Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo

Michael Richard Pompeo was born in Orange, California, on December 30, 1963, to Wayne and Dorothy (Mercer) Pompeo. His paternal great-grandparents, Carlo Pompeo and Adelina Tollis, were born in the community of Pacentro (population 1,269 in the 2007 Census) in the province of L’Aquila in the region of Abruzzo. Carlo immigrated to the United States in 1899 and Adelina, in 1900.
Pompeo grew up in Santa Ana and was a forward on the varsity basketball team of the Los Amigos High School in Fountain Valley, California, before he graduated in June 1982. He then enrolled in the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. He finished first in his class with a degree in engineering management in June, 1986. After graduating, he married Leslie Libert. They had no children and later divorced. Pompeo served in the U.S. Army, 2nd Squadron, 7th Cavalry, 4th Infantry Division, based in West Germany, first as an armor officer, then as a tank platoon leader, then as a troop executive officer, before becoming the squadron maintenance officer. He left with the rank of captain in June, 1991.
He applied to Harvard Law School and was admitted in September, 1991. As a student, he served as one of the editors of the Harvard Law Review and the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. He received his Juris Doctor degree in June 1994 and was hired by the law firm of Williams & Connolly in Washington, D.C., where he worked mainly in tax litigation.
After two years, he left the firm to move to his mother’s home town of Wichita, Kansas, where he co-founded Thayer Aerospace with three West Point friends. He married his wife, Susan Justice Mostrous, in 2000. He adopted her son, Nicholas. In 2006, he sold his interest in the company to become president of Sentry International, an oil field equipment manufacturer.
In 2010, he decided to run for public office and was elected as a Republican to the House of Representatives in November. He was sworn in as the U.S. Representative for the 4th District of Kansas in January 2011. He was re-elected in November 2012, 2014, and 2016. During his tenure, he served on the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Intelligence Subcommittee on the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
President Donald J. Trump nominated him to be the Director of the CIA, and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate by a vote of 66 to 32 on January 23, 2017. He was sworn in as the 6th Director later that day. After serving almost 14 months, he was nominated by President Trump to be the Secretary of State. The U.S. Senate confirmed him by a vote of 57 to 42 on April 23, 2018. He was sworn in as the 70th Secretary and the first Italian American to occupy the office three days later. In early October 2018, he embarked on a four-nation European tour. His first stop was Vatican City where he met with Pope Francis. He then traveled to his ancestral home town of Pacentro for a visit. During his tenure, Pompeo took a strong stance against the Islamic Republic of Iran. As a result, Iran threatened to assassinate him.
Pompeo resigned on January 20, 2021, when Joseph R. Biden Jr. was inaugurated as President. Nevertheless, Biden provided him with a federal security protection team after Pompeo left office. Initially, he became a distinguished fellow at the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington, D.C. In January 2023, Harper Collins published Pompeo’s memoir of his tenure in the first Trump administration. Later in 2023, he became a director on the board of Cyabra, an Israeli counter-disinformation firm. In October of that same year, he became Of Counsel for the Texas law firm of Oberheiden, P.C.
When former President Trump was criminally charged with taking classified documents from the White House, Pompeo criticized Trump for doing so. As a result, when Trump was re-elected President in November 2024, he announced that Pompeo would not be appointed to any position in his second administration. Later, on January 23, 2025, three days after Trump was inaugurated for a second term, he revoked the government security protection for Pompeo. Consequently, Pompeo continues to practice law in Texas at the age of 61.

Sources, all accessed January 24, 2025:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Pompeo
https://www.biography.com/political-figure/mike-pompeo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacentro
https://apnews.com/article/trump-pompeo
https://www.Hudson.org
Mike Pompeo meets the Pope in Rome, Daily Mail, October 3, 2019.