Who is Kayleigh McEnany? Meet Trump's New Press Secretary

Kayleigh McEnany is not a new member of the GOP, as she already made a name for herself during President Trump's early days in the White House after she defended him on CNN.

She immediately became a fixture at his 2020 political rallies and is known as Trump's campaign aide. On April 7, she was annointed as the new White House press secretary.

Who is Kayleigh McEnany

McEnany, 31, is given the task to answer questions from press in the briefing room and communicate the president's decisions to the public. However, the latest briefings showed that Trump is doing the task himself, and McEnany is now expected to defend him on television.

She will replace Stephanie Grisham, a known Trump loyalist who was named press secretary last summer and will return to the East Wing as chief of staff for first lady Melania Trump. Ms. Grisham did not hold any press briefing during her time as a press secretary, and Ms. McEnany is also not expected to, at least in the short term.

Few aides see the point, as President Trump remade the presidency in his own image, he approached the job and make hiring decisions himself, the role of White House press secretary is not the same as what it used to be during the past administrations.

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The idea that one aide would be designated to spend half the day collecting information and talking points to explain the decision of the president to the American public is now long gone.

The coronavirus pandemic has shown the people that President Trump is more than happy to spend a minimum of two hours doing the job himself, as his press secretary was nowhere to be found these past few months.

President Trump has grown to see the daily briefings that he attends with members of his coronavirus task force, answering questions from the press and taking the stand after medical experts.

On his two-hour briefing on April 7, President Trump said that one of the reasons why he does new conferences is to made sure that "fake news" would be debunked immediately.

Ms. McEnany and the Trump campaign has declined requests to comment on her new position as press secretary and they have not stated a specific date on when she would start.

The new addition to the White House

Another figure who will join the White House press staff will be Alyssa Farah, a top spokeswoman at the Defense Department who once worked for Vice President Mike Pence. Ms. Farah is close with former Representative Mark Meadows of North Carolina, who is also a Trump ally. Ben Williamson, the longtime congressional aide of Mr. Meadows, will join the communications team as an adviser.

As for the new press secretary, Ms. McEnany is skilled at furthering the president's message on cable television. Soon after she graduated from Harvard Law School in 2016, she was contributing on CNN as Trump's representative. By summer of 2017, she was named Republican National Committee spokeswoman.