First on Fox: Trump Cabinet nominee Loeffler pledges to donate salary to charity if confirmed
EXCLUSIVE: Former Sen. Kelly Loeffler, President Donald Trump’s nominee to serve as Small Business Administration (SBA) administrator, plans to donate her entire federal salary to charity, Fox News Digital has learned.
Loeffler, a prominent business executive and philanthropist who served as a senator from Georgia for two years, goes in front of the Senate’s Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee on Wednesday for her confirmation hearing.
If confirmed, Loeffler says she would donate her annual federal pay of approximately $207,500 to charity.
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The pledge by Loeffler, whose net worth is estimated at roughly $1 billion, follows her actions in Congress from 2019 to 2021, when she donated her Senate salary of $174,000 per year to over 40 Georgia charities and nonprofits.
Among those included were food banks, faith groups and organizations opposed to abortion, foster care/adoption groups as well as organizations promoting health care, agriculture, education, law enforcement, and disaster relief.
Loeffler also donated $1 million to Phoebe Putney Hospital in Albany at the height of the pandemic, when the city in Southwest Georgia was one of the hardest hit in the nation.
Loeffler, who hails from a family of small business owners and entrepreneurs, was raised working on the family farm in Illinois. After becoming the first in her family to graduate college, she spent nearly three decades working her way up in the private sector.
Along with her husband Jeff, Loeffler built a Fortune 500 financial services and technology company from 100 employees to 15,000. Loeffler later launched another company, named Bakkt, as its founding CEO and first employee. She was also a part owner of the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream.
Loeffler and her husband have long been major donors to Republican causes and and candidates, including Trump. Loeffler served as co-chair of the president-elect’s inaugural committee.
“Like President Trump, Senator Loeffler left behind a successful career in the private sector to advance the America First agenda. Should she be confirmed, she will continue the practice of donating her federal salary to charities and nonprofits across the country – and put her full focus on working to make the Small Business Administration a gateway to the American Dream for entrepreneurs across the country,” Loeffler spokeswoman Caitlin O’Dea told Fox News.
While successful in the business world, Loeffler was not well known until becoming a politician.
After GOP Sen. Johnny Isakson resigned from the Senate at the end of 2019 due to his deteriorating health, Republican Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia appointed Loeffler to fill Isakson’s unexpired term until the next regular election.
Loeffler narrowly lost to Democrat Raphael Warnock in a runoff election in January 2021, after no candidate topped 50% of the vote in a crowded field of contenders in the November 2020 Senate election.