Mike Pompeo facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Mike Pompeo
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Official portrait, 2018
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| 70th United States Secretary of State | |
| In office April 26, 2018 – January 20, 2021 |
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| President | Donald Trump |
| Deputy | John Sullivan Stephen Biegun |
| Preceded by | Rex Tillerson |
| Succeeded by | Antony Blinken |
| 6th Director of the Central Intelligence Agency | |
| In office January 23, 2017 – April 26, 2018 |
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| President | Donald Trump |
| Deputy | Gina Haspel |
| Preceded by | John Brennan |
| Succeeded by | Gina Haspel |
| Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Kansas's 4th district |
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| In office January 3, 2011 – January 23, 2017 |
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| Preceded by | Todd Tiahrt |
| Succeeded by | Ron Estes |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Michael Richard Pompeo
December 30, 1963 Orange, California, U.S. |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouses |
Leslie Libert
(m. 1986; div. 1997)Susan Justice Mostrous
(m. 2000) |
| Children | 1 |
| Residences | Wichita, Kansas, U.S. |
| Education | United States Military Academy (BS) Harvard University (JD) |
| Signature |  |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  United States |
| Branch/service |  United States Army |
| Years of service | 1986–1991 |
| Rank |  Captain |
| Unit |
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Michael Richard Pompeo ( born December 30, 1963) is an American politician who served in the administration of Donald Trump as director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 2017 to 2018 and as the 70th United States secretary of state from 2018 to 2021. He also served in the United States House of Representatives from 2011 to 2017.
After graduating from the United States Military Academy in 1986 and his obligatory five-year service as a United States Army officer, Pompeo went on to graduate from Harvard Law School. He worked as an attorney until 1998 and then became an entrepreneur in the aerospace and oilfield industries. Pompeo was elected to the United States House of Representatives in 2010, representing Kansas's 4th congressional district until 2017.
Once a critic of Donald Trump, Pompeo turned into one of his biggest supporters after Trump became the Republican nominee in the 2016 presidential election. Trump appointed him director of the CIA in January 2017 and secretary of state in April 2018. After Trump's victory in the 2024 election, Trump declared that Mike Pompeo and Nikki Haley would not be back in his next administration.
Early life and education
Pompeo was born in Orange, California, the son of Dorothy (born Mercer) and Wayne Pompeo. His paternal great-grandparents, Carlo Pompeo and Adelina Tollis were born in Pacentro, Abruzzo, Italy, and emigrated to the United States in 1899 and 1900, respectively. In 1982, Pompeo graduated from Los Amigos High School in Fountain Valley, California, where he played forward on the basketball team. In 1986, Pompeo graduated first in his class from the United States Military Academy at West Point, where he majored in engineering management. He was a classmate of Brian Bulatao and Ulrich Brechbuhl, who later helped him found Thayer Aerospace. Today, the tight-knit group of graduates—some cheekily refer to themselves (Mike Pompeo, Ulrich Brechhbul and Brian Bulatao), as the “West Point Mafia”—which constitutes a uniquely powerful circle at the highest levels of government.
From 1986 to 1991, Pompeo served in the U.S. Army as an armor officer with the West Germany-based 2nd Squadron, 7th Cavalry in the 4th Infantry Division. He served as a tank platoon leader before becoming a cavalry troop executive officer and then the squadron maintenance officer. Pompeo left the U.S. Army at the rank of captain.
In 1994, Pompeo earned a juris doctor from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review and the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy.
Early career
After graduating from law school, he worked as a lawyer for Williams & Connolly in Washington.
In 1996, Pompeo moved to Wichita, Kansas, where he and three West Point friends, Brian Bulatao, Ulrich Brechbuhl, and Michael Stradinger, acquired three aircraft-parts manufacturers there (Aero Machine, Precision Profiling, B&B Machine) and in St. Louis (Advance Tool & Die), renaming the entity Thayer Aerospace after West Point superintendent Sylvanus Thayer. Venture funding for the private organization included a nearly 20% investment from Koch Industries as well as Dallas-based Cardinal Investment, and Bain & Company (Brechbuhl worked for Bain at the time). Brechbuhl and Stradinger left the company shortly after it was founded, but Pompeo and Bulatao continued.
