Monica Crowley, a conservative radio host and Fox News analyst, has been tapped by the Trump administration as the senior director of strategic communications for the National Security Council, the Trump transition team announced Thursday.
“I am deeply honored, humbled and grateful to be asked by the President-elect to join the extraordinary national security team he is assembling,” said Crowley in a statement. “With vision, courage and moral clarity, he is committed fully to re-establishing America's singular place in the world. He is also committed to selecting the best people for the jobs of keeping the American people safe and the country secure. It will be a great privilege to serve with them.”
Crowley’s selection was first reported by The Daily Beast.
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Crowley, a self-described “happy warrior,” a loyal Trump supporter and advocate, had also been floated as a possible pick for White House press secretary.
Her career in foreign policy began as a foreign policy assistant to former President Richard Nixon, according to her Fox News bio. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and holds a Ph.D. in international affairs from Columbia University.
She will succeed Ben Rhodes, who currently serves as the U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications. Rhodes was one of Obama’s the most influential staff members and had a critical hand in shaping the administration’s global security policies and then selling those policies to the world.
Crowley has been a vocal critic of the Obama administration and Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy positions, particularly their avoidance of the term “radical Islamic terrorism.”
She has also made particularly incendiary comments about Muslims—including Hillary Clinton’s top aide Huma Abedin.
In an August appearance on Hannity in August 2016, Crowley said her Abedin parents were “essentially tools of the Saudi regime” in an effort for Muslims to take over the West.
In November 2015, she wrote in The Washington Times only a fraction of the refugees pouring into Europe from Syria were fleeing “war and persecution.” Most, she wrote, were from “Middle East, North Africa and countries like Pakistan and Indonesia who are using the European Union’s open doors-open borders policy to reach the West for social welfare and the longer-term goal of spreading Islam.”
The Trump campaign also announced the appointment of retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg as chief of staff and executive secretary of the National Security Council.
Kellogg and Crowley will serve under National Security Advisor, retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, and with fellow former Fox News analyst KT McFarland who was named as a part of Trump’s national security team last month.
The story has been updated.
