Photography by Jeff Elkins
The national media spotlight shone hard on Katie Walsh when she left her powerful job as White House deputy chief of staff, two months into the Trump administration. Weary of the speculation, she insists that leaving was her idea: She wanted to work with America First Policies, an outside political group, to push for the president’s healthcare reforms. Walsh was already famous in the Beltway for her work as chief of staff for the Republican National Committee (a job Sean Spicer tried for but she nailed)—and some say her efforts won Trump the White House. Her mentor at the RNC was Reince Priebus, and her predecessor was Mike Shields—to whom she recently became engaged.
He proposed in a cabinet room at 10 Downing Street? Do you guys really love politics that much?
Mike’s half British, and he grew up over there. One of our first pictures as a couple was in front of 10 Downing Street, three years ago. So we were in London, and he asked if I wanted to go to a New Year’s Eve party at 10 Downing Street. I said yes—but the whole thing was a hoax. They showed us into the cabinet room—they were all in on it—and he went down on one knee.
It’s been said that you viewed Trump with skepticism through most of his campaign.
As chief of staff, I am paid to be neutral through the whole process. Some people will say, “Well, she was not an early supporter.” Correct. I was paid not to be an early supporter. It was an outsider campaign; it’s easy for those folks to shoot at the RNC.
Meanwhile, it’s said that you helped build the voter ID and mobilization infrastructure that made it possible for Trump to win.
I’d like to also credit Mike with it. He was chief of staff at the RNC for the 2014 cycle, after the 2012 loss. Reince Priebus brought him in as a change agent. He could ask some really hard questions about the party and push people and say, “We have gotten the game wrong, and the Democrats have revolutionized how they use data and how it drives get-out-the-vote efforts.”
What had to change?
We could no longer assume that if we just knocked on the doors of known Republicans 72 hours out, we would win. We had to know these voters. What do they engage with you online about? What are other things they do in their lives that tell you what they care about? What’s their consumer profile, what do they buy? And we had to figure out how to communicate with that person. Does that person prefer email or a phone call or do better if you knock on their door?
So the party bought data and built a digital infrastructure…
And once we had a nominee, I almost had a campaign waiting for him. I had an army of people already trained and a huge database that told me everything I could possibly know about every possible voter. I was able to communicate his message down to a grassroots level the party had never seen.
So you sat down with Donald Trump and—
We worked hand in glove. It was the Trump campaign’s call what the message was, but we could then say, “We have voters here that are inclined to vote for you if you double down on this part of your message.” We could do that by geography, by ethnic background, by age, by sex, by economic background. “You are underperforming with, say, married women in southern Florida, but these women care about X, so let’s go down there and give a campaign speech about X.” Suburban Pennsylvania was a great example of a place where, outside Philadelphia, we were not getting single women. So we sent a direct mail piece that talked about Ivanka’s paid-leave initiative.
To the rest of us, the first 100 days looked like a lot of palace intrigue. What was really happening?
This administration was a little different than most in that the people hadn’t been working together necessarily for two years…so they were still getting to know each other. The other thing that is unique, that the national media could not wrap their heads around, is that the voters elected Trump. Instead of doing some real reflection on how they, the media, got this so wrong, they just wanted to talk about silly palace intrigue stuff. Every time a national reporter would come to me and want to talk about Jared [Kushner] and Reince, or [Steve] Bannon and Reince, I’d say, “Do you really think a family in Toledo cares that Jared and Reince went at it in the Oval Office? No. They care that the president is going to lower taxes and repeal Obamacare." I think the palace intrigue stuff gained so much momentum because it was an escape and an excuse.
You told Breitbart News, “The schedule is never a sexy thing to talk about, but at the end of the day the most valuable time we have is the president’s time.” Did people suck up to you to get on his schedule? What’s the most effective way to do that?
The schedule’s always an interesting balance between how does the president just by nature like to spend his time and what are we doing to further the promises made during the campaign. The two arguments people came to the table with were, “The president would love to do this” or “This was a promise made to the American people that I know he’s committed to doing.” At the end of the day, the president’s in charge of his schedule; he was always going to make the final decision. But if I didn’t think he was going to enjoy doing something or there wasn’t a tie to something he was committed to doing...
What does the president hate to do?
I’m not going to comment on that!
Do you think the country’s as divided as many people say?
I do. There are divisions in what people really think the country should look like and what the role of government should be. I don’t think it’s systemic. I think it’s solvable—maybe not short-term, but long-term. If we continue to grow the economy. Everything is better when the economy is better. If we get tax reform and deregulation and infrastructure, these are all things that will help provide jobs, and then people become more willing to work together. When you have people with a lot of frustration and anger in them, it’s hard to bring people together. You’ve got to get to a situation where people don’t feel so angry.
Is the anger only economic, or are racial issues entwined?
One of the stats that really hit me, from the last election, was that most people don’t have $400 cash for an emergency. That creates a real fear in people. And out of that fear, some ugly things can happen. But if you make people feel more secure in their ability to take care of themselves, a lot of these other conversations get easier.
Is the media the enemy?
