The state of Arkansas has elected Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a White House press secretary in the Trump administration, as its first female governor. Sanders defeated Democrat Chris Jones for the strongly conservative seat.

Sanders has long been involved in Republican politics in Arkansas, working on her father Mike Huckabee’s campaigns while he was the state’s governor from 1996 to 2007.

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She worked as the administration’s spokesperson and one of the former president’s closest advisers for nearly two years in the Trump White House.

Sanders will replace Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R), who has held the position since 2015 but was unable to seek reelection due to term limits.

Who is Sarah Huckabee Sanders?

Sarah Elizabeth Huckabee Sanders, the incoming governor of Arkansas, was born in the United States on August 13, 1982,  in Hope, Arkansas.

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She served as the White House’s 31st press secretary from 2017 to 2019 under President Donald Trump. She was the third woman to hold that post.

Prior to joining Trump’s 2016 campaign, Sanders worked on the electoral campaigns of her father, Mike Huckabee, a former governor of Arkansas and presidential candidate. After working for Trump, Sanders ran as the Republican candidate for governor of Arkansas in 2022 and won.

She was the press secretary for the Trump administration’s policy decisions, and she had a combative relationship with the White House Press Corps. She acknowledged making false statements in her job when questioned by investigators as part of the Mueller investigation. Compared to the 13 prior White House press secretaries, Sanders held fewer press conferences.

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Trump announced that Sanders would be quitting her position as press secretary in a tweet in June 2019. On January 25, 2021, she declared her candidacy for governor of Arkansas with Trump’s support. The Democratic candidate Chris Jones and the Libertarian candidate Ricky Dale Harrington were her opponents in the November 2022 election after she won the Republican nomination in May 2022. She is the first woman to occupy the position.

Huckabee attended Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas, after completing his education at Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. She participated in Republican organisations and was chosen president of the university’s student government. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the university in 2004 with a major in political science and a minor in mass communication.

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During the 2008 presidential campaign of her father, Huckabee got to know Bryan Sanders. Sanders was employed as a media consultant, and she served as the campaign’s field director. They got married in 2010. One daughter and two sons make up their family of three.

The Red Hen restaurant issue started on June 22, 2018, when a co-owner of a 26-seat restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, 200 miles (320 km) from Washington, D.C., asked Sanders to leave the establishment because Sanders worked for the Trump administration.

In September 2022, Sanders received a papillary thyroid carcinoma diagnosis. Her thyroid and the surrounding lymph nodes were surgically removed.