Former Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, who is also the wife of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is resigning from the Bloomberg Philanthropies board because the foundation is stepping up its anti-coal donations.
Chao tendered her resignation over the weekend, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.
Ex-New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s foundation announced Wednesday that it would award $48 million to cities to help them transition from coal-fired power plants to sources that emit less carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that scientists say drives climate change.
McConnell’s fall 2014 election opponent, former Democratic Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, had tried to turn Chao’s position on the board into a hot-button issue because she said the philanthropy’s work undermined the state’s coal industry.
Bloomberg is a supporter of President Obama’s environmental policies, including an Environmental Protection Agency regulation that seeks to limit carbon emissions from power plants.
McConnell campaigned on a platform of blocking the EPA rule. He, like many Republicans and coal-state Democrats, said the EPA effort would raise electricity prices and threatened coal industry jobs in his state.
