A San Diego Navy doctor has been removed from her leadership role and is now under investigation after her social media profile caught the attention of a right-wing activist and the U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

U.S. Navy Cmdr. Janelle Marra, who has served on active duty in the Navy for 17 years, was the medical services director of Expeditionary Medical Facility 150 Bravo, a Navy unit in San Diego trained to provide medical care to support military operations.

Her LinkedIn profile was flagged in a post by a right-wing account^[1] on X – Libs of TikTok – on Sept. 4, calling out Marra for including her pronouns on the page and listing a job title of “Deputy Medical Director for Transgender Healthcare.”

The post tagged Hegseth and asked him to “look into” it. By that evening, Hegseth re-shared the post^[2] with the message: “Pronouns UPDATED: She/Her/Fired.”

While Marra has not officially been fired and is still working as a physician at Navy Medical Center San Diego clinics, she has been “administratively removed from her leadership position for a loss of confidence in her ability to lead” and is “under investigation for violating social media policy,” according to a U.S. Navy official.

The Department of Defense, which President Trump has asked Congress to rename the Department of War, said it stands by Hegseth’s post on X that commented on Marra’s pronouns and indicated that she would be terminated.

“The War Department is not in the business of radical gender theory. We are in the business of warfighting,” Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson said in a statement. “Secretary Hegseth’s post on X reaffirms this.”

For Marra’s family, the experience has been shocking.

“I never thought that somebody so high in government would be willing to target individual people,” said Marra’s wife, Cassandra. “They’re willing to put somebody in the military on that front page and be like, ‘Get her.’”

Marra could not be reached for comment while she’s under investigation.

Active-duty service members’ social media accounts have been under closer scrutiny this month. Multiple members are reportedly under investigation or have been suspended^[3] for posts on social media critical of conservative activist Charlie Kirk following his recent assassination. Many of the posts were publicly flagged by accounts such as Libs of TikTok.

Nik Ursher, a communications associate professor at the University of San Diego who focuses on technology, politics and the news media, says that Libs of TikTok is akin to an “organized watchdog group,” but notes that this situation isn’t new. Opposition research is a tactic that’s been used by political activists for decades.

“You comb through somebody’s past and you find things that could discredit them, and you use that in order to help you achieve your political goals,” Ursher said. “And the difference now is that that has been democratized and anybody can be part of that.”

A Navy official confirmed that it’s “actively reviewing reports” of sailors whose social media activity is “misaligned with the Department’s current social media guidance,” but did not elaborate further on what exactly the current guidance entails.

However, there is a social media handbook^[4] for the Navy that outlines expectations for sailors’ online conduct. The handbook states that active-duty sailors can express personal views about public issues or political candidates using social media, though they can’t engage in partisan political activity, such as posting a link to a political party or campaign.

Marra has spent much of her medical career in San Diego. She completed her internship and residency in family medicine at the Naval Hospital at Camp Pendleton in 2011, according to^[5] the American Medical Women’s Association. She completed a fellowship in primary care sports medicine at the naval hospital a few years later.

She also has experience presenting on health care for the LGBTQ+ community and women, which she describes on her LinkedIn as a “focus” of her work.

“She treated me like a real person and not a number,” said Parker Moore, a nuclear reactor electronics technician in the Navy and one of Marra’s current patients.

Moore has been seeing Marra as their primary care doctor for the last few months. After 13 years of service, Moore is being separated from the Navy under the Trump administration’s ban on transgender service members, but says they’re not seeing Marra for transgender health care.

“None of my medical things are transgender related, which a lot of providers relate everything to,” Moore said, adding that Marra’s understanding of trans health means she doesn’t jump to it as a conclusion for all ailments.

Marra’s LinkedIn profile has been updated over the last few weeks. While it still lists her pronouns, the profile photo was removed, it no longer includes any leadership positions within the Navy and now issues a disclaimer: “This profile does not represent the opinions of the DoD, DHA, Navy or other government entities.”

Marra had the role of deputy medical director for transgender health care on her LinkedIn. But it’s a role that doesn’t appear to exist, at least not anymore.

“The Department does not have a transgender health center,” a Defense Health Agency spokesperson said. “It was considered last year but the idea was abandoned.”

Since taking office, the Trump administration has taken significant steps to roll back key protections for the LGBTQ+ community – specifically, transgender people. Trump’s policies have especially impacted service members and veterans, including an executive order that bans transgender troops^[6] and another that bars trans veterans from receiving gender-affirming care through the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Earlier this year, as part of the implementation of the executive order banning transgender troops, the U.S. Air Force issued a memo prohibiting the use of “preferred pronouns” in official communications – though it was quickly rescinded. A 2024 law^[7] prohibits the department secretary from requiring or prohibiting a member of the armed forces or civilian employee from using personal pronouns in official correspondence.

Marra’s wife says their family has received hateful messages and read demeaning online posts about them since Hegseth posted about Marra on X a few weeks ago. She said that while she tries to avoid reading them, she reviews some to assess for any credible threats.

It’s also hard for her to send Marra off to work each day, she said, not knowing if it might be her last day on the job.

Marra is the family’s primary provider; Cassandra works part-time as an instructor at a local community college. And since both their children have autism and are receiving health care through Marra’s job with the Navy, Cassandra worries about what could happen if Marra ultimately does lose her job in the service.

“We just keep waiting,” she said. “And that’s part of the frustrating part: you sit there and you wait.”

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