Alternative Facts, Fake Massacres and Threats to Reporters: Kellyanne Conway’s Most Infamous Exchanges With the Media

Kellyanne Conway announced on Sunday that she’s leaving the White House at the end of the month. That means the Trump administration is about to lose one of its longest serving and most recognizable faces. President Donald Trump will also be losing one of his most combative antagonists of the press.

The White House special counselor and former Trump campaign manager confirmed she would step down from her position at the end of the month, in order to focus on her family. Conway’s announcement came as her husband, conservative lawyer and prominent Trump critic George Conway, announced he would also back away from Twitter and the Lincoln Project to deal with family matters. The couple’s teenaged daughter has earned viral attention as a fierce critic of the president — as well as her parents.

Conway rose to fame by serving as Trump’s final campaign manager in the 2016 election, and she has retained her national profile with constant appearances in the press from her perch at the White House. Conway was well known for her fierce — and often fact-free — defenses of Trump and sharp attacks against his enemies, and many of those moments have gained notoriety.

Here are just 7 of Conway’s most memorable moments between herself and the media.

1. “Alternative Facts”

Conway coined the infamous phrase “alternative facts” during a Meet The Press interview where she was asked about former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer and his demonstrably false claim Trump had the largest inauguration audience ever. Chuck Todd repeatedly grilled Conway over the administration blowing up its own credibility, which eventually resulted in her saying this:

You’re saying it’s a falsehood, and our press secretary, Sean Spicer, gave alternative facts to that.

Todd was taken aback by that retort, and “alternative facts” became a common phrase used by Trump critics to bash the administration whenever it is suspected of pushing false or dishonest information.

2. Bowling Green Massacre

You might have forgotten this one, but it’s wild: Conway once invented an imaginary terror attack to justify Trump’s attempts to ban Muslims from entering the United States. Speaking to MSNBC’s Chris Matthews at the time, Conway claimed the Barack Obama administration set a precedent for Trump by banning Iraqis after two refugees entered the country, became radicalized, and supposedly went on a killing spree:

I bet it’s brand new information to people that President Obama had a 6-month ban on the Iraqi refugee program after two Iraqis came here to this country, were radicalized and they were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green Massacre.

Slight problem: those 2 Iraqis Conway mentioned were arrested on terror-related charges, but the “Bowling Green Massacre” never happened. Conway admitted her remarks were incorrect, but she has also complained about the media for covering it.

3. Hatch Act Alert

There have been instances where Conway’s punditry on behalf of Trump led her into legally-problematic territory. Beyond the ethics rule violations of instances like Conway using an interview to tell people to buy Ivanka Trump’s merchandise, she also spent much of the Trump administration being dogged by accusations of violating the Hatch Act.

The act forbids employees of the executive branch from engaging in partisan activity in their official capacity to influence the result of an election. The United States Office of Special Counsel (OSC) accused Conway of violating the act twice by going on TV, attacking Doug Jones, and effectively endorsing accused sex abuser Roy Moore during their senate race.

Conway responded to this charge by sneering at the accusations against her, railing against those attempting to hold her accountable for it, and claiming her First Amendment rights were being suppressed.

4. “What’s Your Ethnicity?”

One of the most outrageous moments of Trump’s presidency came when he told progressive Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Ayanna Presley and Ilhan Omar (all American citizens of color) to “go back” to “the crime infested places from which they came”. White House reporter Andrew Feinberg pressed Conway for an explanation of Trump’s comments, which Conway countered with a stunning question: “What’s your ethnicity?”

This led to a skirmish as Feinberg told Conway his ethnicity was irrelevant to the question at hand, and she eventually grumbled that “a lot of us are sick and tired of this country, of America coming last to people who swore an oath of office.”

5. A House Divided

Mrs. Conway is one of Trump’s most high-profile supporters, while her husband has become one of her boss’s best-known critics. The dynamic between George and Kellyanne Conway has been one of the messiest recurring stories of the Trump presidency, and it led to many public moments of friction between the two, Trump attacking his adviser’s spouse, and ultimately both Conways quitting their jobs.

One of the messiest episodes of the whole drama: When Conway tried to go off-the-record in an interview with the Washington Post to anonymously trash her husband for his tweets criticizing Trump.

From the Post, as told by reporter Ben Terris:

Ben Terris: You told me you found [George’s tweets] disrespectful.

Conway: It is disrespectful, it’s a violation of basic decency, certainly, if not marital vows . . . as “a person familiar with their relationship.”

Terris: No, we’re on the record here. You can’t say after the fact “as someone familiar.”

Conway: I told you everything about his tweets was off the record.

Terris: No, that’s not true. That never happened.

Conway: Well, people do see it this way. People do see it that way, I don’t say I do, but people see it that way.

Terris: But I’m saying we never discussed everything about his tweets being off the record. There are certain things you said that I put off the record.

Conway: Fine. I’ve never actually said what I think about it and I won’t say what I think about it, which tells you what I think about it.

6. Threatening a Reporter

In 2019, Conway had a long and angry phone call with Washington Examiner journalist Caitlin Yilek for publishing an article about her that made reference to her husband’s tweets. The conversation was never declared off the record, and as Yilek defended her piece during the call, Conway insulted the reporter, became increasingly hostile, and eventually made this threat to investigate the Yilek’s personal life.

So, listen, if you’re going to cover my personal life, if you’re going to cover my personal life, then we’re welcome to do the same around here. If it has nothing to do with my job, which it doesn’t, that’s obvious, then we’re either going to expect you to cover everybody’s personal life or we’re going to start covering them over here.

When asked about the blow-up afterwards, Conway accused Yilek of getting her “15 minutes of fame,” lashed out reporters, and rejected the idea that her comments were threatening.

7. “Kung Flu”

When the coronavirus pandemic was catching fire back in March, CBS News correspondent Weijia Jiang said that an unnamed White House official referred to the disease as “the kung-flu” to her. The term has been condemned as an anti-Asian slur, and when Conway was asked about the incident the next day, she called it “highly offensive” but demanded Jiang name the person who said it.

“Weija, who was it? Tell us,” Conway repeatedly asked the reporter, noting she is “married to an Asian.” The White House adviser seemed to doubt the reporter’s claim.

Months later, as Trump held a campaign rally in Tulsa, he used the slur himself by telling the crowd “it’s a disease without question that has more names than any disease in history. I can name Kung flu. I can name 19 different versions of names.” Trump has used the term repeatedly ever since.

Reporters asked Conway about Trump taking the term for himself, and she responded by diverting the conversation toward China, defending Trump’s use of the slur, and attacking Jiang by telling her “you lost your opportunity, you lacked the courage to tell everybody who said that to you.”