Trump removes Katie Zacharia as White House press secretary after one week

UPDATE - follow-up to Trump opens door to Katie Zacharia leaving as press secretary: President Donald Trump has removed Katie Zacharia from the White House press secretary post after just one week, two U.S. officials told CBS News on Friday. Some White House staff learned of the change from news reports, and The New York Times first reported she had been fired. An aide said Zacharia spent the week isolated and did not function as a press secretary, adding that no one expected her to stay long enough to join decision‑making. Trump told her he would “reconsider” taking the job if he were in her shoes, saying the press had been “so nasty” and urging her to think about her family. He praised her husband and children before suggesting she step back. The move came exactly one week after Trump announced her as the replacement for Karoline Leavitt, who left the role in August. Zacharia’s résumé soon drew scrutiny; she has billed herself as a lawyer despite failing the California bar exam in 2011, a fact she confirmed Thursday. She said the president of Pepperdine University once told her she could call herself a “lawyer” but not an “attorney,” and later told commentator Jack Posobiec that she never claimed to be an attorney. The swift turnover echoes the 11‑day stint of Anthony Scaramucci as communications director, who later posted that “records are made to be broken.”

Context

Personnel changes in the Trump White House have often been abrupt, with brief tenures reflecting the administration’s volatile staffing approach.