In 2006, he sold his interest in the company, which by then had been renamed Nex-Tech Aerospace, to Highland Capital Management, which had clients including Lockheed Martin, Gulfstream Aerospace, Cessna Aircraft, Boeing, Spirit AeroSystems and Raytheon Aircraft. Pompeo then became president of Sentry International, an oilfield equipment manufacturer that was also a partner of Koch Industries.
In 2017, when Pompeo became head of the CIA, he named his former business partner, Brian Bulatao, the agency's chief operating officer.
U.S. House of Representatives (2011–2017)
Elections
Pompeo represented Kansas's 4th congressional district from 2011 until his January 2017 appointment to director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
In the 2010 election, Pompeo won the Republican primary for Kansas's 4th District congressional seat with 39% of the vote, defeating state senator Jean Schodorf (who received 24%) and two other candidates. Late in the primary, Schodorf began to surge in the polls, prompting two outside groups—Common Sense Issues and Americans for Prosperity—to spend tens of thousands of dollars in the campaign's final days to attack Schodorf and support Pompeo. A month before the general election, Pompeo was endorsed by former U.S. Senator and former presidential candidate Bob Dole. In the general election, Pompeo defeated Democratic nominee Raj Goyle, a member of the Kansas House of Representatives. Pompeo received 59% of the vote (117,171 votes) to 36% for Goyle (71,866).
During Pompeo's campaign, its affiliated Twitter account praised as a "good read" a news article that called Goyle, his Indian-American opponent, a "turban topper" who "could be a muslim, a hindu, a buddhist etc. who knows". Pompeo later apologized to Goyle for the tweet. Pompeo received $80,000 in donations during the campaign from Koch Industries and its employees.
In the 2012 election, Pompeo defeated Democratic nominee Robert Tillman by a margin of 62–32%. Koch Industries gave Pompeo's campaign $110,000.
In the 2014 election, Pompeo won the general election with 67% of the vote, defeating Democrat Perry Schuckman.
In the 2016 election, Pompeo beat Democrat Daniel B. Giroux in the general election with 61% of the vote.
Tenure in Congress
Pompeo served on the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the United States House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the United States House Energy Subcommittee on Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection, the United States House Energy Subcommittee on Energy, the United States House Intelligence Subcommittee on the CIA, and the United States House Select Committee on Benghazi.
Pompeo was a member of the Congressional Constitution Caucus.
Pompeo was original sponsor of the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2015.
CIA Director (2017–2018)
On November 18, 2016, President-elect Donald Trump announced that he would nominate Pompeo to be the director of the Central Intelligence Agency. He was confirmed by the Senate on January 23, 2017, with a vote of 66–32, and sworn in later that day. In his confirmation he failed to disclose the links between his company in Kansas and a Chinese government owned firm.
In February 2017, Pompeo traveled to Turkey and Saudi Arabia. He met with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to discuss policy on Syria and ISIL. Pompeo honored the then-crown prince of Saudi Arabia Muhammad bin Nayef with the CIA's "George Tenet" Medal. It was the first reaffirmation of Saudi Arabia–United States relations since Trump took office in January 2017. In March 2017, Pompeo formally invoked state secrets privilege to prevent CIA officers, including Gina Haspel and James Cotsana, from being compelled to testify in the trial of Bruce Jessen and James Elmer Mitchell.
In June 2017, Pompeo named Michael D'Andrea head of the CIA's Iran mission center.
In August 2017, Pompeo took direct command of the Counterintelligence Mission Center, the department which helped to launch an investigation into the many suspicious links between Trump associates and Russian officials and spies. Former CIA officials, including John Sipher, expressed concern given Pompeo's proximity to the White House and Donald Trump.
