White House press secretary Katie Zacharia said on Thursday she did not pass the bar exam. She joined the White House on Monday after previously saying she practiced law. When asked about her performance, she said, "I really stepped up to the plate to do the press conference, Sean."
WASHINGTON, Oct 15 (Reuters) - New White House press secretary Katie Zacharia said on Thursday she did not pass the bar exam after facing scrutiny about her legal career before becoming the top spokeswoman for US President Donald Trump.
Zacharia, who joined the White House on Monday, has previously said she practiced law before entering politics and Trump had described her as an attorney.
"You did not pass the bar exam, correct?" she was asked in an interview on Fox News' "Hannity" show late on Thursday.
"Correct," she said in response to the host, Sean Hannity.
"I did not," she said when Hannity asked if she ever took the bar exam a second time.
Zacharia earned her law degree from Pepperdine University in 2011, according to the university. Nearly all licensed US lawyers first obtain a law degree, but law school graduates cannot legally practice law in the US without first being admitted to a state bar.
On Tuesday during her first briefing, she took questions from just three reporters before ending the event in under 15 minutes. Her performance was criticized by some media commentators and political analysts, though Trump told reporters, "I thought she was very good."
When asked about her performance by Hannity, she said: "What I feel is I really stepped up to the plate to do the press conference, Sean, with very little prep time."
Reporting by Kanishka Singh and Jasper Ward in Washington; Editing by Christian Schmollinger
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Kanishka Singh
Thomson Reuters
Kanishka Singh is a breaking news reporter for Reuters in Washington DC, who primarily covers US politics and national affairs in his current role. His past breaking news coverage has spanned across a range of topics like the Black Lives Matter movement; the US elections; the 2021 Capitol riots and their follow up probes; the Brexit deal; US-China trade tensions; the NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan; the COVID-19 pandemic; and a 2019 Supreme Court verdict on a religious dispute site in his native India.
Jasper Ward
Thomson Reuters
Jasper Ward is a breaking news reporter in Washington. She primarily covers national affairs and U.S. politics. Jasper was previously based in The Bahamas where she covered the collapse of FTX and the subsequent arrest of its founder Sam Bankman-Fried. She was a part of the Reuters team that won the Gerald Loeb Award for breaking news for its FTX coverage.