Before her departure this week, Omarosa Manigault Newman, along with Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, stood as the only black voices among more than 30 Cabinet secretaries and senior White House staff around President Donald Trump.
The announcement Wednesday that Newman, a former "Apprentice" contestant and aide to the president, was leaving her post has brought with it new questions about diversity — or lack of it — in the Trump White House.
Asked by NBC News on Thursday how many black senior staffers remained at the White House in the wake of Newman's departure, Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders declined to cite a number or specify who would take over Newman's outreach to African-American communities.
In a Thursday interview with ABC, Newman referred to herself as "the only African American woman in this White House," adding that she had "quite a story to tell" in the future about her time in an administration that has struggled with racial issues and outreach to minority communities.
