While filling multiple roles within the Donald Trump administration,
Hope Hicks became the youngest person to serve as White House Communications Director.
But there's a lot more to learn about the woman known as the "Trump whisperer."
Here are some things you may not know about Hope Hicks.
Often drawing comparisons to Victoria's Secret model Hilary Rhoda,
Hicks took a pretty serious stab at modeling in her teen years. According to NPR,
she landed a modeling gig for Ralph Lauren in 2002, then signed a two-year contract with Ford,
the famous modeling agency that has represented everyone from Lindsay Lohan to Naomi Campbell.
While her Ford connections helped her land TV commercials, Hicks' most high-profile gig,
according to Cosmopolitan, came in the form of a cover shoot for The It Girl,
a novel spin-off of the TV series Gossip Girl.
Even with her early success in the industry, Hicks knew modeling may not be her career of choice.
In an interview with Greenwich Magazine, she said,
"I'm not ready to decide if modeling is what I want to do with my life. I'm having so much fun,
I'm just going to go where it takes me. But I want to continue with the acting."
In the same interview, Hicks also dropped a hint about her future
and offered a glimpse at her family's politically connected past, saying,
"I'm also interested in politics — it runs in the family, my parents met while they
were working on Capitol Hill. If the acting thing doesn't work out,
I could really see myself in politics. Who knows?"
According to The New York Times, Hicks got her own big break in the PR world when she and her
father ran into Alec Baldwin at the Super Bowl. The chance encounter with the actor — who would
later become her boss' Number 1 public tormentor — led to a job with a powerful New York City public
relations expert who represented Baldwin and who also happened to work for the Trump Organization.
Through her gig, Hicks found herself assigned to none other than Donald Trump's daughter,
Ivanka Trump, who at the time was developing a fashion line, according to GQ.
Hicks and Ivanka grew close, which in turn put Hicks onto Donald's radar.
It didn't take long for The Apprentice star to poach Hicks,
hiring her to work directly for him at Trump Tower. Donald told GQ during a profile about her,
"I thought Hope was outstanding."
It was perhaps this respect from her famous boss, combined with an apparent savvy about how to
retain control of one's image from intrusive media outlets, that led to Hope becoming a
pivotal figure in Donald's presidential campaign.
According to Politico, President Trump has become so fond of Hicks that he calls her "Hopie" or "Hope-ster," so it's no surprise that when he
decided to run for the presidential election, he didn't really offer her a choice in whether
or not she would join him on the campaign trail. Hicks' mother told The New York Times,
"Mr. Trump sat her down and said, 'This is your new job.' It was a shocker."
So, why was the, quote, "least credentialed press secretary in the modern history of
presidential politics" handpicked for such an important job? Simple. Republican adviser,
former campaign manager, and now-convicted felon Paul Manafort said back in 2016,
"Her most important role is her bond with the candidate. She totally understands him."
Ivanka Trump added:
"My father makes people earn his trust. She's earned his trust."
However, Hicks was reluctant to take the offer to become a campaign press
secretary — she even declined it when she was told she had to choose between
working on the campaign and working for the Trump Organization. It was
reportedly the urging of Donald himself that convinced her to get on board.
In an extremely rare interview, Hicks spoke in surprisingly candid terms
about Donald Trump's expectations of his political staffers and the
grueling nature of a political campaign. She told Marie Claire,
"Somebody wanted to go home at like 11:30 p.m. And the campaign manager said, 'My boss [Trump]
is working harder than you. That's not right. You need to stay and do what you're supposed to do.'
This is Mr. Trump's time away from his family, and frankly, it's his money. He's spent millions,
and the thing we can do is work to the best of our ability as hard as possible. The pressure
and the long hours — it's all relative to what he's putting in, which is everything."
Hicks' slavish devotion to the campaign even caused her mother to fret.
Speaking with The New York Times, she said,
"She doesn't really talk to anybody anymore,
she has no life. I can't actually let her know how worried I am."
GQ even alleged that her schedule led to her ending a relationship with her boyfriend of
six years. Whether that's true or not, the experience of joining the Trump Train has
obviously been an emotional one for Hicks, who even felt the need to passionately defend her boss
when she overheard guests at a wedding she was attending expressing dismay about his
election victory, according to Politico. She allegedly told the Trump detractors,
"I promise, he's a good person!"
Though it's clear by now that Donald doesn't pay much attention to his handlers,
Hicks apparently has something of a magic touch when it comes to penetrating the
president's steadfast independence. According to a Politico profile,
"She has become something of a Trump whisperer — other aides rely on Hicks'
judgment to gauge when is a good time to speak to the president."
To that end, her strategy when it comes to managing Trump's communications may focus
less on what he says to the press and more on how she communicates with him, which her colleagues
told Politico is akin to how Trump's daughter Ivanka communicates with him. They explained,
"She can express her disagreements to the president privately,
but ultimately supports his decisions unquestioningly."
Hicks reportedly helps to soften Trump's email outbursts towards journalists who
have displeased him by politely signing them with "Best, Hope," and she apparently knows
to steer clear of him when he's indisposed with other important duties, like, quote,
"watching a major golf tournament," according to The New York Times.
