Conservative commentator Katie Zacharia will be the Trump administration’s new press secretary, The New York Times reported on Friday. Her record of transphobic commentary on Fox News makes her the perfect spokesperson for Trump’s endless crusade to eradicate trans people from civic life nationwide.
Zacharia currently works as a communications adviser to Trump Media and Technology Group, which runs the president’s social media platform Truth Social. She worked briefly as a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security during the tenure of then-Secretary Kristi Noem (who Trump fired after a tumultuous year and two months on the job).
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Just last month, Zacharia appeared on Fox News to criticize former President Barack Obama, saying he has no business complimenting women’s leadership skills when “his administration was quite hostile toward biological women.”
His trans-inclusive policies, she claimed, negate his ability to respect and believe in the power of women. She said, “So I want to first ask, what is a woman, Barack Obama? And who are you gonna put up as a woman? What if it’s a man who identifies as a woman?”
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In a May 30 Fox & Friends Weekend segment, she criticized former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Steyer of California for supporting trans athletes (or “biological males competing in women’s sports” as she called it). She said Steyer’s support opposes Trump’s executive order and called Steyer’s position “out of touch with the California voter.”
The current Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Xavier Becerra, also supports trans participation in sports and is widely favored to win most Californian voters’ support, despite Zacharia’s claims.
In a February 4 Fox & Friends First segment, she defended Trump’s executive order seeking to restrict gender-affirming care for trans youth, even though nearly every major American medical association considers the care an effective, safe, and life-saving treatment for gender dysphoria.
She called California’s Senate Bill 107 — a 2023 law establishing the state as a “sanctuary state” for trans youth, their families, and health care providers — a “war against our children,” pushing rhetoric that encourages violence against the above groups by vilifying them as a threat to kids.
During the segment, she also stated the importance of protecting children from irreversible procedures like double mastectomies. In reality, such procedures are rarely ever conducted on trans kids.
Comparatively, approximately 23,527 cosmetic plastic surgical procedures were performed on patients between the ages of 13 and 19 in 2017. Zacharia doesn’t seem to have publicly commented on that.
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