Elaine Chao

Elaine Lan Chao is an American economist who served as the 24th U.S. Secretary of Labor under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2009. Born in Taiwan to Chinese parents, she was the first Asian American woman in U.S. history to be appointed to a U.S. presidents cabinet. She is married to U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Elaine Chao was born in Taipei, Taiwan. The eldest of six daughters, Chao was born to Ruth Mulan Chu Chao , a historian, and Dr. James S.C. Chao , who began his career as a merchant mariner and later founded a successful shipping company in New York called Foremost Shipping. Chaos parents had fled to Taiwan from mainland China after the Chinese Communists took over after the Chinese Civil War in 1949. When she was eight years old, in 1961, Chao came to the United States on a freight ship with her mother and two younger sisters. Her father had arrived in New York three years earlier after receiving a scholarship.

Source: Wikipedia