NEW YORK — White House press secretary Katie Zachariah was abruptly removed just four days into the job amid allegations of falsified credentials, the shortest tenure in the history of the position.
Speaking to reporters at the White House in Washington on the 16th before departing for Georgia, President Donald Trump said he had told the press secretary to reconsider the role, saying there was no need to do the job if it was not wanted. Trump said the remark did not mean a dismissal, but added that the job might not be a good fit. He also said he hoped for a good life ahead for the press secretary, who had faced harsh attacks from the media. Shortly after Trump's remarks, the White House officially confirmed the dismissal.
Zachariah was announced as press secretary on the 9th and began work on the 12th. The post had been vacant for nearly two months after former press secretary Karoline Leavitt resigned in August following the birth of her second child. Zachariah had served as senior communications adviser at Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG), the operator of Truth Social, the social network founded by Trump. The president had introduced the appointee as a loyal and outstanding supporter and an enthusiastic fan of MAGA, or Make America Great Again.
Questions over credentials and qualifications surfaced immediately after the appointment. Zachariah had appeared on television and elsewhere as a lawyer, but it emerged that after graduating from Pepperdine University School of Law in 2011, the press secretary had failed the California bar exam.
In media interviews, Zachariah gave evasive answers, saying that failing the bar exam was not particularly important and that the White House had never asked about it. Considerable time was spent on these explanations at a moment when the administration's policies needed promotion ahead of the midterm elections.
At a first White House briefing on the 13th, the press secretary took questions from only three conservative outlets and left after 14 minutes, raising further doubts about qualifications. In an interview with the conservative outlet Real America's Voice on the 15th, Zachariah recalled living in China from 2011 to 2016 and said the country did not even have proper toilets, drawing a rebuke from China's Foreign Ministry.
Trump's decision to cut ties is seen as a response to an unnecessary political burden with the midterm elections approaching. Short-serving press secretaries under former Presidents Gerald Ford and Franklin Roosevelt lasted at least a month and left for unavoidable reasons such as the end of an administration's term or a shooting. Sean Spicer, the first White House press secretary of Trump's first term, which was relatively brief, stepped down after six months.