Trump's New Press Secretary Katie Zacharia Worked at Beijing Law Firm With Ties to Chinese State Agencies

Katie Zacharia, Donald Trump's new White House press secretary, worked at Beijing-based Zhong Lun Law Firm from August 2011 to June 2013, according to her professional profile. The firm's published history records work for Chinese government institutions both before and after that period.

Her profile identifies her position as an associate on Zhong Lun's International Practice Team. The material reviewed does not identify her as handling the government matters listed in the firm's history or establish wrongdoing on her part.

The records provide context for her earlier international experience while distinguishing her own employment from the law firm's wider institutional relationships.

Beijing Legal Work and Communications Experience

Zacharia's professional profile lists nearly two years at Zhong Lun in Beijing. Newsweek also reported her employment on the firm's International Practice Team from 2011 to 2013.

During part of that period, she held a separate fundraising and communications role at Compassion for Migrant Children, a non-profit supporting children of migrant workers. Her profile dates that position from August 2012 to June 2013 and lists elementary proficiency in Chinese.

Her political experience predates her Beijing employment. The same profile records internships with the White House Office of Political Affairs and the Republican National Committee in 2006.

More recently, she served briefly as a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson and deputy assistant secretary for public affairs in February and March 2026. Before her White House appointment, she held senior communications roles with Trump Media & Technology Group and Truth Social.

Those positions span legal, non-profit and political communications work. Her listed Beijing role does not, on its own, establish which clients or individual matters she worked on.

Zhong Lun's Work for Chinese Government Institutions

Zhong Lun was founded in 1993 and describes itself as one of the first partnership law firms approved to practise in China. Its official history lists government-related work across several decades.

In February 2010, before Zacharia joined, the firm says it reviewed draft standard documents for the Ministry of Transport.

A separate entry falls within her employment period. In March 2012, Xuebing Zhang, chairman of Zhong Lun's Managing Committee, was appointed by the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council as an external director of China Telecom, according to the firm's history.

That entry records Zhang's corporate appointment. It does not describe a legal assignment undertaken by Zacharia or identify a role for her in the appointment.

Several ministry mandates highlighted in Zhong Lun's timeline came after she left in June 2013.

The firm records becoming the Ministry of Land and Resources' first retainer-based legal counsel in April 2016. In May 2018, it became the Ministry of Natural Resources' first retainer-based legal adviser.

Zhong Lun's history also records that it won all bids in the Ministry of Commerce's selection of law firms for its law-firm library in October 2018 and November 2021. These entries describe the firm's later work and selection for the ministry's legal-services roster, rather than Zacharia's activities during her employment.

Party Organisation and the Firm's Current Positioning

Zhong Lun's history records the establishment of its CPC Beijing Committee General Party Branch Committee in May 2009, before Zacharia joined.

Its current overview also describes its legal services as aligned with China's national strategies. That contemporary description should not be treated as a record of what Zacharia personally did between 2011 and 2013.

The party organisation, ministry work and Zhang's directorship are distinct institutional relationships. None of the cited entries identifies Zacharia as a party member or establishes her participation in the government matters described.

The chronology places her at Zhong Lun during Zhang's state-appointed corporate role, but before the later ministry retainers. Her documented position was on the International Practice Team.

The records therefore establish her employment and the firm's institutional connections. They do not establish that she personally represented the Chinese ministries named in its timeline.