In other words: Hicks cracked the elusive code to communicating with Trump by never questioning
his authority, serving up his rebukes with a smile, and not bugging him when he's watching TV.
During the multiple investigations into Donald Trump's connections with Russia, Hicks found
herself a central figure. She was interviewed for two days by Special Counsel Robert Mueller,
and a few months later, she sat for over eight hours of private testimony before
the House Intelligence Committee to discuss Russian interference into the 2016 election,
according to The New York Times. Hicks refused to answer most questions about her time on the
campaign or in the administration, but she did admit that Trump apparently often asked her to
tell, quote, "white lies." The report also stated that Hicks was involved in the firing
of James Comey as F.B.I. director. Also, when Donald Trump Jr. was in contact with Russians
to obtain damaging information about Hillary Clinton, Hicks allegedly said his emails
attempting to schedule the infamous Trump Tower meeting would, quote, "never get out."
A day after her February 2018 meeting with the House Intelligence Committee,
Hicks announced her plans to resign.
Roughly eight months after her resignation,
Hicks was named the VP and chief communications officer for New Fox,
a restructuring of the Fox Corporation after Disney purchased 21st Century Fox.
Critics saw the move as Fox further aligning itself with Donald Trump's agenda
and his reelection campaign. According to Variety,
the president of the watchdog group Media Matters for America said,
"Hicks' presence at Fox will further align the
Trump communications apparatus with the Fox News propaganda machine."
Meanwhile, Trump's press secretary at the time, Sarah Huckabee Sanders,
praised the hire. She tweeted,
"FOX won't find anyone smarter or more talented than Hicks.
So happy for my friend. They are beyond lucky to have you and the East Coast misses you already."
It turns out, she didn't stay in the job long.
Almost two years after leaving the White House for Hollywood, Hicks returned to accept her third role
in the Trump administration: a counselor to the president who reports directly to senior adviser
Jared Kushner, according to The New York Times. Donald was reportedly "superstitious" and wanted
to recreate the team that propelled him to the Oval Office back in 2016.
According to CNBC, a financial report released later that year
revealed that Hicks left the White House with, quote, "a bank account valued up to $15,000
as her sole asset [and returned with] a bank account that is valued at up to $1 million."
So, why did Hicks leave such a lucrative gig to take another job with the Trump administration?
A White House official claimed to Vanity Fair,
"She didn't find it exciting. She was bored."
Another potential reason is that her brand of politics reportedly didn't play well in
Tinseltown. A source alleged that Hicks would find herself defending Trump at Hollywood
dinner parties and never felt welcome in that world. One of her White House colleagues said,
"It'll be two minutes before Trump's calling her into the Oval
asking her what she thinks about things."
Upon Hicks' return to the White House,
expectations were high. According to Politico, the former assistant secretary of the Treasury said,
"[Hope] understands the president is the message. It cannot be outsourced
to anyone. He is at his strongest when he is communicating directly with the public.
Her instincts are impeccable and lead to good decisions."
However, five months into her new position, America saw a wave of protests in the wake
of the passing of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis Police.
After spending the weekend secured in a bunker while protestors marched and
stormed the White House gates, Hicks came up with a plan to have Trump and several aides
walk to St. John's Church and pose with a Bible, according to The New York Times.
The only problem with that plan was that they cleared his path by instructing D.C. police to
hit peaceful protestors with tear gas and flash-bang grenades. When Trump reached
the church, a reporter asked if he was holding his own personal Bible, to which Trump replied:
"It's a Bible."
According to the Daily Mail, the D.C. mayor was "shocked" by the display. Amid social media
backlash against the Trump administration, the Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington,
said she was, quote, "outraged" by the stunt and called it, quote,
"antithetical to the teachings of Jesus and God of justice."
On October 1st, 2020, it was announced that Hicks
had tested positive for the novel coronavirus. According to Bloomberg,
Hicks was symptomatic while traveling aboard Air Force One with Donald, who tweeted at the time,
"Hope Hicks, who has been working so hard without even taking a small break,
has just tested positive for COVID 19. Terrible! The First Lady and I are waiting
for our test results. In the meantime, we will begin our quarantine process!"
Three days later, Trump was in Walter Reed Army Medical Center
receiving treatment for COVID-19 himself. During a press conference on October 4th,
POTUS' medical team stated that he was on a steroid therapy and had to be administered oxygen,
according to NBC News. Vanity Fair reported that Hicks experienced a
high fever and a cough and lost her sense of smell. Her friends stated that she was
frustrated with the Trump administration's, quote, "cavalier approach" to the pandemic.
"So with the masks it's going to be a voluntary thing."
According to the report, Hicks was the only one to wear a mask during West Wing meetings
and was routinely "made fun of" by people in the room.
"So she tested positive and she got better so fast, it was like"
She was also allegedly upset at the media for
suggesting she was the one who infected the president. One of her friends said,
"It's so unfair she's sort of being blamed."
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