Donald Trump’s new press secretary, Katie Zacharia, has repeatedly described herself as a lawyer. But when asked after her inaugural press briefing on Tuesday to name the state where she passed the bar exam, she replied curiously: “when I moved to China”.

No public record shows she has ever been licensed to practice law in the US states where she resided, and her answer to reporters’ questions on Tuesday only deepened scrutiny.

Zacharia wasn’t registered in 38 states, as well as DC and the Virgin Islands, where the state’s attorney list was publicly available, according to a review from the Guardian.

After her shaky and widely panned first briefing, a reporter asked Trump which state Zacharia had passed the bar exam in. The president, who had described Zacharia as an attorney when announcing her appointment, turned to her and asked: “Which state?” She replied: “when I moved to China”.

Zacharia’s law degree is real – Pepperdine University confirmed she graduated from its law school in 2011. But a degree is not a license, and no record has surfaced showing she was admitted to practice, according to the report in Popular Information.

In a later statement to the press, Zacharia said she had “practiced international transaction law, with all the appropriate credentials”. The White House did not say whether she had passed a bar exam anywhere.

Zacharia’s LinkedIn profile lists her as general counsel of Fix California, a conservative group founded by Ric Grenell, a longtime Trump ally and the special presidential envoy for special missions. Zacharia lived in California, but the state bar of California said it had no record of her being licensed in the state.

“The State Bar of California has no record of Kate Sharon Zacharia or Kate Sharon Black (or Katie in both instances) having been licensed to practice law in California,” a spokesperson for the California state bar said in a statement. Black is her maiden name.

“Due to confidentiality laws, the State Bar can only confirm whether someone passed the bar exam, not whether they took the bar exam,” it added.

No report alleges that Zacharia has been charged with or has committed an offence.

Campaign for Accountability, a non-profit watchdog organization, on Wednesday filed a complaint with the state bar of California, asking it to investigate whether Zacharia misled the public – and potentially violated state law – by describing herself as a lawyer.

“In California, calling yourself a lawyer without a license isn’t puffery; it’s a crime,” said Michelle Kuppersmith, the group’s executive director, in a statement.

California law says anyone “advertising or holding himself or herself out as practicing or entitled to practice law” who is not an active member of the state bar could be punished with a fine of up to $1,000 and up to one year in jail.

“There is a difference between having a JD and being a lawyer, you are licensed as a lawyer by saying that you took the bar,” said Richard Painter, a university of Minnesota law professor and the former chief White House ethics lawyer under the George W Bush administration. “Calling yourself an attorney … it’s a misdemeanor at least.”

Zacharia’s LinkedIn notes that she was remote while at Fix California. But Painter said that was “not relevant – you need to be a member of the bar”.

The profile also says she worked as an associate at the Beijing firm Zhong Lun from 2011 to 2013. Only Chinese citizens can be licensed as lawyers in China, according to Chinese law and legal affairs website China Justice Observer, though foreign staff can work at Chinese firms in other capacities.

The press office of Gavin Newsom, California’s governor, mocked the exchange on X, asking whether the new press secretary “appears to be a Chinese lawyer”. Steven Cheung, the White House director of communications, in the meantime described her briefing performance as “tremendous” and “commanding”.

Zacharia was relatively unknown when Trump announced her selection to be his next press secretary last week, after the departure of Karoline Leavitt earlier this year. In the days since, several outlets have uncovered a series of since-deleted social media posts that promote debunked or baseless conspiracy.

In a series of now-deleted social media posts on X, reviewed by the Guardian, Zacharia fawned over Tesla and Space X founder, Elon Musk.

On 22 May 2022, the new press secretary described Musk, a tech billionaire and Trump ally, as “based”. She went on to explain the term was applied “when you want to recognize someone for being themselves” and “courageous and unique or not caring what others think”.

In another post from the same year, Zacharia also responded to one user sharing a widely circulated picture of Musk and Ghislaine Maxwell, the co-conspirator of the late sex-offender Jeffrey Epstein, at the Vanity Fair Oscar party in 2014, where Zacharia wrote “oh please, he already responded to this #oldnews”.

Musk has not been charged with any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein, and has denied knowing Maxwell, claiming the photo which pictures her standing close to him is because she “photobombed” him.

In other now-deleted posts, also from the same period, Zacharia directed various complimentary messages at Musk. “#IstandwithElon,” she wrote in one. In another she praised him for renouncing his support for the Democratic party and saying he would now support Republicans. “Smartest and richest man in the world right here is saying out loud what everyone else is thinking,” Zacharia wrote.

However, last year Zacharia questioned whether Musk could have been trusted “from the beginning” while appearing as a guest on conservative commentator Buck Sexton’s podcast.

“He’s heavily invested in China. A lot of people were questioning his allegiance to begin with. Where is his allegiance completely?” she asked on the show. In late 2025, Musk and Trump had a public falling out of the president’s sweeping domestic policy legislation. They have since reconciled and Musk, according to the New York Times, is spending record sums to help Republicans retain control of the midterm elections this cycle.

The Bulwark previously reported on Zacharia’s since-deleted posts where she called on the administration to “suspend habeas corpus” – the constitutional right to challenge detention before a judge.

Meanwhile CNN also found now-deleted social media posts where Zacharia wrote and reshared comments that accused prominent political figures and Hollywood elites of pedophilia. This includes longtime Democratic operative John Podesta – who was the notable target of the debunked Pizzagate conspiracy – which alleged that several prominent Democrats were part of a child sex-trafficking ring.