Katie Zacharia has joined the ranks of short-lived political figures such as Liz Truss, Anthony Scaramucci, and failed products like New Coke, CNN+, and Quibi. The White House confirmed on Friday that Zacharia was leaving her role as press secretary after just five days on the job. No one was surprised after a lacklustre press briefing debut and scrutiny over her legal credentials.
TV-driven hiring and downfall
Zacharia reportedly got the job by closely monitoring the US president's public schedule and tracking his active hours on Truth Social to predict when he would be watching TV. She timed her own appearances on air to catch his eye, and her glossy blond aesthetic, fitting Trump's "central casting" image, also helped.
But TV also proved her undoing. On Thursday, Zacharia gave a series of interviews to Trump-friendly outlets in a bid for redemption, but instead sealed her fate with more hapless performances. Even Fox News host Sean Hannity, who has spoken at Trump rallies, was sceptical when she admitted she had "stepped up to the plate with very little prep time" for the first briefing. Hannity asked: "Am I hearing that you think the staff should have prepped you better?"
Interviews and exit
Zacharia rejected the notion that she had only taken questions from conservative outlets, incorrectly asserting that the Daily Mail is "not known to be a conservative outlet". Hannity also quizzed her about her legal credentials, asking why she did not simply say she went to Pepperdine law school, took a different career path, and took the bar once without passing.
She tried again on Fox & Friends, where host Lawrence Jones said: "You know, Katie, it's been a tough week for you. It's not an easy job to be the press secretary and you never want to be the story." He also asked if she thought she still had the confidence of the president. Zacharia responded: "I'm standing here," referring to her speaking from the White House North Lawn. Her exit hours later was met with widespread ridicule and some human compassion.
Reactions and broader implications
Scaramucci, who lasted 11 days as White House communications director during Trump's first term, tweeted: "Records are made to be broken. But I take no pleasure in other people's pain." Joe Lockhart, a former White House press secretary under Bill Clinton, said: "It's hard to generate sympathy for this woman, but there was no way for her to succeed. It takes years to be ready to do that job. Not days, not hours. I spent 20 years preparing for my first briefing from the very first campaign I did. It was very unfair for her, but very bad judgment on her part to think she could wander out there and smile."
The fiasco also highlighted Trump's judgment as a manager whose chief criteria are looks and loyalty. During his 2015 campaign, he promised to hire only "the best people". His first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigned after 23 days. His second term has featured figures such as Kristi Noem, fired as homeland security secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, a health secretary who promoted anti-scientific claims, and Pete Hegseth, a defence secretary who bungled the Iran war and announced a livestreamed execution only to be overruled.
Kurt Bardella, a political commentator, said: "It shows the limitations of the president making decisions like this based solely on: 'Oh, I liked watching this clip of her on this segment in the most friendly environment possible.' We've seen this time and again with this president selecting figures for very meaningful, important and substantive positions solely based on cable news, and just look at how the war in Iran is going to know that ain't working out too good."
Lockhart added: "It one more time shows how Trump cheapens everything he touches. He wants everything to be in his image. He tears down the East Wing. He puts his name on the Kennedy Center. Now he has tried to put someone in that job who reflects him, not the country and the values and the power of this country."
Zacharia may thrive as a "former White House press secretary" in rightwing media, as Scaramucci has. However, the job is arguably superfluous when Trump is a word machine who holds two-hour campaign rallies and takes calls from reporters on his mobile phone. Lockhart concluded: "He's certainly remade the job because all the press secretary does now is repeat what the president says and tell him how brilliant he was in saying it. It used to be that credibility was the currency in the room. It's impossible to be credible when you're working for someone who lies almost every time he speaks."
