Karoline Leavitt’s surprise resignation as White House press secretary, announced August 12, 2026, does not take the 29-year-old out of President Donald Trump’s orbit. She left the briefing room podium for the last time on Friday, August 28, and is headed back to MAGA Inc. That super PAC is sitting on a war chest of roughly $400 million, the quiet engine of Trump’s hold over the Republican Party, and the size of the hoard has Washington operatives asking why a president barred from running again needs that much money.
A mother of two, Leavitt shares her two-year-old son, Niko, and her daughter, Viviana, three months, with her husband, real estate developer Nicholas Riccio, 60. In a post on X after the announcement, she laid out her reasoning: “The truth is since returning to the White House after the birth of my daughter, I have felt in my heart that I cannot be the best mom my two young children deserve while devoting the constant time, energy, and attention required of the White House Press Secretary — and that is why I have ultimately made the bittersweet decision to depart the White House and embark on a new chapter in my life.” Trump said her exit was “a decision I totally understand and respect.” Family is not the whole of it, though: she is also positioning herself to help plan the president’s future.
Her precise duties at the super PAC have not been disclosed. A spokeswoman for the group in 2023, she left it to join Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign; the operation she is rejoining is far bigger and richer than the one she departed, and dark-money groups affiliated with it now form a tangle that makes the money hard to trace.
“You guys will still see me all the time,” Leavitt told reporters on Friday, August 21. She is expected to return to MAGA Inc. in September for the Republican midterm convention.
On her final day, Leavitt stopped to speak with reporters on the White House lawn before leaving 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for the last time. She had on a slim-fit navy knee-length dress with white pumps and gold jewelry. Fashion expert Dawn Del Russo told The Sun they were “shocked” she chose something low-key on such an important day.
The $400 Million Question
Filings by February put MAGA Inc.’s haul since Trump’s 2024 victory at $305 million — about five times what any previous president had collected in the year after winning. Yet the group has barely dipped into the roughly $400 million it amassed heading into the midterms, and Republicans in competitive races are still waiting for the checkbook to open.
One of the cycle’s biggest interventions came in the August 25 South Carolina run-off, where the PAC put more than $800,000 behind Trump-endorsed candidate Darline Graham, sister of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham.
Its donor roster amounts to a directory of industries with billions riding on administration policy. Topping it is Foris Dax, the parent company of crypto.com, which has given about $35 million. Pipeline billionaire Kelcy Warren of Texas also appears, as does billionaire TikTok investor Jeff Yass. So do OpenAI power couple Greg and Anna Brockman, plus crypto twins Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, whom Trump has described as “male models with a big, beautiful brain.”
James Blair, the group’s current chief and a former White House political director, will be among Leavitt’s new colleagues, along with veteran Trump strategist Chris LaCivita and pollster Tony Fabrizio. The fundraising machine was Trump’s own creation, and he says the money answers to him. The possibility insiders whisper about is that November has little to do with the stockpile at all — that a Constitution-defying bid for a third term is what the president is quietly preparing, something he continues to raise as a joke.
An Empty Podium With No Front-Runner
A successor to Leavitt had not been settled on by the White House as of August 26 — nor even a leading candidate. One reason for the holdup, a White House official told The Independent, was how suddenly she resigned, since Trump was reportedly caught off-guard when she quit. Scott Jennings, 48, CNN’s resident conservative, is among the names floated, and since the job came open he has held quiet meetings with Susie Wiles, Trump’s chief of staff. Sources say he is unlikely to be the final pick; parts of the MAGA movement loathe Jennings because he initially faulted Trump for the deadly January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
Alina Habba, 41, Trump’s former personal lawyer and failed U.S. attorney pick, pushed back on rumors she was in line for the job in a post on X. Also mentioned as possibilities are Katie Miller, wife of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller; chief of protocol Monica Crowley, a onetime conservative pundit; Jason Miller, once a spokesman for Trump’s campaign; and Leavitt’s deputy, Anna Kelly. Senior administration officials are expected to rotate through the briefing room until a choice is made, the arrangement used during Leavitt’s 11-week maternity leave.
From Intern to Youngest Press Secretary
Leavitt’s start in Trump’s first term was an internship in the White House Office of Presidential Correspondence, and by January 2021 she was an assistant press secretary. In 2022 she won the Republican primary in New Hampshire’s first congressional district, then lost to incumbent Democrat Chris Pappas. She took the podium job at 27, when Trump was inaugurated in January 2025, making her the youngest person ever to serve as White House press secretary, and combative exchanges with reporters became her reputation.
Her duties were set aside in late April 2026. Viviana was born in early May, and mid-July brought her first formal briefing back at the podium. While she was out, Trump called repeatedly to ask when she would come back — reportedly one factor in her decision to leave. Weeks before the announcement came an appearance on the Fox News show hosted by Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump, where she discussed juggling work and motherhood and credited the president with supporting working parents.
“Karoline has been one of the best White House Press Secretaries in the History of the Office,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, adding that she would remain among his top outside advisers as Republicans fight for the midterms. On a replacement he has stayed publicly silent, aside from sharing an artificial intelligence-generated post casting himself as the best choice for the job.
The president thanked her directly in a White House speech on Monday, August 24, streamed on Fox News. “And our press secretary, mother-of-two, and well, she decided she loved her children more than she loved Donald Trump,” he said. He went on to say he was “very upset” about her departure, adding: “She has to go home and spend time with her children. That does happen on occasion with some people when they love their children, and she does.”
The White House issued a statement marking her departure, saying she “truly set a new standard for the White House Press Secretary” and that she “fought for the facts, defended the America First agenda, and never, ever surrendered.”
Her exit closes out a year of churn. Firings since the start of 2026 have claimed former Attorney General Pam Bondi and former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, while scrutiny of their leadership preceded the resignations of former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer and acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement head Todd Lyon. A conspiracy theory was meanwhile pushed by the Iranian Embassy, claiming she quit over an Air Force One decoy-plane betrayal, though she was unlikely to have been aboard.
