Kayleigh McEnany joins Fox News as an on-air contributor as new White House press secretary Jen Psaki wishes her predecessor well in the gig
Former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany is joining Fox News as an on air contributor, becoming the latest alumni of the Trump administration to join the network.
Fox News host Harris Faulkner announced McEnany's addition on Tuesday when she had McEnany on as a guest.
'It is my distinct pleasure today to welcome Kayleigh McEnany to the Fox family. We will be seeing much more of her in the future,' Faulkner said.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki wished McEnany well in her new gig and said she'd be willing to on the network with her predecessor.
'I've done Fox News Sunday twice now I'm happy to go on a range of shows,' Psaki said.
She noted she and McEnany had spoken a few times in green rooms at CNN when they waited to go air - this was back when McEnany was a CNN contributor and before she became Donald Trump's chief spokesperson.
'Like many Americans, we disagree on political issues but we talked about our families, our spouses, sports all sorts of things in the green room. And I certainly wish her the best in her future endeavors,' Psaki said at her daily press briefing.
McEnany has been critical of President Joe Biden on her personal Twitter account.
McEnany is one of several former Trump officials to join the Rupert Murdoch-owned news network.
In January, Fox announced that Larry Kudlow, a former top economic adviser to Trump, would host a new weekday show on the Fox Business Network.
And, in 2019, former press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders became a Fox News contributor but she left the network in January 2021 and is running for Arkansas governor.
Former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany is joining Fox News as an on air contributor
White House press secretary Jen Psaki wished her predecessor all the best in her new gig
Kayleigh McEnany returned to her home in Florida after she left the Trump administration
Kayleigh McEnany is one of several former Trump officials to join Fox News: Former economic adviser Larry Kudlow (left) hosts a weekday show on the Fox Business Network and former press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders (right) was a Fox News contributor
McEnany joined Fox News in March after an original job offer from the Rupert Murdoch-owned network was put on hold after the January 6th MAGA riot at the Capitol.
Questions arose about McEnany's future employment after her disclosure report, obtained by the watchdog group CREW, showed she had an offer from Fox News in January.
McEnany signed her disclosure report on January 12, stating she had an 'employment agreement with Fox News, starting work in January.'
She filed the report ahead of her departure from the Trump White House. She left his administration on January 19th, the day before President Joe Biden took the oath of office.
But a Fox spokesperson told DailyMail.com in January that 'Kayleigh McEnany is not currently an employee or contributor at FOX News.'
There were discussions between the cable news network, where McEnany was a familiar face during her time as White House press secretary, and McEnany but they were put on hold.
'Initial conversations were had post-election and we paused on them,' a source familiar with the matter said. 'We do not discuss the details behind contracts with any personnel, but we are open to hiring her in the future given we do not condone cancel culture.'
Former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany had a job offer with Fox News put on hold after the MAGA riot at the Capitol
Kayleigh McEnany was a frequent face on Fox News during her White House tenure - particularly at the end of her time when she aggressively pushed his election fraud claims
After the election, McEnany made 20 appearances on Fox News, according to a tally by The Washington Post.
She was a CNN contributor during the 2016 election before she took jobs with the Republican National Committee and then the Trump re-election campaign. She joined the White House in a staff shake up brought by then-chief of staff Mark Meadows.
Kudlow was hired in the wake of insurrection on Capitol Hill.
Kudlow, who as Trump's chief economic aide, regularly delivered upbeat assessments of the economy and the prospects of beating the pandemic, got a weekday show on Fox Business Network.
Infamously, in February 2020, he said of the pandemic: 'We have contained this. I won’t say airtight, but it’s pretty close to airtight.'
Kudlow had had his own show on CNBC until 2014, and was then a regular on the business network's other shows. It is unclear if it had approached him to return.
But many staffers from the Trump administration were having trouble finding jobs in their post-White House lives, particularly after President Trump was heavily criticized for his initial, lack luster response to the riot.
Several Trump aides described to Politico a bleak job market with virtually no chance of landing jobs in corporate America. Some even had leads disappear after the riot at the Capitol on January 6th.
A former White House official said they knew of 'people who got jobs rescinded because of Jan. 6.'
But a Republican strategist said of the former staffers: 'They are really f***ed.
The person said not even Republicans on Capitol Hill wanted anything to do with them.
More: 'The Hill scramble, one of the few places where they'd be welcomed, already happened a month or so ago… They were told over and over to take their hand off the hot stove, and they didn't want to listen.'
McEnany made her last appearance as White House press secretary on January 7th, the day after Trump supporters launched an attack on the Capitol that left five dead and interrupted the certification of Biden's victory.
She condemned the actions, saying she spoke for the entire administration in her denouncement of the violence.
'Let me be clear, the violence we saw yesterday at our nation's capital was appalling reprehensible and antithetical to the American way,' she said.
McEnany spoke for less than two-minute, reading a statement from her notebook, before fleeing the room without answering any questions.
'What we saw yesterday was a group of violent rioters undermining the legitimate first amendment rights of the many thousands who came to peacefully have their voices heard, in our nation's capital,' McEnany said.
Kayleigh McEnany posted to her private Twitter account her final updates about her work from the White House
McEnany departed the White House on Friday January 15th to return to Florida, where her husband, Sean Gilmartin, a professional baseball player, lives.
On her personal Twitter account, McEnany revealed she left notes for incoming White House press secretary Jen Psaki and other Biden administration communications staffers.
She also joined the tradition of signing the desk drawer in the press secretary's office.
Her subsequent tweets have been critical of Biden's tenure thus far and celebrating Tampa Bay going to the Super Bowl. McEnany is a Florida native.
