U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao this afternoon announced her resignation effective Monday, January 11, citing “a traumatic and entirely avoidable event [yesterday] as supporters of the President stormed the Capitol building following a rally he addressed” in a letter to colleagues. Chao, the wife of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), has guided the Department of Transportation (DOT) with an experienced, and largely non-partisan, hand since she took office in February 2017.

While her remaining time was short at the DOT—Chao was staged to be replaced by Mayor Pete Buttigieg after the January 20 inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden—the resignation is nothing short of a protest over events that transpired yesterday on Capitol Hill. “As I'm sure is the case with many of you, it has deeply troubled me in a way that I simply cannot set aside,” she said.

Chao previously served as deputy secretary of transportation for President George H.W. Bush and has a long history of public service, having served as deputy maritime administrator and chairman of the Federal Maritime Commission in the late 1980s and then as deputy secretary under then-Secretary Sam Skinner from 1989 to 1991. She later became the first Asian-American woman to hold a Cabinet post, serving as secretary of labor for President George W. Bush.