I don’t want to go as far as to say the media is the enemy. The media has created challenges for itself that make it difficult for both parties right now. The media’s inability to do self-reflection and admit that they got something so wrong and make actual structural changes is a real problem for people like myself in the Administration. You guys were basically pointing and laughing at us before the election, that we were going to lose, and we won, and there’s been no owning up, and now you spend every day telling us that we are wrong. The media’s outrage that we don’t get more upset at their accusations—well, the last time, you were wrong! The media plays a very important role in a successful democracy. But the breakdown of the relationship between the elected officials and the media is not helpful. I think we have gotten to a place where they feel like the enemy. But I think it’s possible to reverse that.
How would you begin?
I’d make every single one of my reporters spend more time outside D.C. than in D.C. And then I think they’d ask different questions.
Who are the unsung powers in the new administration?
Andrew Bremberg, head of the domestic policy council. Every piece of domestic legislation that goes through the White House, Andrew is responsible for. He is brilliant. But he works really hard and keeps his head down. Policy folks don’t get a ton of attention. That goes back to our conversation earlier. If the media were really honest about what’s going on in the White House, Andrew should be in every article.
Interesting. Who else?
Joe Hagin. He was deputy chief of operations under Bush 41 and Bush 43. He came up to New York to talk to me, and I had a four-hour session with him briefing me on all the logistical and operational procedures, and I left that meeting and told Reince, “We’ve got to hire this guy. He’s got to come back.” Things work in that White House because of Joe Hagin.
You went to the Academy of the Visitation. Has anything you learned there been particularly helpful?
Viz was probably the most influential institution of my whole life. If you were in a class and you weren’t challenged, or you were falling behind, Viz was good at pulling you out and either challenging you more or getting you more secure on that topic. Viz was never afraid of identifying strengths and weaknesses. Watching them do that on a daily basis, acknowledging problems and fixing them…
What are you responsible for in your new job?
My No. 1 priority every day is to make sure that the policies the president got elected on are represented fairly and accurately to the voters. This Obamacare argument is really interesting to me. Repealing and replacing Obamacare is something that every single Republican in Congress and the president ran on and won. And now we have control of the House, control of the Senate, and the White House, and all of a sudden there is a false narrative that Republicans are wishy-washy on repeal and replace. That’s because of the professional left—Emily’s List, left-leaning organizations that have a lot of money to throw campaigns together, and policy arguments together, that are used to scare voters into thinking that something they fundamentally want, they shouldn’t want. There’s been a large campaign waged by the left that people with preexisting conditions would lose coverage, which is fundamentally false. There’s a large effort to scare seniors specifically into thinking they will lose their health care. Unless there’s a counter-argument, that narrative can take over and hurt Congress’s ability to do what they came to do. My main job is to make sure that we are communicating what the policies are.
Your departure was billed as a shot across the bow at Reince Priebus.
Absolutely it was. The Trump administration will always have critics: “Oh, look, Katie’s leaving; something must be wrong.” I pushed back pretty hard on that. I pulled reporters in with me, Jared, Bannon, and Reince, and they said, “Look, we all need Katie to go do this.” Now I’m on the outside, and I actually can’t take direction from the White House, and I’ve got a lot of money at my disposal—if they didn’t trust me to give me that podium, it wouldn’t have happened. But anyone leaving was going to be viewed as “Who’s losing power?”
Did you lobby for this job?
When we first polled healthcare off the floor, I said, “Look, I’m obviously privileged to work here, and I love the president, but running the schedule isn’t my skillset.” My skillset is more political—I like running campaigns and solving problems. Jared had seen me do that so successfully during the campaign that he called me one of its unsung heroes. This was an opportunity for me to use my strengths—and get a little bit of work-life balance back that I hadn’t had in two and a half years.
What’s your take on Kellyanne Conway?
I don’t think there are many people better at communicating the president’s message. The Republican base loves hearing from her. And she does, in a really unique way, break down complicated and sometimes confusing media narratives into digestible pieces of information the public can understand. She’s incredibly good at staying on message.
And Steve Bannon?
Oh, I’m a fan. I think Steve understands the Trump movement in this country better than anyone but the president. There are a lot of people in this country that feel left behind, and he really understands that.
How do you think people perceive you?
As kind of a no-nonsense individual. I don’t like beating around the bush or wasting time. I tend to think that being direct and being real is an asset.
Yet it does sometimes get people in trouble.
It does. But people always know where I stand. People always say, “Katie’s definitely not conflict-averse,” and I think there’s a negative connotation—but conflict, if dealt with the right way, leads to a solution. To resolve a conflict, you need to be honest. And just because you disagree doesn’t mean either of you are right or wrong.
Despite all that conflict, you’re said to have a calming voice and demeanor—did you cultivate that quality for your job or were you born with it?
By nature, I’m not predisposed to panicking. I just don’t think it solves any problems. I can get worked up when I’m trying to think through an issue, but when a crisis is unfolding, I tend to be pretty steady-Eddie. You already have chaos; adding undue emotion doesn’t help.
When Kushner complained that the RNC wasn’t giving enough money to his father-in-law, word is, you pushed back.
Oh, that was really overblown. Jared’s a really smart guy, and he had just never gone through this process before, to understand how a federally regulated party works.
Would you ever want to be president?
No. I like solving problems and forcing conversations, and as a principal, to build consensus, you have to have not so much of that in you.
Yet look at the current president.
Trump did. But—it’s a hard life. And I value my privacy, maybe a little too much.
