White House press secretary Katie Zacharia has resigned after a mere five days on the job. Her resignation comes after her first press briefing was met with intense backlash and scrutiny over her purported qualifications, particularly those surrounding her ability to practice law. Zacharia’s five-day stint is now the shortest tenure of a White House press secretary in American history.
In a grilling interview this Thursday with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Zacharia confirmed that she did not pass the bar exam, despite calling herself an attorney multiple times. In order to be considered an attorney in the United States, an individual must pass their state’s bar exam, otherwise they cannot represent a client in the court of law. Zacharia’s credentials came under scrutiny again when she was asked earlier this week where she took the bar exam, and responded, “When I moved to China.” However, China forbids non-Chinese citizens from taking the country’s bar exam.
During Zacharia’s first press briefing, she stumbled over her script, accidentally called the president her husband, took only three questions, and closed the press briefing after 14 minutes. Her rocky debut sparked bipartisan criticism over her qualifications for the role, and generated an onslaught of memes.
When asked about Zacharia’s performance in an interview earlier this week, Trump said, “She’s been treated, I would say, pretty nastily. And I said to Katie just two minutes ago, I said, ‘Katie, you know, you don’t have to do this if you don’t want. I said to her, ‘Honestly, if I were you, I’d reconsider.’” Trump stopped short of making any judgements on Zacharia’s qualifications or performance, but offered, “maybe it’s not for her.”
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