What's Happened to MAHA's Promises?
Remember when Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) stormed onto the American scene promising to blow the doors off the rotten institutions which have held our nation hostage for decades?
When it vowed to take on the FDA, Big Pharma, the corrupt bureaucrats, the fake experts, and every last swamp creature standing between the American people and the truth?
MAHA was supposed to be the movement that saved American health — not another slogan, not another committee, not another round of bureaucratic excuses.
It was supposed to be a revolution.
What happened?
The FDA of today, under Marty Makary, isn't the FDA MAHA promised to reform:
—Instead of resetting the agency, we're watching it implode under its own incompetence.
—Instead of draining the swamp, leadership hired people who brought the swamp back in the front door.
—Instead of restoring trust, they created more confusion, more drama, and more instability.
MAHA told America it would deliver accountability.
Instead, we got an ethics scandal involving George Tidmarsh — a man who allegedly used his FDA post to chase a personal vendetta.
That's exactly the kind of Washington nonsense MAHA was supposed to eliminate.
Now the agency is burning credibility faster than it is approving medications.
MAHA promised to rebuild public confidence in health agencies.
Instead, we've seen the FDA lose more than 1,000 staff in a single year, while the remaining workers are caught in turf wars between drug regulators and biologics regulators.
MAHA said it would unite the agency around its mission; instead, it has presided over a meltdown that looks like two dysfunctional departments locked in a custody battle.
MAHA ran on strength. But right now, the FDA looks weak, chaotic, and leaderless.
And let's talk about staffing.
When the head of the drug center resigns in disgrace, and senior leadership has to beg long-serving employees to "step up," that’s not reform — that's panic.
Appointing Richard Pazdur after he initially turned the job down wasn't a decisive move; it was a last-minute scramble. MAHA promised competence. This isn’t that.
The MAHA movement had one massive advantage - Americans wanted it to succeed.
People were ready for:
—Transparency.
—Honesty.
—For a clean break from decades of political rot.
But movements don't survive on promises — they survive on performance.
And right now, the performance doesn't match the promise.
The question now isn't whether America needs MAHA.
It absolutely does.
The question is whether MAHA still remembers what it came here to do.
We were told MAHA would dismantle the old ways, restore trust, and put the people back in charge. It's time to prove it.
Because if MAHA doesn't course-correct — and fast — the movement risks becoming exactly what it swore to replace: another ambitious idea swallowed whole by the very institutions it set out to fix.
America is waiting.
. . . And watching.
Charlie Kolean has worked as a senior policy adviser for state legislators, multinational corporations, and think tanks. Mr. Kolean has been involved in politics for over a decade as an activist, candidate, political consultant, and party leader. He was a bundler on the Trump Finance Victory Committee, and is a member of the American Association of Political Consultants. Read more Charlie Kolean Insider articles — Click Here Now.
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