‘Doctor’ Adbul El-Sayed’s Longtime Aide Sold Shady Brain Pills in ‘Pyramid Scheme,’ Falsely Claimed Pills Treat Alzheimer’s Disease

Michigan Senate Candidate’s Operations Director Previously Distributed Nerium Products

Tara Terpstra, operations director for Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign, worked as an independent distributor for Nerium International from at least 2015. Terpstra promoted the company’s EHT supplement, a coffee-bean extract, in social-media posts that described it as an “age-defying supplement” and referenced its potential use for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurocognitive conditions. She also posted about compensation opportunities, including bonuses described as iPads, a Lexus, and cash.

Nerium marketed skincare and dietary supplements through a multi-level structure in which distributors earned commissions on personal sales and on recruitment of additional distributors. In 2013, actor Ray Liotta sued the company, alleging unauthorized use of his image in promotional material. In 2017, a group of distributors filed a class-action complaint alleging the compensation plan constituted an illegal pyramid scheme and that product claims lacked substantiation. In 2019, the Federal Trade Commission filed suit against Nerium, alleging that the company’s income representations were deceptive because only a small percentage of participants earned profits and that statements about EHT’s ability to prevent or treat Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and chronic traumatic encephalopathy were unsubstantiated. The FTC reached a settlement with EHT suppliers that year concerning those claims. In 2023, a federal judge ruled that Nerium’s compensation plan did not meet the legal definition of a pyramid scheme under federal law.

El-Sayed, who holds an M.D. and a Ph.D. from Columbia University, has not completed a medical internship or residency and is not licensed to practice clinical medicine. He has worked in public-health administration and academic research. He served as director of the Detroit Health Department beginning in 2016 and later as Wayne County health director. His campaign website states that he “rebuilt” the Detroit Health Department. In campaign materials and on his podcast “America Dissected,” El-Sayed has criticized the promotion of unproven health products. In 2022 he stated that corporations and influencers “sell people shit they don’t need.” Terpstra produced episodes of the podcast.

Public records show Terpstra was first hired by El-Sayed at the Detroit Health Department in 2016. A Wikipedia account using the handle “tjterps” created El-Sayed’s page that year and added biographical details. Terpstra later received consulting payments from El-Sayed’s 2018 gubernatorial campaign and from his political-action committee. She continued in health-department roles and now receives a monthly salary from the Senate campaign as operations director. No public statements or documents indicate that El-Sayed was aware of Terpstra’s Nerium distribution activities at the time of her initial hiring or subsequent promotions.

El-Sayed’s campaign and Terpstra did not respond to inquiries about the earlier work. Terpstra’s social-media posts from 2015 remain accessible and contain the product and compensation claims described above. The 2023 federal-court ruling addressed only the pyramid-scheme allegation and did not resolve separate FTC findings on advertising claims, which were settled with the product suppliers.

El-Sayed has referred to himself as “Dr. Abdul El-Sayed” in recent campaign advertising. Michigan election filings list Terpstra’s current compensation at $6,400 per month. Campaign finance records show earlier payments to Terpstra and her company totaling more than $139,000 across 2018–2021. No records link El-Sayed personally to Nerium sales, product claims, or compensation structures.

The sequence of Terpstra’s employment with El-Sayed began after her Nerium posts and continued through multiple public-sector and campaign positions. The 2023 judicial determination that Nerium did not operate an illegal pyramid scheme stands as the final federal ruling on that specific allegation.