The House committee on the Capitol Hill attack on January 6 2021 will treat the upcoming October 13 hearing as closing arguments ahead of the November midterm elections.
The hearing will likely seek to solidify claims that former president Donald Trump remains a danger to the country, particularly in the context of the upcoming 2024 elections. This will be the ninth hearing by the committee.
While no new in-person witnesses are expected to testify at Thursday’s hearing, CNN reported that there is a high chance that pre-taped interviews of former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and former Secretary of Treasury Steve Mnuchin will act as newly presented evidence.
Also Read | What we learnt so far about the Jan 6 riots in the last 8 hearings
Who is Elaine Chao?
Elaine Chao is an American businesswoman and a former US government official who is a member of the Republican Party. During her time in government, Chao served as the Secretary of Transportation from 2017 to 2021 in the Trump administration and as the Secretary of Labour in the George W. Bush administration from 2001 to 2009. Chao is the first ever Asia-American woman to serve in a presidential cabinet.
The businesswoman turned politician turned businesswoman again was born in Taipei, Taiwan on March 26, 1953. Chao and her family emigrated to the US when she was eight years old. She attended the Syosset High School in Nassau County, New York before moving to study economics at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts, graduating in 1975. She went on to get an MBA from the Harvard Business School in 1979.
Between 1979 and 1983, she worked for Citigroup as an international banker before her time in government.
Chao has been the subject of numerous controversies during her time in public service. During her time as the Secretary of Labour, it was reported that her department’s Wage and Hour division was not resolving complaints from minimum wage workers.
She married Mitch McConnell, the US Senator from Kentucky in 1995.
