Sean Duffy
American politician (born 1971) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sean Patrick Duffy (born October 3, 1971) is an American politician, lawyer, and former reality television personality who has served as the 20th United States secretary of transportation since 2025. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the U.S. representative for Wisconsin's 7th congressional district from 2011 to 2019.
Sean Duffy | |
|---|---|
Official portrait, 2025 | |
| 20th United States Secretary of Transportation | |
| Assumed office January 28, 2025 | |
| President | Donald Trump |
| Deputy | Steven G. Bradbury |
| Preceded by | Pete Buttigieg |
| Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Wisconsin's 7th district | |
| In office January 3, 2011 – September 23, 2019 | |
| Preceded by | Dave Obey |
| Succeeded by | Tom Tiffany |
| District Attorney of Ashland County | |
| In office August 1, 2002 – July 9, 2010 | |
| Preceded by | Michael Gableman |
| Succeeded by | Kelly McKnight |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Sean Patrick Duffy October 3, 1971 Hayward, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 9 |
| Relatives | Leah Campos (sister-in-law) |
| Education | Saint Mary's University of Minnesota (BA) William Mitchell College of Law (JD) |
After graduating from Saint Mary's University of Minnesota and William Mitchell College of Law, Duffy first gained fame as a cast member on The Real World: Boston, Road Rules: All Stars and Real World/Road Rules Challenge: Battle of the Seasons, before going on to serve as district attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2010, and as congressman from Wisconsin from 2011 to 2019. After resigning from Congress, he became a lobbyist and a Fox Business television co-host.
On November 18, 2024, President-elect Donald Trump named Duffy to be his nominee for U.S. Secretary of Transportation in his second presidency. He was confirmed by the United States Senate to the office on January 28, 2025 by a vote of 77–22 and was sworn in later that day.[1]
Early life
Duffy was born on October 3, 1971, in Hayward, Wisconsin,[2][3][4] the tenth of 11 children of Carol Ann (née Yackel) and Thomas Walter Duffy. He has Irish and German ancestry.[5] He has a bachelor's degree in marketing from Saint Mary's University of Minnesota and a Juris Doctor from William Mitchell College of Law.[6]
Duffy started log rolling at age five and speed climbing (sprinting up 60- and 90-foot poles) at 13. He holds two speed-climbing titles.[7]
Early television career
In 1997, Duffy starred on The Real World: Boston, the sixth season of the MTV reality television show, and on Road Rules: All Stars, a Winnebago driving event, in 1998, where he met his future wife Rachel Campos. Duffy later appeared on Real World/Road Rules Challenge: Battle of the Seasons, which aired in 2002. Both appeared in a filmed segment on 2008's The Real World Awards Bash, while Duffy served as district attorney.[8]
Duffy has been an ESPN color commentator for televised competitions and in 2003 appeared as both a competitor and commentator on ESPN's Great Outdoor Games. He was named Badger State Games Honorary Athlete of the 2004 Winter Games.[6]
District attorney (2002–2010)
Duffy, a Republican,[9] was appointed Ashland County district attorney in 2002[10] to succeed Michael Gableman by Governor Scott McCallum. He was reelected unopposed in 2002,[10] 2004,[11] 2006[12] and 2008.[citation needed]
Duffy was on the Republican slate of the 10 Wisconsin electors for the 2008 presidential election.[13]
U.S. House of Representatives (2011–2019)
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Elections
- 2010
On July 8, 2009, Duffy announced his campaign for Congress in Wisconsin's seventh congressional district. Duffy was considered an underdog in the race until May 2010 when 15-term incumbent Democratic representative Dave Obey announced that he would not seek re-election.[14] Following Obey's announcement, Democratic state senator Julie Lassa joined the race.
On June 4, 2010, Duffy announced his resignation from the position of Ashland County district attorney to focus on the congressional race. The resignation was effective three weeks later and Duffy returned to work in his father's law practice. He won the race on November 2, 2010, in a nationwide wave of Republicans being elected to Congress.[15]
Different sources attribute his victory to his ten-month head start on Lassa's campaign, his grassroots organization and fundraising, his experience as a district attorney, and voter discontent with the economy.[16]
- 2012
Duffy was challenged by Democratic nominee Pat Kreitlow, whom he defeated.
- 2014
Duffy defeated challenger Kelly Westlund, the Democratic nominee.