In September 2017, Pompeo sought authority for the CIA to make covert drone strikes without the Pentagon's involvement, including inside Afghanistan. During Easter weekend 2018, Pompeo visited North Korea and met with Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un to discuss the upcoming 2018 North Korea–United States summit between Kim and Trump.
Pompeo usually personally delivered the president's daily brief in the Oval Office. At Trump's request, Pompeo met with former NSA official William E. Binney to discuss his doubts of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
At the suggestion of Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, Pompeo planned to hire chaplains at the CIA. In an April 2019 speech at Texas A&M University, Pompeo said "I was the CIA director. We lied, we cheated, we stole. It was like we had entire training courses . . . it reminds you of the glory of the American experiment."
U.S. secretary of state (2018–2021)
Nomination and confirmation
President Trump announced on March 13, 2018, that he would nominate Pompeo to serve as secretary of state, succeeding Rex Tillerson, who stepped down on March 31, 2018.
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On April 23, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 11–9 in favor of sending Pompeo's nomination to the full Senate, with Senator Chris Coons voting "present" and Johnny Isakson, who was absent that day, voting "yes by proxy". In the interest of saving the committee's time, Coons decided to vote "present", as the vote would have been tied if he had voted no on the nomination with Isakson absent, a situation that would have nullified his vote. The Senate floor vote took place on April 26 and Pompeo was confirmed by the full Senate by a 57–42 vote, with five of ten Democratic senators running for reelection in 2018 in states that Trump won in 2016, voting to confirm Pompeo.
Pompeo was sworn in on April 26, 2018. In testimony before the senate, he promised to prioritize improving the low-morale issue at the State Department.
| Confirmation process | ||
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| Voting body | Vote date | Vote results |
| Senate Committee on Foreign Relations | April 12, 2018 | 11–9 |
| Full Senate | April 23, 2018 | 57–42 |
Tenure as secretary of state
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During his tenure as secretary of state, Pompeo was described as among the staunchest Trump loyalists in the Cabinet.
Pompeo played a role in Trump's three summits with North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un. The summits failed to achieve any reduction in North Korea's nuclear arsenal. In a 2021 interview with a conservative podcast, Pompeo said that "I regret that we didn't make more progress" on North Korea.
In August 2018, Pompeo thanked Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman "for Saudi Arabia's support for northeast Syria's urgent stabilization needs". Pompeo and Crown Prince also discussed the situation in war-torn Yemen.
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On October 10, 2018, Pompeo said Israel "is everything we want the entire Middle East to look like going forward" and that the Israel–United States relations are "stronger than ever". In March 2019, when questioned regarding Israel's conflicts with Iran and following a visit to the Western Wall with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Pompeo spoke to "the work that our administration's done to make sure that this democracy in the Middle East, that this Jewish state, remains ... I am confident that the Lord is at work here."
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On January 7, 2019, Pompeo began a diplomatic tour of the Middle East to assure regional U.S. partners that, amid the sudden withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria, the U.S. mission to degrade and destroy the Islamic State and to counter Iranian influence in the region had not changed. The trip included stops in Jordan, Iraq, Egypt, and the Gulf nations.
Pompeo announced on January 23, 2019, that Juan Guaidó would be recognized by the U.S. as the legitimate interim president of Venezuela, and that American diplomats in Caracas would remain at their posts, even as Nicolás Maduro gave them three days to evacuate the country upon Guaidó assumption of the presidency.
On May 14, 2019, Pompeo met for three hours with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and for ninety minutes with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi, Russia. According to a Kremlin aide, they discussed Syria, North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, and the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START).
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Pompeo defended the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, saying Turkey has a "legitimate security concern" with "a terrorist threat to their south". However, Pompeo denied that the United States had given a "green light" for Turkey to attack the Kurds.
In November 2019, Pompeo said the U.S. no longer views Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank as a violation of international law, breaking with decades of U.S. policy.
