President-elect, Joe Biden, announced a set of appointments to the White House contact team within his next administration, after taking office on January 20, to occupy all high-profile media positions in the team, for the first time in the history of the United States.
President Barack Obama’s State Department spokeswoman, Jane Sackey, has been appointed as the White House spokesperson, while Biden has appointed his election campaign spokeswoman, Kate Bedingfield, as director of communications.
The chief advisor to the President-elect’s campaign, Simon Sanders, will become the spokeswoman for the Vice President, Kamala Harris.
The former Biden spokesperson, Elizabeth Alexander, when he took over as Obama’s vice president, will manage Harris’ communications.
“I am proud to announce today that the White House contact team is made up entirely of women, ” Biden said in a statement on his transition team’s website .
The Biden-Harris campaign advisers, Karen John Pierre and Ashley Etienne, respectively, will also hold the positions of deputy White House spokesperson and deputy director of communications for the vice president.
As for Billy Tobar, the former media director for the leader of the Democratic minority in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, she was appointed deputy director of communications, and she is of Hispanic background.
The transition team stated in a tweet that it was the first time that an entire women’s team had filled such senior media roles.
President-elect Biden and Vice President-elect Harris today announced new members of the White House staff who will serve in senior communications roles.
For the first time in history, these communications roles will be filled entirely by women.https://t.co/SjWAWJg941
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) November 29, 2020
Saki said on Twitter that the contact group “is the most diverse group in history, and includes 6 mothers of young children.”
This is a team of some of the most talented, battle-tested communicators out there @KBeds, @K_JeanPierre, @SymoneDSanders, @AshleyEtienne09 @EAlexander, @pilitobar87—who are also all women, most diverse team in history and also 6 Moms of young kids
— Jen Psaki (@jrpsaki) November 29, 2020