COME BACK KAROLINE...

Trump’s New Mouthpiece Given Brutal Verdict by White House Goons

Katie Zacharia’s debut as press secretary lasted all of 14 minutes and 12 seconds.

Donald Trump’s top aides are wondering just how long the president’s new press secretary will manage to stay on the job after a disastrous debut that lasted less than 15 minutes.

Katie Zacharia, 41, took the podium on Tuesday for the first time after taking over from Karoline Leavitt, 29, last week.

ODDS ARE IN

Katie Zacharia Sparks Exit Speculation After Car Crash Debut

Lauren Hartley

She spent much of her briefing reading scripted remarks praising the 80-year-old president, answered questions from just three reporters—revealing that the administration had fired embattled U.S. Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle—and then rushed off again.

Several White House aides told CNN they were baffled about why Trump hustled Zacharia out in front of the press less than two working days after announcing her as his pick to replace Leavitt.

“She should have been doing murder boards for two weeks before going up there,” one adviser said. “The best thing she did was break the news about Guilfoyle—at least that takes the focus off of her performance.”

“Why did they put her out there so quickly?” another asked. “Literally zero reason to put her out on her second day, unprepared.”

“No question we’re all missing Karoline,” a third added. The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.

Zacharia went to considerable lengths to land the job in the first place. She tracked Trump’s public schedule and Truth Social posts to work out when he might be watching television, then timed her appearances on conservative networks to ensure she was giving interviews that might catch his eye.

Play Video

The strategy paid off, with influential figures at Fox News, Newsmax, and One America News Network backing her for the position, ahead of other hopefuls like CNN’s resident MAGA commentator Scott Jennings.

Her troubled debut has only added to mounting questions about her suitability for the role. Zacharia has repeatedly presented herself as an attorney, despite no evidence at this stage of which state she’s supposed to have passed the bar in.

Reporters confronted her about those credentials after Tuesday’s briefing. Asked where she passed the bar, the Pepperdine law school graduate replied that it was “when I moved to China,” without naming a U.S. jurisdiction.

Gamblers have already started placing bets on how quickly she’ll be off the job. A market opened on prediction platform Kalshi within minutes of her first briefing ending, with traders putting the odds of her departure before the end of 2026 at 99 percent on Tuesday.

One administration official offered a particularly gloomy assessment, telling MS NOW that Zacharia was at risk of breaking the record set by Anthony Scaramucci, who survived just 10 days as Trump’s communications director during his first term.

“Getting behind the podium is tough, but she got off on the wrong foot,” they said. “She needs to get much better, fast.”

Public reaction has hardly been kinder, with media analyst Aaron Rupar writing on X that “Katie Zacharia makes Karoline Leavitt seem like Winston Churchill.” Rolling Stone reporter Nikki McCann Ramirez called it a “Chat-GPT-a-- first speech from the new press secretary.”

Leavitt left the White House in August after the president reportedly hounded her with phone calls during her maternity leave following the birth of her daughter, repeatedly asking when she intended to return to work.

Her exit was part of a much broader exodus from an increasingly embattled administration. Trump’s media operation alone has shed a quarter of its senior personnel since the summer, while other prominent figures to leave include Deputy Chief of Staff James Blair, Director of Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and White House Chief Counsel David Warrington.

The departures come as Republicans brace for potentially devastating losses in next month’s midterm elections, with former administration officials warning that the results could trigger an even greater stampede toward the door.

As one former staffer put it: “Once Nov. 3 hits, it’s Armageddon, and everyone’s out.”

See more of our coverage in your search results.

ADD THE DAILY BEAST ON GOOGLE

Will NealReporter

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.