Katie Zacharia defends her performance and legal credentials after first press briefing

New White House press secretary Katie Zacharia stated that she did her "very best" during her first briefing while addressing criticism regarding her legal credentials on the Fox News program "Hannity" on Thursday. Zacharia, a graduate of Pepperdine Law, made her debut in the White House briefing room on Tuesday, shortly after President Donald Trump announced her appointment on Friday, which she noted left her with limited preparation time for the role. "What I feel is I really stepped up to the plate to do the press conference," she told host Sean Hannity. "With very little prep time, I received briefing materials in the morning of Tuesday." Zacharia faced scrutiny for taking only three questions during her approximately 14-minute briefing, where she highlighted the Trump administration’s accomplishments ahead of the midterm elections. She defended her performance, stating she had been on the job for less than eight hours before her briefing and challenged the notion that she only took questions from conservative-leaning news organizations. "Given the fact that I'd been on the job less than maybe eight hours and had a briefing book in the morning, I feel like I did my very best, Sean, to deliver for the American people that day," Zacharia said. She also delivered breaking news during her debut, announcing that the Trump administration had requested Kimberly Guilfoyle to resign from her ambassador role. The scrutiny surrounding her performance was intensified by questions about her legal credentials after The Wall Street Journal reported that she had failed the California bar exam. During the interview, Hannity questioned Zacharia about social media posts where she identified herself as an attorney. Zacharia clarified that those were retweets and not endorsements of the title. She explained that after failing the bar exam the first time, she did not retake it due to plans to move to China. Zacharia expressed her desire to build stronger relationships with members of the White House press corps and to have more substantive interactions with reporters in the future. "I would love to build a relationship with all of those members of the press corps so there is a substantive component to us having an ability to interact," she said. "And I will be very prepared, Sean, and I will step up to the duty that President Trump has asked me to as press secretary."