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conspiracy theories
'America Deserves Better': Top Trump FEMA Official Continues to Claim He's Being Teleported By God
"With over 340 million people in this country, you’d think we could find people grounded in reality to run our government programs," said Sen. Mazie Hirono.
Apr 01, 2026
The man appointed by President Donald Trump to lead America's disaster recovery will not stop talking about teleportation. It's leading many people to question whether he's fit for the job.
Even before this past week, many concerns had already been raised about Gregg Phillips, who Trump tapped as associate administrator for the Office of Response and Recovery at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in December.
Phillips had no formal experience in disaster management prior to being given a senior role overseeing billions of dollars to help victims of floods, hurricanes, and wildfires.
But he did have qualifications that are evidently more important to the second Trump administration: a long history of echoing the president's baseless claims about election fraud, including that millions of noncitizens illegally voted in 2016 and that an elaborate operation involving ballot stuffing “mules” helped former President Joe Biden beat Trump in 2020.
Because Phillips was a presidential appointee, Congress was not given the opportunity to scrutinize these statements or others he's made, including his description of himself as a "very vocal opponent of FEMA," the very agency he was chosen to help lead. Nor did it have the opportunity to examine accusations that he directed millions in government contracts to his own personal businesses and associates while working in the Texas and Mississippi governments.
But months into his tenure, Phillips is finally getting some attention for comments he made on multiple podcasts, in which he claimed to have been involuntarily "teleported," including to a Waffle House in Georgia.
Phillips discussed the supernatural experience in a January 2025 episode of the podcast Onward, hosted by fellow election conspiracy theorist Catherine Engelbrecht. CNN first reported on the conversation earlier this month:
"I was with my boys one time and I was telling them I was gonna go to Waffle House and get Waffle House. And I ended up at a Waffle House—this was in Georgia—and I end up at a Waffle House like 50 miles away from where I was,” Phillips said...
"And they said, ‘Where are you?’ and I said, ‘A Waffle House.’ And, 'A Waffle House where?’ And I said, ‘Waffle House in Rome, Georgia.’ And they said, ‘That’s not possible, you just left here a moment ago.’ But it was possible. It was real.”
“Teleporting is no fun,” Phillips added. “It’s no fun because you don’t really know what you’re doing. You don’t really understand it, it’s scary, but yet um—but so real. And you know it’s happening but you can’t do anything about it, and so you just go, you just go with the ride. And wow, what, just an incredible adventure it all was.”
Phillips said this was not the only time he'd been teleported. In another case, he described his car being “lifted up” and dropped in a ditch outside a church in Albany, Georgia.
CNN reported on other controversial and violent statements made by Phillips as well, including one on the same podcast in which he said he'd like to "punch [Biden] in the mouth" and that he "deserves to die." In a 2024 Truth Social post, Phillips also urged listeners to learn how to shoot firearms and warned them that migrants were "coming here to kill you."
But it's his tales of teleportation that have drawn the greatest ridicule. And Phillips has only continued to double down, according to a report out Wednesday from CNN's KFile.
“Haters gonna hate,” Phillips wrote on Truth Social in a post that now appears to be deleted.
"I know what I’ve experienced, I know Who I serve," he continued, in a reply to one of his detractors on the right-wing social media site owned by Trump.
To another, he said: “I have no regrets for my words nor my faith in my Savior, Jesus Christ. The Bible has many examples of the power of God."
Given the enormity of FEMA's responsibility, especially with the climate crisis increasing the number of billion-dollar disasters in the US in recent years, Phillips' tenuous grasp on the fabric of reality has led some to worry that the agency is in suboptimal hands.
“With over 340 million people in this country, you’d think we could find people grounded in reality to run our government programs," said Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii). ”And yet, here’s another powerful official who exists on lies and conspiracy theories. America deserves better.“
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Senators Urged to Oppose 'Wholly Unqualified' Trump Surgeon General Nominee
The coalition noted that Dr. Casey Means does not have an active medical license and "has expressed misinformed and conspiratorial thinking on matters of public health."
Jul 25, 2025
In a Friday letter to senators, 32 consumer, health, and other advocacy groups argued that Dr. Casey Means, President Donald Trump's proposed surgeon general, "is not a serious nominee and is wholly unqualified to serve as a lead U.S. public health official."
