New White House Press Secretary Katie Zacharia has a lot to say. And what she has said raises serious questions about the person now tasked with speaking for the president of the United States.
Zacharia’s first press briefing is slated for October 13. She was announced as press secretary on October 11, with Trump writing on Truth Social: “Katie has been with me, in spirit, from the very beginning, and will do a fantastic job!”
Whether she will do a fantastic job depends on how firm a grasp you have on reality — and how willing you are to inhabit the same world she does.
The Posts
Zacharia’s social media history, first reported by The Bulwark and Popular Information, includes a series of inflammatory and conspiratorial statements.
“The radical left Hollywood elitists are sick pedo cannibals. Change my mind,” she posted. “The election was stolen from President Trump, and I’m just going to say it: It was stolen,” she wrote on another occasion. She also directed a post at Bill Gates: “@BillGates you are a eugenicist and deserve every single person in the world to look at you in shame and disgust.”
In 2022, she shared a Truth Social post from far-right conspiracy theorist Ali Alexander that read: “Democrats want to mask and rape your children. That’s their satanic platform.”
The Conspiracy Theories
Zacharia has also promoted a baseless conspiracy theory about the abortion pill mifepristone, falsely claiming it is “connected to the manufacturer of the deadly gas Zyklon B, used in the World War II concentration camps” by Nazis. The drug was developed in France in the 1980s.
She has raged online about the “woke left” and “their revolting, rabid, and unhinged hatred.” She believes Trump should run for a third term in 2028, something the Constitution forbids. And she has suggested suspending habeas corpus — the foundational legal right for anyone detained by the government to challenge their detention in court — in order to round up immigrants living in sanctuary cities.
What It Means
This is the kind of rhetoric that was once confined to the far corners of the internet. Now it comes from the person who will stand behind the White House podium and speak on behalf of the president.
Zacharia’s elevation is not an anomaly. It is a reflection of what the Republican Party has become. To be a Republican today, you have to buy into conspiracy theories. You have to show absolute fealty to Trump. You have to think vaccines are a grand conspiracy. And you have to dislike your political opponents enough to call them pedophiles, cannibals, and Satanists.
There is reality. And then there is a rabbit hole full of half-baked conspiracies and dark, divisive fantasies. The White House press secretary has chosen the rabbit hole.
The Bottom Line
New White House Press Secretary Katie Zacharia has a history of inflammatory and conspiratorial social media posts. She has called Democrats “sick pedo cannibals,” claimed the 2020 election was stolen, and promoted a baseless conspiracy theory about the abortion pill. She has suggested suspending habeas corpus and believes Trump should run for a third term. Her elevation reflects the Republican Party’s embrace of conspiracy theories and absolute loyalty to Trump. Her first press briefing is October 13.
My Opinion
The White House press secretary is not just a spokesperson. They are the public face of the American government. They stand at a podium in the briefing room and answer questions on behalf of the president. They are supposed to represent the administration’s policies, not its darkest impulses. Katie Zacharia has spent years posting things that would get a college freshman expelled from a debate club. Now she speaks for the president.
And that is the point. Trump did not pick her despite her history. He picked her because of it. He wants a press secretary who will fight the media, not inform them. He wants someone who believes the 2020 election was stolen, who calls Democrats pedophiles, who thinks Bill Gates is a eugenicist.
