page_title: Sarah Sanders
section_title: Trump administration
hierarchical_section_title: Sarah Sanders / Trump administration
caption_attribution_description: National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Ambassador to China Terry Branstad, State Councilor Yang Jiechi, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, White House Senior Aide Jared Kushner, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, Director of Social Media and Assistant to the President Dan Scavino Jr., Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. Cui Tiankai, and Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Zheng Zeguang during President Trump and the First Lady’s tour of the Forbidden City, Beijing, China on November 8, 2017. [State Department photo/Public Domain]
context_page_description: Sarah Elizabeth Sanders is an American campaign manager and political adviser who served as White House Press Secretary under President Donald Trump from 2017 to 2019. She previously served as White House Deputy Press Secretary to her predecessor, Sean Spicer, in 2017. Sanders is the third woman to fill the position.
  With the release of the Mueller Report in April 2019, it is claimed that Sanders admitted to investigators that she had made false statements to the public as press secretary.
  On June 13, 2019, President Trump tweeted that Sanders would be leaving her role as press secretary for his administration at the end of the month.
context_section_description: After Donald Trump was elected, Sanders was named to the position of deputy White House press secretary in his new administration. On May 5, 2017, she held her first White House press briefing, standing in for Press Secretary Sean Spicer, who was serving on Naval Reserve duty. She continued to cover for Spicer until his return to the podium on May 12. She stood in for Spicer during the dismissal of James Comey and the controversy following it. Her defense of the Trump administration's actions led to some speculation that President Trump was considering promoting her to replace Spicer. This was denied at the time by her father, Mike Huckabee. However, on May 26, The Wall Street Journal again suggested that Sanders was being considered as a possible replacement for Spicer, in the context of wider staff changes and the investigation into alleged communications with Russia. She continued to fill in for Spicer occasionally.
  After the dismissal of James Comey by President Trump in May 2017, Sanders said that she "heard from countless members of the FBI that are grateful and thankful for the President's decision" to fire the FBI director. However, emails show that several FBI heads of regional field offices and high-ranking FBI members reacted with dismay to Comey's firing. After Trump sought to discredit Comey and the FBI, Sanders was questioned on a tweet she had sent during the 2016 presidential election that "when you're attacking FBI agents because you're under criminal investigation, you're losing". After Comey accused Trump of lying about the circumstances in which Comey was dismissed, Sanders defended Trump: "I can definitively say the president is not a liar, and I think it's frankly insulting that question would be asked."
  On June 27, 2017, during a press briefing, Sanders criticized the media, accusing them of spreading "fake news" against Trump. Sanders cited a video created by James O'Keefe. Although she was unsure of the video's accuracy, she said, "I would encourage everyone in this room and, frankly, everybody across the country to take a look at it." The video features CNN's health and medical producer, John Bonifield, saying that CNN's coverage of the Trump campaign's alleged links to Russia are "mostly bullshit" and driven by ratings.
  On June 29, 2017, Sanders said during a press briefing that the "president in no way, form or fashion has ever promoted or encouraged violence." However, in February 2016, Trump said during a presidential campaign speech: "So if you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of them, would you? ... I promise you, I will pay for the legal fees. I promise." Politifact also "found at least seven other examples in which Trump offered public musings that showed a tolerance for, and sometimes even a favorable disposition toward, physical violence."
  On July 21, 2017, following Spicer's announcement that he was going to resign, newly appointed White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci announced that Sanders would take the role of White House press secretary. Sanders is the third woman to hold the role of White House Press Secretary after Dee Dee Myers in 1993 and Dana Perino in 2007.
  In August 2017, Sanders said President Trump "certainly didn’t dictate" a statement released by Donald Trump Jr. regarding the 2016 Trump Tower meeting with Russians. Sanders also said that President Trump "weighed in, offered suggestion like any father would do." In January 2018, President Trump's lawyers wrote to the special counsel investigation that "the President dictated" the statement released by Donald Trump Jr. In June 2018, Sanders was asked by the media to explain the discrepancy in the statements, but she repeatedly refused to answer the question, saying: "I’m not going to respond to a letter from the president’s outside counsel ... We’ve purposefully walled off, and I would refer you to them for comment", as well as: "I'm an honest person".
  In October 2017, Sanders was asked by CBS News' Jacqueline Alemany whether the official White House position was that all
caption: Sanders with Rex Tillerson, Jared Kushner, Robert Lighthizer and Wang Yi in Beijing, China, November 2017
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