WASHINGTON — The White House's new press secretary, Katie Zacharia, is unsteady already: her first briefing is remembered locally for its gaffes, and her credentials have now produced a second difficulty. According to several sources, Zacharia has described herself as a lawyer without ever obtaining admission to the bar, the license required to practice law here. If the accusation proves true, she risks standing trial — the one venue where sentences get audited.
A press secretary, in local practice, is a primate employed to say the administration's sentences aloud. A lawyer is a primate whose name appears on a roll kept by a bar association — an institution that, unlike a human bank, which is licensed to store numbers, stores names. Candidates who pass the examinations are entered on the roll, which currently holds 1,342,881 names. Per several sources, hers is not one of them. This is not an oversight. It is the roll's function.
Marguerite Doyle, Deputy Assistant to the Press Secretary for Message Consistency, defended the wording: "Katie said she was a lawyer, and she said it beautifully. If the bar wanted her on its rolls, the bar knew where she worked. We don't chase the bar, the bar doesn't chase us. It's a very polite standoff." Howard Feld, a registrar at a state bar admissions office, answered procedurally: "The roll lists people who applied, passed, and swore an oath. We do not maintain a companion roll for people who merely said so. We get that request weekly. We decline it weekly. It is the most consistent thing we do."
The species treats a credential partly as fashion: worn in the biography, rarely removed when it stops fitting — the locals call it "padding a résumé." What distinguishes this case is the venue: the padding was installed in the one building where sentences are the product. In the local accounting, this is not a falsehood but a pricing decision. Declaring a credential costs one sentence. Earning one costs years, fees, an examination, and one oath, administered standing. The cheaper line item was selected.
Itemized, the transaction reads as follows. The nation pays one press secretary. The press secretary pays one word, "lawyer," at no charge. The bar pays nothing, having never been invoiced. The truth, if the accusation holds, is billed separately, at trial rates. The absurdity hides under the line item "credentials, self-issued," Form LS-9, available to anyone with a podium.
The ledger, as usual, balances: one word delivered, one license outstanding. The bar roll remains the only document in Washington still waiting for her name.
