Welcome to a bonus edition of Washington Secrets. We have been hitting the phones since Donald Trump announced the departure of Karoline Leavitt yesterday, and we bring you everything we know about what the White House press shop will look like once she has left at the end of the month…EXCLUSIVE — Karoline Leavitt has been one of the top performers in the Trump administration, making it almost impossible to replace the press secretary when she leaves at the end of the month.Which is why President Donald Trump knows there is only one man for the job: himself.
Two sources told Secrets that he is planning to retool his media operation, with a heavier focus on surrogates hammering his message on television, while he continues to talk to journalists whenever he can.“He is pissed there aren’t dozens of surrogates out there hammering his position on the Strait of Hormuz, for example,” said a former Trump official who remains in close contact with the president.“Speculation about the next press secretary is all wrong,” the official added. “It is not the role you think it is when he has reporters in every day and is talking to them on the phone.”So don’t expect a like-for-like replacement for Leavitt.Instead, Trump communications veteran Jason Miller has already quietly returned to the White House in a key role.A source told Secrets of Miller: “He’s an unpaid special government employee helping the team with accomplishments messaging through the midterms.”Expect him to also take a hand in getting surrogates to deliver the message across media, although running the slate of boosters is not central to his work.The gist from a dozen people inside or connected with the administration is that no one should get too caught up in speculating who might be the next press secretary.“Search me,” said one insider when asked which names were in the frame.“The talent pool is not deep and those are very big shoes to fill anyway,” a former Trump official said.It’s a job that is not just about being a good communicator of the president’s positions and White House policy, but it requires behind-the-scenes skills of building relationships with journalists, knowing when to dish out favors, and the dark arts needed to kill bad stories.They played down the idea that Anna Kelly, principal deputy press secretary, might step into the top role.The result is that any names being floated in the media are simply the result of speculation rather than knowledge. Or of possible candidates talking themselves up.An insider said the president was pleased with how Leavitt’s 12-week maternity leave worked out. The press operation did not grind to a halt in her absence, even without a like-for-like replacement.Instead, a series of top officials and Cabinet secretaries made a splash with briefings that were crammed with excited reporters, while Trump kept up a steady stream of informal press conferences in the Oval Office.That could provide something of a model. It shows how the Trump press operation has shifted over time.When Leavitt took up the job 19 months ago, she expected to be in the briefing room three times a week: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, except on those days when the president himself was due to make a public appearance.But with Trump talking so frequently, she found herself briefing barely once a week.Runners and riders for the role
