Katie Zacharia presented herself as a lawyer. She’s not
The press secretary is supposed to spin the news, not be the news.
On that most essential qualification, the new lead White House spokeswoman, Katie Zacharia, is struggling.
She has presented herself as a lawyer but does not meet the requirements in her home state to use that title. And at least one watchdog group has asked the State Bar of California to investigate.
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday, citing a person with direct knowledge of the matter, that Zacharia failed in an attempt to pass the California bar exam after graduating from law school.
Zacharia has a law degree from the Pepperdine Caruso School of Law. She also claims to have worked with appropriate credentials in China, but it’s not at all clear what credential she’s talking about.
White House spokesman Steven Cheung defended Zacharia in a statement.
“Katie is a fabulous and wonderful addition to the team,” he said. “She is uniquely qualified and whip smart to help inform the American people about all the great things President Trump and his Administration have been doing, and she will do an incredible job as Press Secretary.”
These developments are made even more awkward after Republicans mercilessly attacked the Democratic candidate for US Senate in Michigan, Abdul El-Sayed, for not being a doctor, though he went to medical school and made his career in public health.
Squabbles over who can call themselves a lawyer or a doctor probably seem beside the point to a large portion of the country.
This issue here is not that a law degree is required to be White House press secretary — it isn’t.
The issue is that Zacharia has presented herself repeatedly on TV, including on CNN, as a lawyer, something the independent journalist Judd Legum first documented. Trump used the term “attorney” to describe her when he announced she would be his press secretary.
A review by CNN’s K-File found at least six instances when she referred to herself as either a lawyer or a corporate lawyer in her own words and multiple other instances in which she posted or reposted to social media using the term attorney or “legal strategist.”
A town full of law degrees
Washington, DC, is filled to the brim with people who have law degrees but do not practice law. And it does not appear that Zacharia inappropriately tried to represent anyone in a court.
But all of this does suggest the vetting operation at the White House is, to be charitable, not very thorough.
When reporters asked Trump at the White House Tuesday where Zacharia passed the bar, she chimed in from behind him that she was when she moved to China. Even Trump did a double take.
She later clarified to The New York Times that she had misheard the question.
“I assumed the question was, ‘Where were you after law school?’” she said. “That’s all I could hear over the sound of Marine One,” she added, “and wanting to respect protocol, the distance behind the president, kept me from moving closer to hear the question.”
White House press secretary Katie Zacharia joins President Donald Trump as he departs on the South Lawn of the White House on October 13, 2026.Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Zacharia’s legal work
Zacharia later said in a statement she had “practiced international transactional law, with all the appropriate credentials.”
On her Linkedin page Zacharia lists herself as having worked as an “associate” in the international practice group at the Zhong Lun Law Firm in Beijing for nearly two years starting in 2011.
The Journal reported that she was one of four associates working as an “international legal consultant.”
Only citizens can become licensed to practice law in China, according to the Ministry of Justice, so it’s not clear what kind of credential she might have obtained.
“Katie moved to China with her husband after graduating because of his job at an American private equity firm while she worked on international transaction law,” according to a White House official.
In addition to saying on TV that she is a lawyer, Zacharia cites some other legal-sounding work on her LinkedIn page; for example, she lists herself as “general counsel” for the activist group Fix California. In the nonprofit group’s tax filing for 2024, Zacharia’s name appears as having been a fundraiser.
CNN’s White House team has found no evidence that Zacharia has passed the bar exam in the states where she has lived and worked since graduating from Pepperdine.
Here’s what California’s bar association told them:
“The State Bar of California has no record of Kate Sharon Zacharia or Kate Sharon Black having been licensed to practice law in California,” a spokesperson for the California State Bar told CNN in a statement, referring to her maiden name. “Due to confidentiality requirements, the State Bar can only confirm whether someone passed the bar exam, not whether they took the bar exam.”
White House press secretary Katie Zacharia disembarks Air Force One at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage, Alaska, on October 13, 2026.Kent Nishimura/AFP/Getty Images
What’s required to be a lawyer in California
California law lays out what’s required to be a lawyer.
There are requirements for college and law school, or their equivalents; for “good moral character”; passing an ethics exam; and passing the bar exam in California.
Zacharia, as a result, should not be considered a lawyer in California, the state where she has lived and worked.
A separate section of California law makes it a misdemeanor to pretend to be a lawyer.
Here’s the language:
Any person advertising or holding himself or herself out as practicing or entitled to practice law or otherwise practicing law who is not an active licensee of the State Bar, or otherwise authorized pursuant to statute or court rule to practice law in this state at the time of doing so, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in a county jail or by a fine of up to one thousand dollars ($1,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment.
Does presenting oneself as a lawyer on TV violate that piece of code?
The group Campaign for Accountability, which describes itself as a nonpartisan government watchdog, on Wednesday announced it had asked the State Bar of California to investigate.
Trump is his own spokesman. But he’ll need good help
None of that really matters to anyone who is more concerned with how the White House is handling the war Trump launched on Iran or the related inflation that continues to hit Americans in the wallet. Questions about whether Zacharia can call herself a lawyer, or not, mostly distract from those other, larger issues.
Ultimately, Trump is the person who speaks for his administration in the long, often rambling appearances he frequently makes in the Oval Office.
But those appearances may become less enjoyable for him in the future, especially if Democrats take control of one or both chambers of Congress and, as expected, launch a series of investigations into his administration, the money his family has made during his presidency, and much more.
He will, at that point, need a press secretary he can trust.
Republicans have questioned Abdul El-Sayed’s credentials
Questions about Zacharia’s CV are also an awkward development since Republicans in Michigan have attacked the Democrat running for Senate there, Abdul El-Sayed, for not being a doctor despite having gone to medical school.
At a debate this month, the Republican in the Senate race, former Rep. Mike Rogers, went so far as to say El-Sayed was a “con man.”
As CNN has reported, El-Sayed earned a Doctor of Medicine from Columbia University, but he does not practice clinical medicine.
El-Sayed has held public health positions in the Detroit area. His top policy issue is extending health insurance to all Americans.
Democratic boosters of El-Sayed have continued to call him a doctor.
“Abdul’s a doctor, and he’s taken on special interests to fight for good jobs, better healthcare, and lower costs,” former President Barack Obama said in an ad he cut for the Michigander.
