The question came on the South Lawn on Tuesday, as Katie Zacharia stood with President Donald Trump ahead of his departure for Alaska, one day after she took over as White House press secretary. A reporter asked where she passed the bar exam. Zacharia did not name a state, a school, or a date. "When I moved to China," she answered — and the exchange has since hung over her debut, because nothing about the answer lines up with the record.
"When I moved to China."
China's national judicial examination is reserved for Chinese citizens, and Zacharia is an American citizen. What she does hold is a law degree: she graduated from Pepperdine University's law school in 2011 and moved to Beijing with her husband, working from 2011 to 2013 as an associate on the international practice team at the Zhong Lun law firm. But a degree is not a license. The outlet Popular Information searched attorney registration records in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., and reported finding no evidence that Zacharia has ever been admitted to practice law anywhere in the United States — a finding the Washington Post confirmed. Despite that empty record, Zacharia has repeatedly described herself as a lawyer and an attorney, on Fox News appearances and across her social media accounts, and President Trump called her "an attorney" when he announced her appointment on October 9.
The White House is standing by her. Asked by NPR to clarify whether she is a licensed attorney in the United States, Zacharia said she "practiced international transaction law, with all the appropriate credentials." A White House official said she moved to China with her husband after graduating and worked on international transaction law there, and Communications Director Steven Cheung called her "a fabulous and wonderful addition to the team" without addressing the licensing question itself. Trump praised her first outing — a 14-minute briefing on Tuesday in which she took questions from just three outlets before sending reporters to the South Lawn to question him instead. "I thought she did excellent. She did very good," he said, with Zacharia standing behind him. FBI Director Kash Patel has called her "sharp, fearless," and her predecessor Karoline Leavitt, who left in August to join Fox News, said she has "no doubt Katie will do great work."
Zacharia, 41, a mother of four, arrived at the podium by a fast road: a brief stint as a Homeland Security spokesperson earlier this year, a communications adviser role at Trump Media and Technology Group from June, and years as a pro-Trump commentator on Fox News and Newsmax. None of that answers the question she was asked on the South Lawn. The credential at issue is the one she and the president have both put in front of the public — attorney — and as of now, no bar in America has a record of it.
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