{"id":375061,"date":"2026-10-16T19:30:10","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T19:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/375061\/"},"modified":"2026-10-16T19:30:10","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T19:30:10","slug":"trump-urges-katie-zacharia-to-reconsider-press-secretary-job-after-less-than-a-week-at-the-white-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/375061\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump urges Katie Zacharia to reconsider press secretary job after less than a week at the White House"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 White House press secretary Katie Zacharia <\/a>has left her post following a devastating series of media appearances and questions about her legal background.<\/a><\/p>\n

Word of Zacharia\u2019s departure emerged shortly after Trump publicly urged her to reconsider her position as he left the White House for a pre-midterm rally in Georgia.<\/p>\n

\u201cKatie\u2019s been treated very badly by the media. Very, very badly, very unfairly, I think. And I just spoke to her about it. I said, \u2018Katie, is this for you?\u2019 Because, you know, she\u2019s been treated very rough. And she\u2019s a nice person,\u201d said the president of the press secretary who started work this past Monday<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve watched her for years on television, but I said, \u2018Is this for you, Katie? Because honestly, you don\u2019t need this.’\u201d<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump speaks to the White House press corps alongside new press secretary Katie Zacharia on Oct. 13, 2026. Zuma \/ SplashNews.com<\/p>\n

The California native is transitioning to a new role that will be announced later and is having dinner Friday with Vice President JD Vance, a senior administration official told The Post after Trump\u2019s comments.<\/p>\n

The president claimed that Fox News primetime host Sean Hannity \u201cwas a little bit tough\u201d on Zacharia in an interview Thursday night and that the hosts of \u201cFox & Friends\u201d were similarly \u201ca little tough\u201d Friday morning \u2014 following a nervous 14-minute initial press briefing on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s been treated, I would say, pretty nastily,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said to Katie two minutes ago, I said, \u2018Katie, you know, you don\u2019t need to do this if you don\u2019t want.\u2019 She said, \u2018This is a lot tougher.\u2019 I said, \u2018Welcome to the world of Trump.’\u201d<\/p>\n

New White House press secretary Katie Zacharia holds her first press briefing at the White House on Oct. 13, 2026. REUTERS<\/p>\n

Asked if he would keep Zacharia in her role, Trump said,\u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know, we\u2019ll see. I\u2019m going to let her make that decision\u201d \u2014 before giving a clear indication that her fate had been sealed. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I get back, we\u2019re going to talk,\u201d he told another reporter. \u201cBecause I don\u2019t think that Katie should be made to suffer like she\u2019s suffering at the hands of the press. So I will talk to her as soon as I get back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zacharia seen at the White House on Oct. 16, 2026. AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Trump said he intends to keep Zacharia in his administration \u201cin some form, but maybe a more pleasant form.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people want the job. I bet you\u2019d want it if I offered it to her,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just think the press has been very tough on Katie, and I said, \u2018There\u2019s no reason for you to have to do this. You\u2019ve got a beautiful family, a fantastic husband and kids.’\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 White House press secretary Katie Zacharia has left her post following a devastating series of media…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375062,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[153,137739,9,11,10,87,58,5561],"class_list":["post-375061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-donald-trump","tag-katie-zacharia","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-politics","tag-us-news","tag-white-house"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375062"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}