President Trump has named Katie Zacharia the next White House press secretary, replacing Karoline Leavitt with a longtime MAGA ally and Trump Media adviser.
President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House that he had just hired a new press secretary and that Katie Zacharia would take the job. He framed the pick as a natural fit for the podium and for his team. The New York Post reported the announcement from Washington as Trump moved to fill the vacancy left when Karoline Leavitt stepped away from the role.
Trump also posted the news on Truth Social, stressing Zacharia’s campaign work and her long record of support. The choice puts a familiar conservative communicator in one of the administration’s most visible jobs as the White House heads into a hard political stretch.
Leavitt left the press secretary post in August to spend more time with her family after the birth of her second child on May 1. Zacharia will replace her. That handoff keeps the briefing room in the hands of a loyal Trump ally rather than an outside hire with no stake in the agenda.
Speaking to the White House press corps, Trump cast Zacharia as someone the room already knows.
He told reporters:
"She’s a friend of most of you. I know she likes people. She likes all of you, actually. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but we just hired a new press secretary. And she’s going to be, I think, terrific."
On Truth Social he went further, tying her résumé to his own winning map. Trump wrote that she had helped in key swing states “where we won 7 out of 7,” called her a “loyal and brilliant supporter,” and said she has been a devoted MAGA member “right from the beginning.” He closed with a simple send-off: “Good luck Katie.”
Fox News reported that Trump named the attorney and TV commentator on Friday, and that two White House officials had confirmed the selection before his public announcement. Fox also carried his formal praise of her current role as senior communications adviser to Truth Social at Trump Media & Technology Group.
That loyalty-first pattern matches other recent personnel moves, including the White House’s emphasis on proven MAGA hires for sensitive jobs.
Trump’s public case for Zacharia was straightforward. He wants a press secretary who already shares the mission, knows the media fight, and will not need on-the-job conversion.
Katie Zacharia is 42 and a mother of four. She has been a fixture on conservative media, especially Fox News, and has written op-eds for the Post. She advises Trump Media & Technology Group and works at Fix California, the group founded by Trump special envoy Ric Grenell to push a conservative agenda in the Golden State.
Just the News reported that she previously served as spokesperson and deputy assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security, and that she graduated from Pepperdine University and its Caruso School of Law. Leavitt, who left in August after giving birth, is expected to join Fox News as a contributor.
Zacharia spent about three months at DHS earlier this year and left after Markwayne Mullin took over as secretary in March. She was reported to have been close to then-Secretary Kristi Noem and special adviser Corey Lewandowski while there. She later told Just the News the long commute from California put a strain on her family.
Her earlier résumé is classic Republican farm-system work. She interned for the Republican National Committee while at Pepperdine and served in the White House Office of Political Affairs during George W. Bush’s second term. Trump’s own description puts her in the swing-state trenches of his campaigns. That mix of government, media, and movement work is why the pick landed with little mystery inside MAGA circles.
Trump has kept a heavy public schedule while locking in staff and message discipline, the same posture on display when he said he never gets tired of a packed midterm travel calendar.
Zacharia answered the appointment on X with full-throated thanks and a clear job description.
She wrote:
"President Trump has shown America that we can be great again, and he works to effectuate that greatness every single day. His confidence is a true privilege, and his leadership is a blessing to this country."
She also said she looks forward to working with the White House press corps and reporters across the country “to get that record out,” and called the post “the honor of a lifetime.” Fox carried a parallel line in which she framed service to Trump and the American people at the country’s 250-year mark as that same honor.
The Washington Examiner reported that Trump tapped the conservative commentator and Trump Media adviser as press secretary less than a month before the 2026 midterm elections, and amid lawsuits from Politico, MS Now, and CNN over White House access bans. The timing is not subtle. The briefing room remains a daily battleground over access, framing, and who sets the record.
A press secretary who already knows the media map and the president’s priorities is a practical answer to that fight. Trump said she has the respect of the media, the American people, and his administration, and that she will work “fantastically” with all three. That is the job description in plain English: defend the record, push the facts out, and refuse to let hostile outlets run the room unchallenged.
The same direct public style has marked other recent Trump moves, from hard-edged campaign endorsements in Michigan to sharp responses when critics try to define the story first.
Leavitt’s exit was personal, not political. She left to focus on her family after a second child. The administration did not leave the podium empty of a trusted voice for long. Zacharia’s selection closes that gap with someone who has already worked the DHS beat, the Trump media orbit, and the conservative airwaves.
Voters watching the next year of briefings will judge the results in real time. They will hear whether the White House answers questions cleanly, corrects false frames fast, and keeps the focus on results rather than process theater. Staffing the room with a proven communicator is how an administration prepares for that test.
Trump has also used executive action to deliver concrete relief on costs that hit working Americans, including when he expanded tax-free red diesel for farmers and truckers. Message and policy still have to travel together.
Zacharia now inherits the daily assignment of making that case under lights. Trump’s public bet is that a loyal, media-fluent hire can do it without confusion about whose agenda she serves.
A White House that picks its own messengers, instead of auditioning for hostile approval, is simply doing the job voters hired it to do.
