with President Barack Obama in 2015 Jackson became a Navy officer after graduating from medical school in 1995. He graduated from the Undersea Medical Officer Program in 1996. Jackson had a series of operational postings, He became WHMU director in May 2010, and in July 2013 was given the additional title of Physician to the President. After
Donald Trump was elected president in 2016, he kept Jackson on as Physician to the President. Jackson was criticized for the statements Trump appointed Jackson as "Assistant to the President and Chief Medical Advisor" on February 2, 2019. but the
Senate Committee on Armed Services returned the nomination to the president on January 3, 2019, without action. Jackson retired from the Navy on December 1, 2019, as a rear admiral (lower half). citing "substantiated allegations" in a 2018 investigation by the
Defense Department's inspector general into reports that the physician had drunk alcohol while on duty, acted inappropriately, and routinely yelled at subordinates. Despite the demotion, Jackson continued to represent himself as an admiral on his congressional website through at least March 2024, when the story was first uncovered by
The Washington Post. On June 13, 2025,
John Phelan, the
Secretary of the Navy, intervened to reverse Jackson's demotion. Some senators expressed skepticism of the nomination due to Jackson's lack of management experience. Others noted the allegations about Jackson's conduct, which the administration disputed. On April 23, the
U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs postponed a hearing on Jackson's nomination after current and former White House medical staff accused him of creating a hostile work environment, excessive drinking on the job, and dispensing medication improperly. Much of the hearing was handled by Senator
Jon Tester (D-Montana), the committee's ranking member, with the support of its chairman, Republican senator
Johnny Isakson. While acting as Physician to the President, Jackson earned the nicknames "the candyman" and "Dr. Feelgood" for ignoring medical procedures and dispensing drugs without prescriptions. Tester told CNN on April 24 that Jackson was known as "the candy man" at the White House, according to around 20 people who brought these concerns to the committee, because he allegedly handed out
Ambien,
Provigil, and other prescription drugs "like they were candy". At a press conference, Trump called Jackson "one of the finest people that I have met", hinted that Jackson might drop out, and accusing Democrats of mounting an unfair attack on his record. Jackson withdrew from consideration for Secretary of Veterans Affairs on April 26, 2018, after the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs began formally investigating the allegations. Senator
Johnny Isakson, the Republican chairman of the Veterans Affairs Committee, defended Tester's grilling, saying he had no problem with Tester's handling of Jackson's nomination. Jackson insisted that the allegations were "completely false and fabricated" and said he was withdrawing because the controversy had become a distraction for Trump and his agenda. Jackson returned to work in the White House Medical Unit but did not return to his position as Trump's personal physician; he was replaced in that position by Navy officer
Sean Conley, who had taken over that role a month earlier in an acting capacity.
Inspector General investigation In May 2018, after receiving 12 complaints about Jackson's conduct, the
Department of Defense Office of Inspector General (OIG) opened an investigation. The investigation stalled from October 2018 to August 2019 because the Trump
White House Counsel's Office objected to the investigation and considered invoking
executive privilege, but ultimately did not. OIG investigators interviewed Jackson and 78 witnesses. The OIG noted that its interview of Jackson "was limited in scope and unproductive" because lawyers in the White House Counsel's office insisted upon participating in the interview and "instructed Jackson not to answer any questions concerning events after his appointment as the Physician to the President in July 2013." The OIG concluded, by a
preponderance of the evidence, that Jackson had "made sexual and denigrating statements about one of his female medical subordinates to another of his subordinates"; that Jackson "drank alcohol with his subordinates in
Manila, became intoxicated, and, while in his hotel room, engaged in behavior that witnesses described as screaming and yelling, and behavior that some complained might wake the President"; and that Jackson took
Ambien (a sleep medication) during official travel, "raising concerns about his potential incapacity to provide proper medical care during this travel." In addition to findings that Jackson had "engaged in inappropriate conduct involving the use of alcohol" during two presidential trips, the report also found that he "disparaged, belittled, bullied, and humiliated subordinates"; "created a negative WHMU work environment"; and "failed to conduct himself in an exemplary manner and made an unfavorable impact on the overall WHMU command climate." On March 2, 2021, the
inspector general briefed members of Congress on its review. After the report was issued, Jackson said that the allegations were a "political hit job because I stood with President Trump" and that they "resurrected those same false allegations from my years with the Obama Administration because I have refused to turn my back on President Trump." ==U.S. House of Representatives ==