Tenure
Duffy during the 112th and 115th Congress
In 2011, Duffy voted to eliminate Davis–Bacon Act prevailing wage requirements for federal projects.[17][18][19]
In March 2011, Duffy attended a Polk County Republican public town hall-style meeting in his district. In a video, following the passage of a state bill which would have effectively frozen the salaries of state employees, Duffy was asked about whether he would be willing to cut his own $174,000 salary. Duffy responded that he would only be willing to do so as part of a general round of salary cuts for government employees, and insisted that he was "struggling" to get by, despite his salary being nearly three times the average for Wisconsin residents.[20][21][22]
On December 22, 2011, Duffy and fellow Republican House freshman Rick Crawford (Arkansas), published an open letter to Speaker John Boehner, urging the leader to allow the House to vote on the Senate's two-month tax cut extension compromise.[23]
In 2013, Duffy and Democratic House member Michael Michaud (Maine) introduced a resolution calling for government action to ensure that people be provided with paper-based information along with electronic.[24]
Duffy was on the Select Investigative Panel on Planned Parenthood.[25]
Duffy supported President Donald Trump's 2017 executive order to impose a temporary ban on entry to the U.S. to citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. He stated that "President Trump is fulfilling a campaign promise to re-evaluate our visa vetting process so that the American people are safe from terrorism."[26] In February 2017, Duffy gave an interview to CNN's Alisyn Camerota supporting Trump's immigration and travel ban. When Camerota, referring to the Quebec City mosque shooting, asked why Trump made no public statement on the white terrorists who perpetrated that act, Duffy replied, "I don't know, there's a difference. You don't have a group like ISIS or al-Qaeda that is inspiring people around the world to take up arms and kill innocents...That was a one-off, Alisyn."[27]
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In January 2017, Duffy co-sponsored legislation that would end protection for grey wolves in the Endangered Species Act.[28]
In July 2018, Duffy said that Europe, China, Canada and Mexico had committed "economic terrorism in a way" by placing retaliatory tariffs on the United States in response to tariffs enacted by the Trump administration.[29]
Duffy resigned his seat effective September 23, 2019, to have more time to help his wife care for their daughter, who has a heart defect.[30]
Legislation sponsored
Duffy proposed legislation[31] to replace the director of the consumer watchdog group, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), with a five-person commission and removing the CFPB from Federal Reserve System oversight so that it "would go through the same funding process as other federal agencies".[31][32][33] The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau would have been renamed the Financial Product Safety Commission. The bill also intended to make overturning the decisions about regulations that the new commission made easier to do.[32] The bill gave the commission more room to get rid of policies that Duffy believes jeopardize the safety of the US banking system.[34]
In December 2015, Duffy introduced legislation[35] to establish a five-person financial oversight board over Puerto Rico (with members appointed by the White House) in exchange for allowing public entities in Puerto Rico access to Chapter 9 restructuring.[36][37][38][39]
In 2018, Duffy introduced legislation for Trump to enact more tariffs.[40]
Committee assignments
After congress (2019–2025)
After resigning from Congress, Duffy briefly served as a CNN political commentator, notably spreading a debunked conspiracy theory about the Trump-Ukraine scandal that there was a missing Democratic National Committee server in Ukraine that was "at the heart of the Russia investigation".[43] He also joined the lobbying firm BGR Group as a senior counsel,[44][45] eventually serving as a leader of the firm's financial services practice, where he represented clients such as Enterprise Products and the Partnership for Fair and Open Skies.[46] After 2023, he served on the firm's advisory board.[46][47]
In December 2022, Duffy and Dagen McDowell were named co-hosts of The Bottom Line, a show on Fox Business which premiered on January 23, 2023.[48]
Secretary of Transportation (2025–present)
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Nomination and confirmation
On November 18, 2024, President-elect Donald Trump named Duffy as his nominee for Secretary of Transportation in his second presidency.[49] During his hearing on January 15, 2025, he stated that if confirmed, his first trip as Secretary of Transportation would be to the Appalachian mountain regions of Tennessee and North Carolina, where flooding from Hurricane Helene damaged major interstate highways along with countless smaller roads and bridges.[50] He traveled to western North Carolina February 10, 2025.[51]
The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation approved his nomination in a 28–0 vote on January 22 and the Senate confirmed his nomination in a 77–22 vote on January 28.[52][53] Some Democrats changed positions on his nomination, citing the Trump administration's ongoing federal spending freeze.[54]
Tenure
Duffy was officially sworn in by United States Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on January 28, 2025.[55] On January 29, 2025, Duffy was ceremonially sworn in by Vice President JD Vance.[56]
