White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is leaving the Trump administration

AP Photo/Evan Vucci

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders speaks during the daily press briefing at the White House, Wednesday, Aug. 1, 2018, in Washington.

• White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders will leave the Trump administration at the end of the month after serving the president for more than three years. 
• Trump praised Sanders and encouraged her to follow her father's footsteps in Arkansas politics in a tweet announcing her resignation on Thursday afternoon. 
• "She is a very special person with extraordinary talents, who has done an incredible job! I hope she decides to run for Governor of Arkansas - she would be fantastic. Sarah, thank you for a job well done!" he wrote. 
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White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders will leave the Trump administration at the end of the month after serving the president for more than three years. 

President Donald Trump announced Sanders' imminent departure via tweet on Thursday afternoon. He praised her work and even encouraged her to follow in her father's footsteps and run for governor of her home state of Arkansas. 

Unlike many of the president's top aides, Sanders was bred in politics. She's the daughter of former Arkansas governor and two-time presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, and served as field director for her father's 2002 gubernatorial reelection campaign, was the national political director for his 2008 presidential campaign, and headed his 2016 presidential bid.

Sanders joined the Trump campaign in February 2016, shortly after her father dropped out of the 2016 Republican primary. 

"I volunteered to join Mr. Trump's campaign because he is a champion of working families; not Washington-Wall Street elites," Sanders said in a statement at the time. "Like the other Republican candidates, Mr. Trump is pro-life, pro-marriage and will appoint conservatives to the courts. What makes Mr. Trump my choice for president is he will break the grip of the donor class on our government and make it accountable to working families again."