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Katie Zacharia, the Trump administration’s new press secretary, did not have the greatest first day of work. Zacharia gave her first press briefing, which lasted just 14 minutes, on Tuesday, and it went so poorly that it reportedly left even Republicans wondering how long she’ll last.
Zacharia is taking over for Karoline Leavitt, who resigned in August and is now set to join Fox News. While Leavitt’s tenure as press secretary was marked by her hostility toward both the media and factual truth, she at least seemed comfortable in her position. Zacharia, on the other hand, stumbled through her introductions, which she appeared to read from a printed script. At one point, she accidentally referred to her husband as “my president.” She seemed to shock members of the media when she announced that the administration had asked Kimberly Guilfoyle to resign as ambassador to Greece. Outside of the briefing room, while she was answering questions with President Trump, a reporter asked where Zacharia passed the bar exam, and she responded with, “When I moved to China.”
To make matters worse, it seems that Zacharia does not have the unequivocal support of her Republican colleagues, per MS NOW. One anonymous White House official apparently admitted that she “got off on the wrong foot,” adding, “she needs to get much better, fast, otherwise she’ll break Scaramucci’s record.” (Anthony Scaramucci did a famously brief stint as the White House’s press secretary during Trump’s first administration in 2017 — he was dismissed after just 11 days.) Another official reportedly called the briefing “rough all around” and theorized that “The press and the administration are all probably thinking the same thing: we miss Karoline.”
But Trump, at least, “thought she was very good.”