Trump initially chose Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, a Fox News contributor and medical director of an urgent care network, for the post. However, amid scrutiny of how Nesheiwat portrayed her credentials, the president announced Means as his new pick in a May social media post, touting her commitment to the administration's "Make America Healthy Again" (MAHA) agenda.
"Casey has impeccable 'MAHA' credentials, and will work closely with our wonderful Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to ensure a successful implementation of our Agenda in order to reverse the Chronic Disease Epidemic, and ensure Great Health, in the future, for ALL Americans," Trump said. "Her academic achievements, together with her life's work, are absolutely outstanding. Dr. Casey Means has the potential to be one of the finest Surgeon Generals in United States History. Congratulations to Casey! Secretary Kennedy looks forward to working with Dr. Janette Nesheiwat in another capacity at HHS."
While Means has a medical degree from the Stanford School of Medicine, "her Oregon medical license has been inactive since 2019," according to Newsweek reporting cited in the Friday letter. The coalition highlighted that Means "dropped out of her surgical residency before completing it," and "states that it was after leaving traditional medical practice that she began to 'understand the real reasons why people get sick' and properly treat them."
"The range of unscientific ideas, wellness products, and conspiratorial claims that Means is associated with makes her a less-than-ideal candidate."
"Colleagues from her residency have criticized her for wrongly perpetuating the idea that modern medicine is a conspiracy to keep people sick," the groups wrote. "Indeed, in her blog posts and interviews as a wellness influencer, Means has expressed misinformed and conspiratorial thinking on matters of public health. She has called birth control pills a 'disrespect of life.'"
Means has "declined to distance herself from anti-vaccine positions espoused" by Kennedy, the letter notes. She has also "refused to say if she thinks vaccines are effective, and has even expressed skepticism about the hepatitis B vaccination for babies."
The letter also warns of "potential conflicts of interest," explaining that "she founded and is the chief medical officer of Levels, a membership-based continuous glucose monitoring technology company. If she does not step down from this role and divest from the company, she will likely be engaging directly on matters as surgeon general from which she stands to personally profit."
One of the surgeon general's primary responsibilities is leading the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, which is made up of thousands of civil servants—including many "subject matter experts who have already been wrongfully terminated by the Trump administration and by directives from Secretary Kennedy," the letter says. Means "may be out of her depth" in this role, as "she has little to no managerial experience in the context of government agencies or scientific research."
The other fundamental responsibility of the job is educating the public about the best available science and issuing public health advisories. According to the letter, "The range of unscientific ideas, wellness products, and conspiratorial claims that Means is associated with makes her a less-than-ideal candidate to serve in a role that requires being a credible health communicator for the country and upholding sound science."
"These are seriously disqualifying characteristics for the surgeon general of the U.S. and the Trump administration should immediately rescind Means' nomination for this position," the coalition concluded. "If they do not, and her confirmation proceeds to the Senate floor, senators must vote no."
The coalition is co-led by Public Citizen and the Center for Science in the Public Interest. Other members include AFL-CIO, Autistic Self Advocacy Network, Doctors for America, Healthy Schools Campaign, Labor Campaign for Single Payer, MomsRising, National Nurses United, and Progressive Democrats of America.
The U.S. Senate, which is narrowly controlled by Republicans, hasn't yet formally rejected any Trump nominees, though Vice President JD Vance broke a tie to confirm Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and over 20 nominations have been withdrawn, according to a tracker maintained by the Partnership for Public Service and The Washington Post.
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Laura Loomer: Trump Whisperer
Meet the influential right-wing conspiracy theorist who has U.S. President Donald Trump’s ear.
May 22, 2025
Laura Loomer is 31 years old and a graduate of Barry University, a private Catholic university. A former commentator on Alex Jones’s Infowars and a far-right conspiracy theorist, she has 1.5 million followers on X. Loomer traffics in anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant rhetoric. She has called herself a “proud Islamophobe” and “pro-white nationalism.”
And she has U.S. President Donald Trump’s ear.
In 2020, Loomer was the Republican nominee for Congress from the Florida district where Mar-a-Lago is located. She campaigned almost exclusively on her allegiance to Trump who, along with Roger Stone, supported her candidacy. Loomer lost the election, as well as her bid to become the party’s nominee again in 2022.
