taken on August 06, 2020 Counselor to the President, Kellyanne
Conway, talks to reporters outside the White House, in Washington,
DC. Olivier DOULIERY / AFP
Kellyanne Conway, a long-serving advisor to
President Donald Trump known for sparring with reporters, announced
Sunday she will step down to focus on her family.
Conway, 53, has been at Trump’s side since day one, managing his
2016 campaign that catapulted the reality TV star into the world’s
most powerful office.
But the past four years of singular loyalty to Trump, including
defending him on TV and with informal “gaggles” with the press,
have taken a toll on the combative spin doctor who coined the
phrase “alternative facts.”
While she made a name for herself as one of Trump’s sharpest
defenders, her husband, prominent Washington lawyer
George Conway, is a strident critic of the president,
repeatedly and loudly questioning his mental fitness for
office.
“I will be transitioning from the White House at the end of this
month,” she said in a statement.
“George is also making changes. We disagree about plenty but we
are united on what matters most: the kids.”
Kellyanne Conway (C) speaks during a briefing on the opioid crisis
at the White House in Washington, DC. NICHOLAS KAMM /
AFP
She said their four children would be starting the new academic
year remotely.
“As millions of parents nationwide know, kids ‘doing school from
home’ requires a level of attention and vigilance that is as
unusual as these times,” she said.
“For now, and for my beloved children, it will be less drama,
more mama.”
Her announcement came a day after her 15-year-old daughter
Claudia tweeted that she was “devastated” that her mother would
speak at the Republican convention, and pledged to seek legal
emancipation “due to years of childhood trauma and abuse.”
‘Alternative facts’
Separately, George Conway said he would be stepping
back from the Lincoln Project, a group of anti-Trump Republicans he
co-founded, and taking a break from Twitter, which he frequently
used to assail the president.
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The dislike was mutual, with Trump calling him the “husband from
hell.”
Kellyanne Conway came to prominence just days after
Trump took office for coining the term “alternative facts” while
defending the debunked White House claim that the 45th president’s
inauguration crowd was larger than Obama’s.
In 2017 she referred to a non-existent terrorist attack, “the
Bowling Green massacre,” to defend Trump’s immigration ban.
During Trump’s term she was both famous and notorious for
sparring with the media, often by finding a way to change the
topic, turn the question back on the reporter, or merely
complain.
She did all of it with a flamboyant fashion sense — snake-skin
pattern dress one day, a bright red one the next — standing out in
an often-gray city.
Her work led her at one point to be depicted on the long-running
US comedy show Saturday Night Live as “Kellywise”, a spoof of the
murderous, sewer-dwelling clown from horror novel and film
“It”.
A lawyer and pollster by training, she also stuck out her White
House role while a parade of other aides was forced out, quit or
left in humiliation.
In her statement, Conway described her time at 1600
Pennsylvania Avenue as “heady” and “humbling” and said her
departure was her call.
“This is completely my choice and my voice. In time, I will
announce future plans.”
AFP
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