Did Time magazine name Rachel Levine "Woman of the Year"? No, that's not true: This magazine cover is not real, it was published by "The United Spot," a Facebook page that is clearly labeled as a satire site. The fake magazine cover does not have any satire labels, but does have the watermark of The United Spot.
The meme appeared in a post (archived here) published by The United Spot on March 29, 2021. The fake magazine cover simply said:
TIME
Woman of the Year
Rachel Levine
@theunitedspot
This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:
(Source: Facebook screenshot taken on Thu Apr 1 13:26:22 2021 UTC)
Time magazine names its "Person of the Year" at the end of the calendar year. On December 11, 2020, Time named then-President-elect Joe Biden and then-Vice President-elect Kamala Harris its "Person of the Year." The Associated Press reported that the editor-in-chief of Time explained the magazine's choice for Biden and Harris:
[was for] changing the American story, for showing that the forces of empathy are greater than the furies of division, for sharing a vision of healing in a grieving world.
Dr. Rachel Levine was the secretary of health for Pennsylvania before she was nominated for confirmation as Assistant Secretary for Health at the Department of Health and Human Services by President Joe Biden. On March 25, 2021, Levine was confirmed by a Senate vote of 52-48. Levine is the first openly transgender person to be confirmed as a federal official.
In February 2021 Lead Stories addressed a similar meme which had photoshopped a fake Vanity Fair magazine featuring Rachel Levine on the cover.
