Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the new White House communications director, is on the front line between the press and Donald Trump. Who is Sarah Huckabee Sanders?
Catching up with my dad @GovMikeHuckabee in NYC tonight. He’s off to @KellyFileFNC and I’m headed to @donlemon! pic.twitter.com/pDcgSIQqP4
— Sarah Sanders (@SarahHuckabee) November 4, 2016
Sarah Huckabee Sanders: The Early Years
Born in 1982 to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and his wife, Janet, Huckabee Sanders was unsurprisingly exposed to politics early on as a kid stuffing envelopes and knocking on doors during her father’s campaigns.
“From the time she was just a little kid … when other elementary school kids were outside playing chase and jumping rope, she was sitting at the kitchen table listening to Dick Morris do poll results and analyzing cross-tabs,” her father told Yahoo News earlier this year.
Huckabee Sanders is the youngest of three and according to her brother David, “the chosen one.” Her father, a former pastor, told Yahoo he basically agrees.
“She is the only girl, and the youngest, and unquestionably spoiled,” he said.
Huckabee Sanders attended her father’s alma mater Ouachita Baptist University in Arkansas and graduated in 2004.
.@GovMikeHuckabee and @JanetHuckabee at #CNNDebate #ReaganLibrary #ImWithHuck pic.twitter.com/eI61tjkzJz
— Sarah Sanders (@SarahHuckabee) September 16, 2015
Sarah Huckabee Sanders: Road to the White House
Instead of heading to law school, Huckabee Sanders dove into politics. She worked on President George W. Bush’s reelection campaign in 2004 and was one of the top advisers for her father’s 2008 White House bid.
“I just think she’s going to grow up to be a big player in politics,” said Ed Rollins, who was Huckabee’s 2008 campaign chairman, Yahoo News reported. “I would not be shocked if she ended up going back and running for something someday.”
Not quite there yet, Huckabee Sanders move to DC and took a job in the Department of Education under the Bush administration, according to a 2007 Time profile.
Huckabee Sanders managed Arkansas Republican John Boozman’s successful run for the Senate in 2010. She served as senior adviser to former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton.
Huckabee Sanders worked on her father’s 2016 campaign, but joined Team Trump after Huckabee dropped out of the race. Sanders worked as a senior advisor on Trump’s campaign.
In Trump’s first summer as POTUS, Huckabee Sanders replaced Sean Spicer as White House press secretary.
“I especially enjoy watching her hold her own and having such confidence. I mean she goes into that press room, like, wearing Lady Gaga’s meat suit and walking over to the zoo in the tiger cage,” her proud papa said. “But she handles herself, I think, very well.”
Incredible night! #MAGA #PresidentTrump pic.twitter.com/HUX1DZAhMh
— Sarah Sanders (@SarahHuckabee) November 9, 2016
Sarah Huckabee Sanders: Wife and Mother
Huckabee Sanders met her husband on the campaign trail during her father’s 2008 campaign. According to Heavy, she hired Bryan Sanders and the two continued to date and eventually married when the campaign ended. The couple has three young children.
Sanders, previously a media consultant, worked on his father’s-in-law failed 2016 bid for the Oval Office. Sanders and his wife co-founded a political consulting firm, Second Street Strategies in Little Rock, Arkansas.
As of the summer, Sanders is a Republican campaign consultant with The Wickers Group, a “full-service political consulting firm specializing in strategic communication, surveys, media production,” according to the group’s website.
So proud of my amazing wife @SarahHuckabee who starts her new job as Principal Deputy White House Press Secretary today pic.twitter.com/kYcTCyUllt
— Bryan Sanders (@sanders_bryan) January 20, 2017
Happy birthday @GovMikeHuckabee the best dad and papa we could ever ask for! We love you! pic.twitter.com/7NEh758GjV
— Sarah Sanders (@SarahHuckabee) August 25, 2015
