Newly hired White House Press Secretary Katie Zacharia (Image: Screengrab via CNN)
President Donald Trump has finally chosen his next White House Press Secretary, and according to a new report from The Bulwark, a series of deleted social media posts have exposed her "sordid history."
On Friday, Trump confirmed on Truth Social that Katie Zacharia — a conservative commentator who previously worked in public affairs for the Department of Homeland Security for a few weeks at the start of 20206 — would be replacing Karoline Leavitt as White House Press Secretary. A report on her hiring from MS NOW described Zacharia as a "relatively obscure figure within Trump’s political sphere," who has "ties to Trump’s personal business and his longtime allies, including serving as a senior communications adviser at Trump Media & Technology Group, the parent company of Trump’s social media platform Truth Social," in addition to her occasional appearances on Fox News and Newsmax.
On Saturday, The Bulwark published a new report about Zacharia's past public and online remarks, accusing her of having "a sordid online history of spreading vaccine conspiracy theories, calling for the upending of constitutional norms, and encouraging the president to run for a third term in office." It also suggested that the stances she expressed in now-deleted X posts "could create uncomfortable questions for her when she takes the podium in the White House press briefing room."
"For example, how committed is Zacharia to the rule of law?" reporter Brendan Hartnett wrote. "In a series of deletedtweets, she called for suspending habeas corpus, one of the oldest and most fundamental safeguards of individual liberty, in response to a tweet from White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller claiming sanctuary cities are a criminal conspiracy."
In response to California Gov. Gavin Newsom posting about Trump taking control of the state's National Guard and deploying them to Los Angeles last year, Zacharia lashed out at the Democrat and suggested the president should go further.
"The federal government under @realDonaldTrump should take over all of California because clearly you can’t be trusted to do a single thing," she posted.
"Zacharia’s posts also indicate deeply skeptical views about COVID, bordering on conspiracism," Hartnett detailed. "In August she reposted an article claiming that '8 in 10 women had a miscarriage after getting the COVID vaccine'—a statistic wildly at odds with actual scientific data. And in 2022, from a now-deleted Twitter account, she repeatedlyaccused Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates of being 'a eugenicist' who 'was pushing for everyone to get a toxic jab.''"
He continued: "Her tweets are a grab bag of right-wing talking points. In September 2025, Zacharia accused 'leftist transgender assailants' of being responsible for 'at least a dozen' school shootings. Last month, she called Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed — who was born and raised in the United States — 'an indictment of our immigration system under Democrats.' Last week, she charged Chief Justice John Roberts with being “not even that conservative” and said his opinion in the birthright citizenship case 'should have gotten him a seat back at those lib-tables.' And in a podcast interview last year she insisted that the abortion pill mifepristone was the same chemical used in Nazi Germany extermination camps. It’s not."
All of these claims and positions, Hartnett suggested, place Zacharia "outside the political mainstream," but should endear her to whatever is left of his passionate base. She also possesses the "over-the-top admiration for" Trump that he seems to view as a major prerequisite for the job.