Jessica Reed Kraus, RFK Jr. Fanblogger, Claims to be “Official” Press. The White House Differs.

The recent shenanigans of Jessica Reed Kraus, better known by her Instagram handle @houseinhabit and her reputation as a die-hard Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fangirl-turned-MAGA faithful, provide a case study of just how screwed the Fourth Estate is under the second Donald Trump presidency.

Kraus recently took big swings inside her own corner of the World Wide MAGA Web, first lashing out at fellow conservative voices Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson, in a sort of extended social media fit that she followed up by releasing personal information and court documents about her own friends and former employees. Since then, Kraus has set her 1.3 million-follower Instagram account to private for more than a week (she has since changed the settings back to public), published the majority of her $8/month newsletter behind a paywall, returned to public view, and announced that she had obtained a White House press pass.

On the last part, though, that’s only part true.

A White House official told Vanity Fair that there are currently 1,430 active hard passes, or permanent press passes with wide-ranging come-and-go access to the White House. Kraus, despite crowing in a social media caption about her “first official week inducted into White House press” and marveling at “what a ride it’s going to be,” was actually in the building on a single-day press pass. As she ponders to followers whether she should shell out for an apartment in DC for her Very Important New Role, the White House clarifies that the pass she’s clutching is for those who do not regularly cover the White House on a full-time basis.

Contacted by Vanity Fair, Kraus did not answer whether she was in the building on temporary or permanent press credentials, nor whether her credential is tied to her Substack newsletter. She also did not answer whether she considers herself to be a journalist or member of the press.

“My inclusion in the White House press circuit is part of the new media embrace Trump’s administration is ushering in,” she wrote in an email. “It is a great honor for any independent outlet or writer.”

On Wednesday, on her Instagram Story, she wrote, “I show up wherever I’m invited. That’s always been my motto—how all reporters should operate.”

The Trump administration has been consistently dismantling the free press, one norm at a time, ensuring hand-picked voices lobbing softballs are handed a megaphone, all the while touting itself as the most transparent presidency of all time.

Karoline Leavitt, the youngest press secretary in White House history, is making good on her promise to push what she called “left-wing stenographers” out of the White House press room. You know, like the Associated Press. Those hacks can’t call the Gulf of Mexico by a made-up name, so on February 11, out went the globally respected wire service. (On Tuesday evening, a Trump-appointed U.S. District Court judge ruled that it is a First Amendment violation to bar the AP from government events, and gave the White House a week to reinstate the wire service or appeal. Shortly after the ruling, an AP reporter and photographer were blocked from joining a pool covering a Trump motorcade.) Leavitt has announced that instead of the White House Correspondents Association managing the press pool rotation that accompanies the president to engagements, now the White House will. Then came the seating chart in the briefing room, another duty plucked out of the non-partisan WHCA’s hands and dropped directly into the administration’s lap.

WHCA president Eugene Daniels published a memo March 31 protesting the change in seating chart authority and explaining the implications for access and coverage it signifies, writing, “For the public to get the information it needs to understand and make decisions about the most powerful office in the world, it needs news produced by experienced, professional journalists who ask tough questions and produce fair coverage.”

Ergo, Kraus, who wrote in comments on her (then-private) Instagram post that she was “too scared” to go to a press briefing with that shiny new press pass, and in another blew off a negative commenter by saying she “worked hard for [Trump’s] campaign,” despite touting herself as an independent journalist. She admitted that she didn’t vote in the 2024 presidential election, but her reasons vary: She was too busy, she was traveling, she wanted to “remain untethered” to political parties, despite those “we did it” posts and repeatedly referring to herself as working for both Kennedy and Trump’s campaigns.

In fact, FEC documents show that Kraus has accepted payment from one of Kennedy’s PACs, American Values 2024. In August 2024, the group’s receipts list a payment to House Inhabit, categorized under subscriptions. The amount—$1,140—is eyebrow-raising. Additionally, Kraus was previously listed on the Kennedy-affiliated Fighting 4 One America PAC‘s website as the “Director of Social Media” with her personal gmail address included.

Kraus has repeatedly claimed on her social accounts that she didn’t receive “one dollar” from any of the campaigns. There are guardrails meant to separate the press from the politicians they cover. For House and Senate press pass applications, for example, there are stringent guidelines about full-time employment by a news organization and rules around additional employment, especially as a consultant for a political group. The State Department has similar restrictions.

“I have never received funding from any political PACs or campaigns,” Kraus told VF in an email.

If you needed another record of Kraus’s coziness with Kennedy and his campaign, look no further than the September 2024 First Amendment lawsuit in which Kraus and Kennedy were co-defendants, attempting to sue Meta for censorship. (They lost.)

She’s not even pretending to do the job well. Another (originally private) missive via Instagram Story detailed her claiming that she had been given the wrong address for Oliver Stone’s testimony and “being forced” to remove her heels and dash across blocks around the Capitol to get to the right location. On her (again, then-private) Instagram, she shared her thoughts on Stone’s sunglasses: “Iconic.” Groundbreaking. On her Substack, she transcribed several quotes from the testimony, adding such journalistic flair as “Stone blinked.” What was that Leavitt was saying about stenographers?

She recently misspelled the word “enemy” in a text slide of her Stories, declaring that “Secrecy is the Enemey (sic) of Democracy” in tres dramatique white-on-black. It’s giving “one time, she asked me how to spell orange.”

She posted a photo of herself at a briefing in her Stories, having apparently finally mustered up the courage to attend. A little white label with “NYT” typed in all-caps black is stuck to the spot, right next to the Easter egg-hued Instax camera she toted along with her to the briefing, which she didn’t write about. There she is, ensuring that the American people stay informed. The power of media, everyone!

In her very first press briefing back in January, Leavitt declared that “This White House believes strongly in the First Amendment,” then announced that credential applications for new media outlets would be opened up. The URL she shared, WhiteHouse.gov/NewMedia, redirects to a simple, one-page web form. The fields for first and last name, email, phone number, and zip code are all required, but so is a link to the applicant’s “Primary social account.”

The single optional field on the form? “News Outlet (If Applicable).”