Hope Hicks, Donald Trump’s longest-serving aide, was appointed as interim White House communications director on Wednesday, weeks after Anthony Scaramucci’s shock exit.
The 28-year-old is also the youngest person to fill the post since it was established in 1969, during Richard Nixon’s presidency.
Here is what you need to know about Trump’s newest appointee to the top communications position.
Her family members are also public relations heavyweights; her father was an executive for Ogilvy, a global marketing and PR agency and now heads up marketing firm Glover Park Group.
Her mother was a former aide to a Democratic congressman and her grandfather was in charge of public relations for oil giant, Texaco.
As a teenager, Hicks was signed to Ford modeling agency and graced a Ralph Lauren campaign with her sister, as well as being the face of The It Girl, a book by Gossip Girl creator Cecily von Ziegesar. She was also the face of the Hourglass Adventures novels.
The keen lacrosse player graduated from Southern Methodist University with an English degree and launched her PR career at marketing firm Zeno Group in New York.
How did she end up working for Trump?
Hicks worked for high-profile PR company Hiltzik Strategies, which represented Ivanka Trump and the Trump organisation in 2012. In 2014, she joined the Trump business full time and worked on Ivanka Trump’s fashion line.
Months later, she was picked by Donald Trump to be the press secretary for his presidential campaign.
In an interview to the New York Times last year, the the 71-year-old said of Hicks: “I’m lucky to have her. She’s got very good judgment.
“She will often give advice, and she’ll do it in a very low-key manner, so it doesn’t necessarily come in the form of advice. But it’s delivered very nicely.”
Hicks has been lauded as trustworthy by those close to the president, with Ivanka saying of her: “My father makes people earn his trust. She’s earned his trust”.
Has she been in politics before?
Despite Hicks’ new position, she had no political experience when she started working with Trump.
However, in December, she was announced as the White House director of strategic communications – a newly created role. She was entrusted as a confidant and was responsible for coordinating media appearances.
Although she worked as a model as a teen, she expressed her ambitions to enter the field of politics in an interview, aged 13.
She made the Forbes 30 under 30 list earlier this year, for “serving as a one-woman press team” during Trump’s presidential run.
Her salary of £140,000 is the highest in the White House.