An Extreme Trump Loyalist
During the 2024 campaign, Loomer said on X that if Vice President Kamala Harris—whose mother was born in India—won the election, “the White House will smell like curry.” Those comments drew the condemnation of even Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who called her “toxic.”
“Getting Loomered” means targeting someone to determine the sufficiency of the person’s loyalty to Trump and his agenda.
A fervent Trump supporter during the 2024 Republican primaries, she claimed without evidence that Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis exaggerated his wife’s bout with breast cancer to gain sympathy votes during his presidential campaign. Her conspiracy theories range from school shootings to election fraud. She shared a video on X stating that the 9/11 attacks were an “inside job.”
According to Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), “Laura Loomer is a crazy conspiracy theorist who regularly utters disgusting garbage intended to divide Republicans.”
A Powerful Influence
Trump aides have tried to limit Loomer’s access to the president—with mixed results. In 2024, She accompanied Trump during appearances commemorating 9/11 in New York and Pennsylvania and traveled on his plane to Iowa where Trump told the audience, “You want her on your side.”
Trump’s top advisers have learned the price of not being on Loomer’s side. In March 2025, she started her own research firm— Loomered Strategies—to provide high-level opposition research and vetting for hire. “Getting Loomered” means targeting someone to determine the sufficiency of the person’s loyalty to Trump and his agenda.
According to Trump, “She’s a strong person. She’s got strong opinions…”
On April 2, she “Loomered” the National Security Council (NSC). Meeting with Trump in the Oval Office, she attacked the character and loyalty of several NSC officials and named the people he should fire. Michael Waltz, who headed the agency, joined the meeting late and briefly tried to defend some of his people. But Trump immediately fired six of her targets.
Waltz and his deputy, Alex Wong, managed to survive Loomer’s onslaught that day, but not for long. Less than a month later, Trump announced Waltz’s termination. The intervening revelation of his inadvertent inclusion of The Atlantic’s editor Jeffrey Goldberg on a sensitive group chat on the Signal app had made him vulnerable in any event.
But Wong was out too. Loomer had speculated that Wong’s family was part of a conspiracy and that he had added Goldberg to the Signal chat “on purpose as part of a foreign opp to embarrass the Trump administration on behalf of China.” Wong’s father is of Taiwanese descent, and Loomer had referred to Wong’s wife Candice as a “Chinese woman.” Candice Wong had clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, was a career prosecutor, and served as a Justice Department official during Trump’s first term.
Three weeks later, Loomer went after an assistant U.S. attorney in Los Angeles, Adam Schleifer, who had unsuccessfully run for Congress as a Democrat in 2020. She posted on social media that Schleifer was a “Biden holdover” and a “Trump hater” who should be fired. An hour later, Schleifer received a one-sentence email terminating his employment. In a highly unusual action, the message came directly from the White House on behalf of the president personally. It gave no reason for Schleifer’s dismissal.
Impervious to Facts
Loomer has also attacked the National Intelligence Council, an elite internal think tank that reports to the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard. Previously, the White House had asked the council to assess the link between the Venezuelan government and the notorious Tren de Aragua gang. Without such a link, Trump could not rely on the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to deprive the gang’s members of due process before deporting them.
On February 26, senior analyst at the council Michael Collins reported the intelligence community’s consensus that the Venezuelan government did not control the gang. But on March 15, Trump signed a proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act based on purportedly factual findings that contradicted the report.
With a presidential inner circle that includes Laura Loomer, we’re all in deep trouble.
When Collins’ report became public and revealed Trump’s lie, Loomer blasted the council as “career anti-Trump bureaucrats” who “need to be replaced if they want to promote open borders.” In the same post, she pasted images of Collins’s LinkedIn profile and an article about the council’s memo. Three weeks later, Gabbard fired Collins.
Meanwhile, federal courts have blocked Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act in every district where he has tried to invoke it. The courts have found that the act’s predicate—that the Venezuelan gang is engaged in either a “war,” “invasion,” or a “predatory incursion” of the United States—does not exist.
At a Mar-a-Lago press conference in April 2024, Trump praised Loomer as “a woman of courage,” he said, “You don’t want to be Loomered. If you’re Loomered, you’re in deep trouble.”
With a presidential inner circle that includes Laura Loomer, we’re all in deep trouble.
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