In his first act in office on January 29, Duffy signed a memorandum directing his department to immediately rescind and replace all existing corporate average fuel economy standards and eliminate the electric vehicle tax incentives instituted by the administration of Trump's predecessor, Joe Biden.[55][57] In an additional memo, Duffy ordered that Transportation Department-supported programs and activities "shall prioritize projects and goals that ... to the extent practicable, relevant, appropriate, and consistent with law, mitigate the unique impacts of DOT programs, policies, and activities on families and family-specific difficulties, such as the accessibility of transportation to families with young children, and give preference to communities with marriage and birth rates higher than the national average."[58][59]
On his first official day in office, Duffy responded to the 2025 Potomac River mid-air collision from the Federal Aviation Administration headquarters.[60] Immediately following the accident, Duffy instructed an investigation be opened into the cause of the crash and ordered his department to "provide full support to the NTSB and all responding agencies and authorities."[61] During the recovery, he held phone conversations with D.C. mayor Muriel Bowser, Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin, Kansas governor Laura Kelly, and NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy.[62] At approximately 12:30 a.m. EST, Duffy, Bowser, MWAA president and CEO John E. Potter, Senator Jerry Moran, and Senator Roger Marshall delivered the first official press conference regarding the incident at Reagan National Airport.[63][64][65]
On March 7, 2025, The New York Times reported that Sean Duffy had a clash with Elon Musk during a White House cabinet meeting. The secretary criticized DOGE's pressure to dismiss air traffic controllers at a time when his department was facing a series of air accidents. Musk retorted that what Duffy had said was a "lie".[66]
Political positions
Sean Duffy engaged in climate change denial[67] on Fox Business in 2024, saying:
If you say the climate's changing, is it coming from CO2 or is it coming from the sun? Where is – why is the climate changing? And then you would say, let's have a rigorous debate about what is causing it, or what are all the factors that bring us to climate change? And when you have the left that says "we're gonna shut down alternative science or science that challenges our narrative," I think it makes people go "maybe there is a different set of priorities here as opposed to climate change, maybe it actually is an agenda of control."[68]
Electoral history
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Sean Duffy | 132,551 | 52.11 | |||
| Democratic | Julie Lassa | 113,018 | 44.43 | |||
| Independent | Gary Kauther | 8,397 | 3.30 | |||
| Write-ins | 423 | 0.17 | ||||
| Total votes | 254,389 | 100.00 | ||||
| Republican gain from Democratic | ||||||
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Sean Duffy (Incumbent) | 201,720 | 56.1 | ||
| Democratic | Pat Kreitlow | 157,524 | 43.8 | ||
| none | Scattering | 405 | 0.1 | ||
| Write-In | Dale C. Hehner | 20 | 0.0 | ||
| Total votes | 359,669 | 100.0 | |||
| Republican hold | |||||
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Sean Duffy (incumbent) | 169,891 | 59.3 | |
| Democratic | Kelly Westlund | 112,949 | 39.4 | |
| Independent | Lawrence Dale | 3,686 | 1.3 | |
| n/a | Write-ins | 77 | 0.0 | |
| Total votes | 286,603 | 100.0 | ||
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Sean Duffy (incumbent) | 223,418 | 61.6 | |
| Democratic | Mary Hoeft | 138,643 | 38.3 | |
| n/a | Write-ins | 210 | 0.1 | |
| Total votes | 362,271 | 100.0 | ||
| Republican hold | ||||
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republican | Sean Duffy (incumbent) | 194,061 | 60.1 | |
| Democratic | Margaret Engebretson | 124,307 | 38.5 | |
| Independent | Ken Driessen | 4,416 | 1.4 | |
| Democratic | Bob Look (write-in) | 3 | 0.0 | |
| Write-in | 53 | 0.0 | ||
| Total votes | 322,840 | 100.0 | ||
| Republican hold | ||||
- 2008 race for District Attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin
- Sean Duffy (R) (inc.)
- unopposed
- 2006 race for District Attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin
- Sean Duffy (R) (inc.)
- unopposed
- 2004 race for District Attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin
- Sean Duffy (R) (inc.)
- unopposed
- 2002 race for District Attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin
- Sean Duffy (R) (inc.)
- unopposed
Personal life
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Duffy is a practicing Catholic.[69] He is married to Rachel Campos-Duffy, a fellow alumna of The Real World and Fox News personality, whom he met when they were co-stars on Road Rules: All Stars.[70][71] They lived in Ashland, Wisconsin, when Duffy was District Attorney for Ashland County.[70][72][73][74] In late 2011, they moved to Weston so that Duffy would be closer to Central Wisconsin Airport for his commute to Washington, D.C., where he spent three or four days a week.[75][76]
As of August 2019, Duffy and his wife had eight children, and were expecting their ninth that October. On August 26, 2019, Duffy announced that because he and his wife learned that their ninth child would experience health complications, including a heart condition, he was resigning from Congress, effective September 23.[77] Their daughter, Valentina, was born on October 1, with Down syndrome.[78]
In August 2021, Duffy purchased a home in Mendham Township, New Jersey, where he, his wife, and their children currently reside. He is the first New Jersey resident to serve in a presidential cabinet since Lisa P. Jackson, an East Windsor Township resident who was the administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency during the first presidency of Barack Obama.[79]
Duffy's nephew, Erik Johnson, is an American ice hockey defenseman for the Colorado Avalanche.[80]
References
External links
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