White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany debuted a new role this week when she appeared on Fox News shows as an adviser to the Trump Campaign, rather than in her typical role as press secretary.
The Trump campaign frequently puts its advisers on television, as does the White House, but Tuesday was the first occasion when McEnany appeared in a campaign role since she joined the White House.
Deputy White House press secretary Sarah Matthews said that McEnany “was appearing in her personal capacity as a private citizen,” per The Hill.
McEnany is reportedly an unpaid volunteer on the Trump Campaign. During a Tuesday interview on Fox’s America’s Newsroom, McEnany was introduced as “Trump 2020 senior advisor and White House press secretary.” Her title was listed as “Trump 2020 Senior Advisor.”
During the interview, McEnany slammed Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s debate performance, saying that “[Biden] looked at the cameras, looked the American public in the eye, and the voters of Pennsylvania and said ‘I will wreck your economy for generation. That is what he was saying when he vowed to ban oil, when he vowed to ban fracking.”
Biden has not “vowed to ban oil,” instead he called for a transition away from oil and after the debate he told reporters that would not ban fossil fuels.
The former Vice President has flip-flopped on fracking and his plan calls for no new fracking projects but does not call for a ban on fracking.
McEnany is not the White House staffer to go after the president’s political opponents on television, though if she had made those remarks while in her capacity as a White House employee, there’s a chance that she might have run afoul of the Hatch Act.
The Hatch Act is a law that bars federal employees from using their role support or attack political candidates. The Office of the Special Counsel recommended that former Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway be fired in 2018 after they said she broke the Hatch Act multiple times by attacking and supporting politicians during interviews.
