Former White House physician Ronny Jackson was demoted from the Navy

In a report completed three years agothe Pentagon discovered that Vice Admiral Ronny L. Jackson had abused subordinates while serving as a White House physician and had drunk and swallowed sleeping pills while on the job. The report advised him to face discipline.

Now it appears that the Navy quietly punished him the following year. Although he retired from the military in 2019, he was demoted to captain — a sanction he has not publicly acknowledged.

Mr. Jackson, now a Republican congressman from Texas and an outspoken ally of former President Donald J. Trump, whose care he oversaw in the White House, still calls himself a retired U.S. Navy rear admiral. on his conference website.

Mr. Jackson was demoted from rear admiral to captain in the summer of 2022, according to a former defense official and a current military official. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters. Mr. Jackson could not be reached for comment. His attorney, Stanley Woodward, declined to comment.

In a statement on Thursday, a Navy official said only that the findings led the Navy to take administrative action against him. The official does not want to say which actions are involved.

The findings of the internal investigation into Mr. Jackson “are not consistent with the standards the Navy demands of its leadership,” the Navy said in a statement Thursday. “And as such, the Secretary of the Navy took administrative action in July 2022.”

Such a demotion, even after retirement, is a blow in military circles, especially for someone who was entrusted as a doctor by both Mr. Trump and President Barack Obama.

Mr. Jackson’s demotion was previously reported by The Washington Post.

The relegation reduces his annual pension benefit by approximately 13 percent military pay scales.

Mr. Jackson is a staunch supporter of Mr. Trump. When the former president was indicted in New York last year for his role in paying hush money to a porn star, Mr. Jackson lashed out at Democrats on social media.

“These cowardly Democrats HATE Trump and HATE his voters even more,” he wrote. “If Trump wins, THESE PEOPLE WILL PAY!!”

In his 2022 memoir, “Holding the Line,” Mr. Jackson called himself a “Trump person” and noted that he had supported the president after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

In early 2018, while serving as a White House physician, he issued a public assessment that Mr. Trump, then 71, was in excellent health, without providing any supporting details such as his cholesterol levels or blood pressure.

About two months later, Mr. Trump nominated Mr. Jackson to be secretary of veterans affairs. But Jackson withdrew after reports emerged of his misconduct in the White House, including that he kept shoddy records and bullied his staff. After Mr. Jackson left the White House and the Navy, Mr. Trump backed his successful 2020 bid for Congress.

Mr Jackson has called the Pentagon’s internal investigation into him a political blow. In his memoir, he said the findings were shared with him a day after President Biden’s inauguration.

“If I had retired and not gone into politics, this investigation would never have gone anywhere,” he wrote. “We’ll have to wait and see how this all plays out.”

His book was released on July 26, 2022. If he was aware of his demotion at the time, he did not mention it in his memoirs.

Alan Feuer contributed reporting from New York.