How Hope Hicks Ended Up in the Hush-Money Hot Seat

Former White House aide Hope Hicks ended up in an unenviable position on Friday: testifying against her ex-boss in the hush-money trial of Donald Trump.

Here’s how the former teen model turned MAGA maven wound up as a star witness in the historic case, year by year:

2014

Ivanka Trump poaches Hicks from the PR firm Hiltzik Strategies for her expanding and lifestyle brand. She did everything from publicity to modeling and quickly became a trusted aide to the future first daughter. She also impressed Donald Trump, who would later tell GQ: “I thought Hope was outstanding.”

2015

Donald Trump decides to jump into the presidential race and taps Hicks as campaign press secretary, even though she had no political experience. “I would take capable over experienced all day long,” Trump told New York magazine of the choice. “Experience is good, but capable is much more important.” She acts as gatekeeper and also takes dictation on his many tweets.

2016

Hicks becomes press secretary for the national transition team after Trump’s victory ahead of becoming White House director of strategic communications, a newly created position, as Trump fills out his administration.

2017

In her strategic role, Hicks stays out of the spotlight, but has “the most sway over who in the news media gets interviews with the president,” The New York Times reported. After Anthony Scaramucci is bounced as White House communications director after just 10 days for trashing his colleagues, Hicks is given his job and oversees a staff of dozens from an office right outside the Oval Office. This ratchets up her profile and drags her further into internal White House drama.

2018

Hicks is grilled behind closed doors for nine hours by the House Intelligence Committee, which is investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. She reportedly admits to stretching the truth for Trump but insists she did not lie about anything related to the investigation. A day later, she suddenly resigns, citing the need to spend more time with family. In a statement, Trump gushes about her: “She is as smart and thoughtful as they come, a truly great person... I am sure we will work together again in the future.”

2019

Hicks begins a big new job as executive vice president and chief communications officer of Fox, based in Los Angeles and reporting to Lachlan Murdoch. Later in the year, she appears before the House Judiciary Committee and refuses to answer questions about her tenure in the White House.

2020

After barely a year at Fox, Hicks leaves the media job to return to the White House as a senior counselor to Trump, working with his son-in-law Jared Kushner. “She didn’t find it exciting. She was bored,” a former West Wing official told Vanity Fair.

2021

Hicks exits the White House, with Bloomberg reporting that her departure was said to be pre-planned and did not have anything to do with the Capitol riots a few weeks earlier. (It later emerges that after the insurrection she sent a text saying Trump made the White House staff look like “domestic terrorists” and ended “every future opportunity that doesn't include speaking engagement at the local proud boys chapter.”)

2022

Hicks is interviewed by the Jan. 6 committee and tells them that she told Trump there was no evidence the 2020 election was stolen from him. “I wasn’t seeing evidence of fraud on a scale that would have impacted the outcome of the election. And I was becoming increasingly concerned that we were damaging his legacy,” she testified. “He said something along the lines of, you know, nobody will care about my legacy if I lose. So that won't matter. The only thing that matters is winning.”

2023

Hicks meets with Manhattan prosecutors investigating hush-money payments Trump made to porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election, and she later reportedly testifies before the grand jury that ultimately indicts him.

2024

As the hush-money trial ends its third week, Hicks takes the stand as a prosecution witness to testify against Trump. Her testimony centers on the campaign’s reaction to the release of the 2005 Access Hollywood tape in which Trump boasts about grabbing women by their genitals—which unleashed a scandal that allegedly led him to approve the payments to Stormy Daniels. Hicks, 35, breaks down in tears under cross-examination.