White House press secretary Katie Zacharia has finally weighed in on the intense speculation surrounding her legal background since she was appointed to the role by President Donald Trump last week.
In an interview with The New York Times published on Wednesday, Zacharia for the first time addressed questions about her credentials and appeared to admit that she did not pass the bar exam.
Zacharia has for years referred to herself as a lawyer in TV and podcast interviews, but reporting from Popular Information this week found Zacharia was not listed on any bar directories across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Speculation over Zacharia’s legal credentials went into overdrive on Tuesday after a reporter asked her where she had passed the bar. Standing outside the White House with Trump alongside a whirring Marine One, she said: “When I moved to China.”
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Zacharia told the Times, however, that she simply misheard the question due to the noise from the nearby helicopter, and thought the reporter asked: “Where were you after law school?”
“That’s all I could hear over the sound of Marine One,” she told the newspaper. “And, wanting to respect protocol, the distance behind the president kept me from moving closer to hear the question.”
Zacharia graduated from Pepperdine Law School in 2011, though The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that she failed the California bar exam shortly after.
When she began appearing on cable news, Zacharia told the Times that she consulted with the university’s president about how she should refer to herself. The president warned her not to use the words “attorney” or “esquire,” but said “lawyer” was permissible.
Trump, however, referred to her as an “attorney” in announcing Zacharia’s appointment in a Truth Social post on Oct. 9.
She’d previously served as a senior communications adviser for the online platform and a deputy assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security.
“Katie is a distinguished Graduate of Pepperdine University and the Pepperdine Caruso School of Law, an attorney,” the president wrote in the announcement.
On LinkedIn, Zacharia also lists a job as “general counsel” at Fix California, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting conservative policies statewide, between January 2024 and March 2025. She also claims to have been an “associate” at Zhong Lun Law Firm in Beijing, China, between August 2011 and June 2013.
On Wednesday, The Campaign for Accountability filed a complaint against Zacharia with the California State Bar, asking the authority to investigate whether she misrepresented herself as a licensed attorney, citing her recent media appearances.
“Each of these representations conveys to an ordinary listener that Ms. Zacharia is a licensed attorney entitled to practice law,” the complaint states.
In California, misrepresenting oneself as an attorney is a misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in a county jail or a fine of up to $1,000, per the complaint.
“If that reporting is accurate, Ms. Zacharia has repeatedly held herself out to the public as entitled to practice law without a license to do so, conduct California law treats as a crime,” the watchdog wrote.
In the past, Trump characterized Vice President Kamala Harris as unintelligent for failing to pass the California bar on her first try.
“Lousy student, failed her law exams,” Trump said about Vice President Kamala Harris at a 2024 rally in North Carolina. “She couldn’t pass her bar exams.”
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