The Kroger Co. has named Elaine Chao, former secretary of the U.S. Departments of Transportation and Labor, to its board of director. Chao, the wife of U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Kentucky), will serve until Kroger’s annual shareholders meeting in June 2022, when she will stand for election by the stockholders. Most recently, Chao (left) served as secretary of transportation under the Trump administration from 2017 to 2021. A Republican, she held the post of secretary of labor for two terms under President George W. Bush, serving from 2001 to 2009. Kroger noted that she is the first Asian-Pacific American woman to serve in the presidential cabinet in U.S. history as well as the longest-serving U.S. cabinet secretary since World War II. Chao’s career leading domestic and international organizations across the public, private and nonprofit sectors also includes serving as a director on Fortune 500 public company boards, president and CEO of the United Way of America, director of the Peace Corps, and a banker with Citicorp and Bank of America.