Elaine Chao

Elaine Lan Chao (born March 26, 1953) is an American businesswoman and former government official. A member of the Republican Party, she served as the 18th United States secretary of transportation in the Trump administration from 2017 to 2021, and as the 24th United States secretary of labor in the George W. Bush administration from 2001 to 2009. Chao was the first Asian American woman ever to serve in a presidential cabinet.

Born in Taipei, Taiwan, Chao immigrated to the United States when she was eight years old. Her father founded the Foremost Group, which eventually became a major shipping corporation. Chao was raised on Long Island, New York, and subsequently received degrees from Mount Holyoke College and Harvard Business School. She worked for a number of financial institutions before being appointed to several senior positions in the Department of Transportation under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, including Chair of the Federal Maritime Commission (1988–1989) and Deputy Secretary of Transportation (1989–1991). She served as Director of the Peace Corps from 1991 to 1992 and as president of the United Way of America from 1993 to 1996.

While not in government, Chao has served on several corporate boards of directors and worked for The Heritage Foundation and the Hudson Institute, two conservative think-tanks. Chao is married to U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell.

During her tenure as Transportation Secretary in the Trump administration, the Transportation Department's inspector general wrote a report with numerous instances where Chao used her office to promote her family's shipping business.

Early life and education

Elaine Chao was born in Taipei, Taiwan, on March 26, 1953, and immigrated to the United States when she was eight years old. She is the eldest of six daughters of Ruth Mulan Chu Chao, a historian, and James S. C. Chao, who began his career as a merchant mariner and in 1964 founded the shipping company Foremost Maritime Corporation in New York City which developed into the Foremost Group. In 1961, Elaine, along with her mother and two younger sisters, came to the United States on a 37-day freight ship journey. Her father had arrived in New York three years earlier after receiving a scholarship.

Chao attended Tsai Hsing Elementary School in Taiwan for kindergarten and first grade. She attended Syosset High School in Syosset, New York, in Nassau County on Long Island and was naturalized as a U.S. citizen at the age of 19.

Chao received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts, in 1975. In the second semester of her junior year, she studied money and banking at Dartmouth College. She received an MBA degree from Harvard Business School in 1979.

Career

Early career

Before entering public service, Chao was vice president for syndications at Bank of America Capital Markets Group in San Francisco, and she was an International Banker at Citicorp in New York for four years from 1979 to 1983. She was granted a White House Fellowship in 1983 during the Reagan Administration and was then Vice President, Syndications at Bank of America from 1984 to 1986.

In 1986, Chao became Deputy Administrator of the Maritime Administration in the U.S. Department of Transportation. From 1988 to 1989, she served as Chairwoman of the Federal Maritime Commission. In 1989, President George H. W. Bush nominated Chao to be Deputy Secretary of Transportation; she served from 1989 to 1991. From 1991 to 1992, she was the Director of the Peace Corps. She was the first Asian Pacific American to serve in any of these positions. She expanded the Peace Corps's presence in Eastern Europe and Central Asia by establishing the first Peace Corps programs in Poland,