Donald Trump’s original plan was to add Fox News’ Monica Crowley to his National Security Council as the NSC’s senior director of strategic communications. She was a poor choice, not just because of her professional background in this area, but also because Crowley was soon after confronted with a serious plagiarism controversy.
Crowley nevertheless remained in the White House’s orbit, and a few months ago, she joined Team Trump with a job at the Treasury Department. Yesterday, she received a promotion.
President Trump announced Tuesday that he plans to appoint former Fox News contributor Monica Crowley to be the next spokeswoman for the Treasury Department.
Crowley, who currently serves as the department’s senior adviser for public affairs, will serve as an assistant Treasury secretary for public affairs, according to the release.
It’s unusual to see someone derailed by a plagiarism scandal return so quickly to positions of governmental prominence.
But I’m also struck by the unnerving frequency with which Fox News alum receive plum assignments in the Trump administration. Indeed, the Crowley news comes just a few months after Morgan Ortagus, a former Fox News contributor, became the State Department’s new spokesperson — replacing Heather Nauert, a former Fox News anchor.
Two months before that, Lea Gabrielle, a former Fox News reporter, was hired to help lead the State Department’s Global Engagement Center.
And circling back to our earlier coverage, each of these Fox News veterans found plenty of other folks on Team Trump who’ve made the transition from the president’s television screen to his administration’s staff.
Not long after Nauert joined Team Trump, for example, the president turned to former Fox News executive Bill Shine to help oversee the White House’s communications office. A few months earlier, Trump tapped Fox News’ John Bolton to serve as White House national security advisor – in part because the president thought he was “good on television.”
Around the same time, the president chose Joe diGenova and his wife, Victoria Toensing, to serve on his legal defense team. Both crossed the White House’s radar because they were – let’s all say it together – Fox News personalities. (Their role on the legal defense team was short lived.)
As regular readers may recall, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) told Rachel on the show last year, “I’m concerned the president’s world is confined now to watching Fox News… Aside from his insular existence in the Oval Office, Fox is his whole world.”
Well, not his whole world: Trump hired television host Larry Kudlow to be the head of the White House National Economic Council – and Kudlow worked for CNBC.









