“I feel like I grew up MAHA,” Daphne Oz says as she leans against a hotel room wall. The 38-year-old mother of four—wearing an emerald green off-the-shoulder Honayda gown and a bezel-set diamond necklace—is reflecting on the health-focused childhood that led her here: moments away from attending the first-ever Make America Healthy Again Inaugural Ball.
Oz’s father, Mehmet Oz, MD, is a former heart surgeon and host of the once Oprah-approved Dr. Oz Show. “I remember your dad’s colonoscopy episode,” I tell her. When I was 10, Dr. Oz aired his own colonoscopy on television, along with the discovery that he had a cancerous polyp. (Apparently, my parents thought it was great after-school viewing.) “Who could forget it,” she says with a laugh. Since then, Daphne has hosted a couple of her own television shows—food is more her thing—and her father has run, unsuccessfully, for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania as a Republican. “Our family dinner-table conversations have always been about things like vitamin D therapies, minimally invasive cardiac surgery techniques, and colostrum,” Daphne says. “Before colostrum was on your Instagram feed, we all knew about it.”
A few floors below us, in a packed ballroom at the DC Waldorf Astoria hotel, more than 800 of US health secretary nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s most loyal followers have gathered to celebrate the official start of the Make America Healthy movement (a.k.a. MAHA). Inspired by President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan, MAHA is, for many, the place where die-hard Republicans and the wellness-obsessed have found a common cause. Kennedy’s directives range from the not so controversial—fewer preservatives in food, more turmeric shots (classic coverage fare for any wellness editor)—to the dubious or dangerous, like promoting raw milk and vaccine skepticism. If Kennedy is approved to lead the Department of Health and Human Services (the date for his hearing has not yet been set), then MAHA could be implemented nationally.
While I’ve worked in the wellness industry for years, this is the first time I’ve ever heard of a wellness ball (and I worked at Goop in its In Goop Health Summit heyday). My run-up to the MAHA event had been less than virtuous: potato chips for breakfast on the Amtrak from New York City to DC, then french fries and a whole-milk cortado for lunch. I’ve carefully selected a Rachel Comey silver sequined gown for the night, which the cutest boy from my high school said made me look like a movie star when he saw me at a wedding. (Since then, I’ve called it my fish-lure dress because it simply draws people in.) Typically, the last step of my routine before leaving is a spritz of perfume, but the idea of it gives me pause—showing up to this particular event smelling like potential endocrine disruptors could label me persona non grata before I even get in—so I guess I’m going all-natural as I head into the 20-degree night.
Organized by MAHA Action—a 501(c)(4) led primarily by the team that organized Kennedy’s 2024 presidential bid as an independent—the event reportedly has a thousand-person wait list, with some guests desperately offering $30,000 to get in the door. Lolli Brands Entertainment, which owns the company Biohack Yourself, is a major sponsor, and the new-to-me Lolli family (Anthony, Tereza, and their two young children) are holding court at the entrance to the event. Actor Zachary Levi enthusiastically embraces the Lollis, gushing, “I’ll support the movement until the day I die. Amen.” The dozens of camerapeople surrounding them—all wearing “Health Press” T-shirts—document it all.
As guests continue to stream in, I look to Vogue’s photographer, Jamie, and whisper the joke I had been waiting to say all night: “It’s all MA-Happening.” I don’t even get a grimace out of him. The VIP list includes some expected guests (doctors I’ve called on as sources since the start of my career, like Will Cole and Mark Hyman), but most of the experts there I’ve never heard of. There are also a few unexpected people of note who are meant to attend, like Tiffany Trump and her mother, Marla Maples.
When it comes to the crowd, MAHA doesn’t really have a look. There’s a tuxedoed man with a skullet (part shaved head, part mohawk, part mullet) and a woman wearing a dress she had custom-made for the gala out of actual American flags, along with many others wearing more streamlined all-black ensembles. “No flags were desecrated or cut to make this outfit,” the star-spangled guest assures me.
Instead of the classic step-and-repeat and cocktail hour, the MAHA Ball has four stations where different Biohack Yourself Media hosts interview guests about their wellness habits. (The MAHA-branded backgrounds feature fireworks and shots of Kennedy and Trump.) When it comes to getting on camera, there’s no pulling rank here, and even a cowboy-hat-clad Kimbal Musk, Elon’s brother, must wait in line to share his secrets.
At the bar, there are functional cocktails from the Bella Hadid–cofounded Kin Euphorics. I had been under the impression it was an alcohol-free event, but the standard bar offerings standing at attention next to the Kin cocktail menu—Knob Creek Bourbon Whiskey, Hendrick’s Gin, Tito’s Vodka—prove me wrong.
“As the leading nonalcoholic functional-beverage brand pioneering a movement of alcohol-free living for all, it was fitting for Kin to be asked to be a part of one of the most historic gatherings of health and wellness leaders to date,” Hadid’s cofounder, Jen Batchelor, shared with me over email. While I enjoy my ginger and gamma-aminobutyric-acid-spiked Kin Spritz, most of the crowd opts for the hard stuff. I guess the surgeon general’s announcement of the recent link between cancer and alcohol wasn’t enough to stop the celebration.
Tucked away by the bar are four pieces of art available via silent auction, including Healthie’s, a painting that substitutes the dinergoers in Edward Hopper’s iconic Nighthawks with Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Joe Rogan, and Tulsi Gabbard; two paintings of Kennedy (one of which is about a foot taller than I am); and a hyperrealistic work in which Kennedy is pictured holding a hawk. As of this morning, Healthie’s is going for more than $30,000.
The evening’s menu takes a full range of dietary restrictions into careful consideration: There’s gluten-free and nut-free butternut squash as an appetizer, then prime filet with lobster for those who embrace a full carnivore diet. A note at the bottom of the printed menu at each seat notes it’s all organic, free from seed oils (a huge topic in the MAHA world right now), and made with extra-virgin olive oil.
When Daphne Oz enters the ball for the evening, the room truly comes to a standstill. She is MAHA royalty, after all. Just moments before, we had discussed her “optimistic outlook” for her family, the next four years, and the future. “Health has finally taken center stage,” she says about why the moment is so exciting for her. Instead of stopping by interview step-and-repeats, she walks straight into the arms of her husband, John Jovanovic. We’d also discussed our hope that mothers would have better access to pelvic-floor therapy in the near future—though by this point in the evening, the new administration had already taken down the website ReproductiveRights.gov.
That’s when the MAHA press team lets me know I’ve turned into a genetically modified pumpkin: All journalists must leave by 7 p.m., and I’m getting kicked out. It leaves me hungry both for dinner (I, sadly, won’t be able to try anything on the seed-oil-free menu) and a glimpse of Kennedy, tanned with white teeth, and his wife, Cheryl Hines. I also missed a performance from the singer Jewel. While leaving, I spot Russell Brand, who is so hyper-focused on whatever is in front of him that I wonder if he’s practicing for an upcoming role in a Bird Box film. Looks like I’ll be hitting up delivery when I return to my hotel; maybe another order of french fries will give me my fill.
