Stephanie Grisham is out as White House press secretary, and in her place arrives Kayleigh McEnany, formerly press secretary for President Trump’s reelection campaign and, as I’m sure they’d like to forget, from CNN.
CNN plucked McEnany out of nowhere and invented her, all as a part of Jeff Zucker’s 2016 strategy to staff the network not with a diverse range of principled conservatives but with pro-Trump “characters in a drama.” As the New York Times Magazine wrote in 2017:
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Prior to CNN, McEnany was a law school student who had done some no-name production work for Fox News. But Zucker and CNN made her into a MAGA superstar. From there, she joined the Trump campaign, and now, one of the most visible posts in the White House. Hardest hit? Probably Brian Stelter, who hasn’t exactly been subtle in his critiques of Fox News for supplying the Trump administration with staffers.
One Fox Newser replacing another: https://t.co/ZPXU5NeHCF
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) March 28, 2019
Until February @HeatherNauert was on @FoxAndFriends. Wonder if @FoxNews will air part of her first briefing today?
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) June 6, 2017
Unlike McEnany, none of the former Fox News reporters hired by the White House were breathless Trump shills. Current State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus was a national security contributor at Fox, and her predecessor, Heather Nauert, had been a veteran news reporter.
It’s not as though Fox had been grooming them to worship Trump publicly, the way CNN had done with McEnany. Her new job is just evidence that Zucker and CNN accomplished the mission from all the way back in 2016.
