Her departure comes after a tumultuous few weeks in the White House.
By Jen Kirbyjen.kirby@vox.com Feb 28, 2018, 5:15pm EST
White House communications director Hope Hicks is leaving the White House.
Hicks is likely to leave the White House in a few weeks, although her departure date isn’t yet known. Her resignation comes after some of the most tumultuous weeks of her tenure. The typically low-profile aide first came under intense scrutiny for her alleged role in crafting the administration’s initial tone-deaf statement about domestic abuse allegations against former White House staff secretary Rob Porter, whom Hicks had been dating at the time.
In late January, the New York Times reported that Hicks’s name has also popped up in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation because Hicks allegedly helped the president craft his false statement about Donald Trump Jr.’s Trump Tower meeting with the Russians.
And on Tuesday, Hicks testified for hours in front of the House Intelligence Committee in its ongoing investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
But according to the Times, Hicks had been mulling leaving the White House in recent weeks. “There are no words to adequately express my gratitude to President Trump,” she said in a statement. “I wish the President and his administration the very best as he continues to lead our country.”
Hicks, 29, is one of Trump’s longest-serving and closest aides. She first came into the Trump orbit doing public relations for Ivanka Trump’s fashion brand in 2014. She joined Donald Trump’s presidential campaign as press secretary and continued with him to the White House. She was named White House communications director after Anthony Scaramucci’s departure in the summer of 2017.
The president praised Hicks, one of the few advisers who has stuck with him since the campaign. “Hope is outstanding and has done great work for the last three years,” he said in a statement given to reporters. “She is as smart and thoughtful as they come, a truly great person. I will miss having her by my side but when she approached me about pursuing other opportunities, I totally understood. I am sure we will work together again in the future.”
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