10:38:16 PM

BS Summary: This article contains 17 faulty reasoning types, including Framing Effect, Ad Hominem, and Red Herring, with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 36.5% saturation with 202 hits. Analysis detected 898 faulty-reasoning hits from 554 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 71.6% and a BS Rank of ⁠80% (4,426 of 21,886 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 79.80% of the article peer group.

Admiral Rachel L. Levine, pictured at HHS headquarters last year, led the Public Health Corps during the Biden administration. 
Her official portrait was changed during the government shutdown to her previous name. 
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." 
Adm. Rachel Levine's official portrait has hung in a hallway of the headquarters of HHS since shortly after she was confirmed by the Senate in 2021. 
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." 
HHS statement 
NPR asked HHS who made the change and why. 
In response, HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon wrote: "Our priority is ensuring that the information presented internally and externally by HHS reflects gold standard science. 
We remain committed to reversing harmful policies enacted by Levine and ensuring that biological reality guides our approach to public health." 
The current assistant secretary for health is Adm. Brian Christine, a urologist from Alabama who was confirmed by the Senate in October. 
An HHS staff member who asked not be identified for fear of professional retribution called the change "disrespectful" and added that it exemplifies "the erasure of transgender individuals by this administration." 
During the 2024 campaign, President Trump and other Republicans spent millions on anti-transgender ads, some of which featured Levine's image. 
Since taking office, Trump has moved aggressively to curtail the rights of transgender and intersex people through many federal agencies, including the Departments of Health, Justice, Education, and others. 
At the Pentagon, transgender servicemembers were forced out of the military without benefits. 
At the Department of State, decades-old passport policies were reversed. 
The president often describes transgender people as a danger to society. 
Shanker says the alteration of Levine's official portrait is unprecedented. 
He praised her public health work on COVID-19, syphilis, HIV/AIDS and opioids, and said rather than act vindictively towards her, current leaders at HHS should focus on the many public health challenges facing the American people. 
Article reasoning-pattern comparisonThis article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.2%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.3%Actor-Observer Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.9%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.6%Anchoring Bias0.0%This article: 1.8%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 2.5%Goats and Soda (NPR): 3.8%Availability Heuristic1.8%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.3%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.1%Blind-Spot Bias0.0%This article: 10.8%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 7.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 3.4%Confirmation Bias10.8%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.0%Dunning-Kruger Effect0.0%This article: 31.6%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 15.9%Goats and Soda (NPR): 11.1%Framing Effect31.6%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 3.3%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.1%Fundamental Attribution Error0.0%This article: 6.5%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.8%Halo Effect6.5%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.8%Hindsight Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.8%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.3%Horn Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 9.1%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.3%In-Group Bias0.0%This article: 1.8%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 6.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.2%Loss Aversion1.8%This article: 36.5%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 20.9%Goats and Soda (NPR): 11.3%Negativity Bias36.5%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.8%Goats and Soda (NPR): 3.4%Optimism Bias0.0%This article: 2.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 5.2%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.2%Out-Group Homogeneity Bias2.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.2%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.4%Overconfidence Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 3.1%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.3%Pessimism Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.5%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.5%Primacy Effect0.0%This article: 1.8%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.3%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.7%Recency Bias1.8%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.4%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.2%Representativeness Heuristic0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 2.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.3%Self-Serving Bias0.0%This article: 1.8%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 3.2%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.1%Status Quo Bias1.8%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.2%Sunk Cost Effect0.0%This article: 19.7%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 4.5%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.2%Ad Hominem19.7%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.5%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.5%Ambiguity (Equivocation)0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.8%Anecdotal0.0%This article: 4.3%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 10.8%Goats and Soda (NPR): 6.1%Appeal to Authority4.3%This article: 6.5%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 20.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 6.6%Appeal to Emotion6.5%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.1%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.2%Appeal to Nature0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.9%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.7%Bandwagon0.0%This article: 3.8%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 3.1%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.9%Begging the Question3.8%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.4%Burden of Proof0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.3%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.1%Circular Reasoning0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.2%Composition/Division0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 2.9%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.5%False Dilemma0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.0%Gambler’s Fallacy0.0%This article: 3.6%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.4%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.5%Genetic Fallacy3.6%This article: 9.4%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 5.3%Goats and Soda (NPR): 4.4%Hasty Generalization9.4%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.1%Middle Ground0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.1%No True Scotsman0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.4%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.1%Personal Incredulity0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.6%Goats and Soda (NPR): 2.8%Post Hoc (False Cause)0.0%This article: 14.6%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.9%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.3%Red Herring14.6%This article: 5.6%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 7.1%Goats and Soda (NPR): 1.3%Slippery Slope5.6%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.3%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.2%Special Pleading0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 1.7%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.3%Straw Man0.0%This article: 0.0%Selena Simmons-Duffin: 0.0%Goats and Soda (NPR): 0.2%Tu Quoque0.0%

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