The newly appointed White House Press Secretary, Katie Zacharia, has disclosed that she failed the bar exam, a requirement in the United States to practice law. This revelation has sparked concerns about the legitimacy of her legal qualifications, as reported by AFP and The Guardian.
After her initial appearance in the White House briefing room on Tuesday, Zacharia faced scrutiny regarding her legal background. Despite frequently presenting herself as an attorney on social media and during her tenure as a consultant for Fox News, the American media has questioned her claims due to a lack of evidence confirming her admission to the bar following her law degree from Pepperdine University in California.
The 41-year-old spokesperson openly acknowledged her failure during an interview on Fox News, following days of public criticism regarding her debut performance.
Context of Her Bar Exam Experience
Sean Hannity, the host, asked her about her educational background: “You studied at Pepperdine. You took the bar exam but didn’t pass, correct?”
“Yes, Sean,” Zacharia replied.
When pressed whether she attempted the exam a second time, she explained, “To provide some context, I graduated from Pepperdine, got married that same week, and our plan was to move to China. I had already registered for the bar exam. However, during the summer, I realized I would be living in China, so the exam result no longer mattered. I took the test because I didn’t want to appear as if I was withdrawing. Then I moved to China, where I secured a position in the international practice department of a Chinese law firm, handling cross-border transactions and shareholder agreements worth millions.”
After further questioning about retaking the exam, she ultimately admitted, “No, I didn’t.”
In a previous interview with conservative outlet Real America’s Voice, she mentioned feeling “distracted and overwhelmed” by her move to China at that time. “I knew I was leaving for China, and the bar result didn’t matter,” she stated on Fox News.
Following her time in Beijing, Zacharia worked as a legal practitioner at a prominent Chinese law firm. She justified not retaking the bar exam upon her return to the United States, citing her pregnancy and the birth of “four children in six years.”
Zacharia has previously denounced the “misinformation” and “misunderstandings” surrounding her qualifications, claiming that “many people in the legal sector” assured her that she could present herself as an attorney due to her law degree and international business law experience from China.
The Campaign for Accountability, a political ethics organization, called on the California State Bar to initiate an investigation regarding her claims.
Unsteady Start as Press Secretary
Katie Zacharia, who is not widely known to the public, made her debut as Press Secretary on Tuesday, during an unusually brief press conference where she responded to questions from three carefully selected journalists.
She succeeded Karoline Leavitt, another loyalist to Donald Trump, who resigned in August to focus on her young children.
In her opening statement, Zacharia repeatedly praised Trump’s energy and emphasized the large turnout at his rallies, despite reports of numerous vacant seats in recent events.
She also indicated she would need to “get back with an answer” regarding a question from Fox about information exchanges with Ukraine—a somewhat unusual response on a topic that had been prominent in news discussions earlier that day, according to the Washington Post.
Zacharia later announced the dismissal of Ambassador to Greece, Kimberly Guilfoyle.
During the press conference, she mistakenly referred to her husband as “my president” while discussing how she plans to balance her responsibilities with her four young children alongside the demands of her job.