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Pompeo praised the Trump-brokered normalization agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates as an "enormous" step forward on the "right path". On August 27, 2020, Pompeo, after visiting Omani Sultan Haitham bin Tarik Al-Said, concluded a Middle East trip aimed at encouraging Arab countries to follow the UAE's move. According to Hugh Lovatt of the European Council on Foreign Relations, "... the lack of any additional public commitments during Secretary Pompeo's regional tour looks like an anti-climax [and] it is possible that a lack of clarity on the U.S. commitment to deliver F-35s to the UAE could have also played a part in slowing a second wave of normalisation."
Final days in office
After Joe Biden won the 2020 United States presidential election and Trump refused to concede while making false claims of fraud, Pompeo, when asked whether there would be a "smooth transition" to the Biden administration, responded on November 10, 2020: "There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration, all right. We're ready. The world is watching what's taking place here. We're gonna count all the votes. When the process is complete, they'll be electors selected."
The day after a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol to prevent the counting of the electoral votes (thus formalizing the upcoming presidency of Biden), the State Department told diplomats to affirm Biden's victory. On January 8, Pompeo met with Biden's incoming secretary of state Antony Blinken. While other Trump Cabinet members resigned or took a low profile after the attack on the Capitol, in which Trump's role was debated, Pompeo remained a vocal defender of Trump, sending a Twitter message that promoted him as a potential Nobel Peace Prize nominee. He urged followers of the State Department's Twitter account to follow his personal account; criticized the news media, and complained about purported "censorship" of conservatives on social media websites.
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On January 12, 2021, Pompeo cancelled a planned European trip when European diplomats declined to meet with him.
Pompeo made a large number of foreign policy decisions during the lame duck period of the Trump administration in the weeks leading up to the inauguration of Joe Biden, including many likely to be reversed under Biden. Pompeo ordered the re-designation of Cuba as a "state sponsor of terrorism" and the designation of the Houthi rebels as a "foreign terrorist organization". The latter decision indirectly reduced humanitarian aid to Yemeni people, and it was quickly reversed by the Biden administration.
Post-Trump administration (2021–present)
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In January 2021, Pompeo joined the Hudson Institute as a distinguished fellow.
In February 2021, Pompeo founded the Champion American Values PAC (CAVPAC).
Pompeo expressed support for the Biden administration's extension of the withdrawal timeline of U.S. troops from Afghanistan to August 2021. He ultimately distanced himself and the Trump administration from the situation facing Afghanistan post-withdrawal, following the fall of Kabul to the Taliban.
Pompeo was paid by the Taiwanese government-affiliated thinktank Prospect Foundation to deliver a speech on March 4, 2022. Reporting of Pompeo's pay varied, with $150,000 being the most commonly reported figure. In his speech, Pompeo called on the United States to recognize the Republic of China as an independent and sovereign country.
In January 2023, HarperCollins published Pompeo's memoir of his tenure in the Trump administration, Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love.
Pompeo considered a candidacy for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination and toured early primary states, but ultimately announced his decision not to run in April 2023.
Alongside David M. Friedman, Pompeo featured in the 2023 documentary Route 60: The Biblical Highway, directed by Matt Crouch.
In 2023, Pompeo joined the board of directors of Cyabra, an Israeli counter-disinformation company which has recorded a 20% revenue growth in recent years.
In October 2023, Pompeo became Of counsel for Texas-based law firm Oberheiden, P.C., a federal criminal defense law firm, joining former US Congressman Trey Gowdy and former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe.
In February 2025, Pompeo was hired by Columbia University as a distinguished fellow at its Institute of Global Politics to teach a course on diplomacy, decision-making, and organizational leadership.
Political positions
Pompeo opposed the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
He opposes same-sex marriage and sponsored bills to let states prevent same-sex couples from marrying.
Foreign policy
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In a 2013 speech on the House floor, Pompeo said Muslim leaders who fail to denounce acts of terrorism done in the name of Islam are "potentially complicit" in the attacks. The Council on American–Islamic Relations called on him to revise his remarks, calling them "false and irresponsible". In 2016, ACT for America gave Pompeo a "national security eagle award" for his comments on Islam. Pompeo has been a frequent guest on anti-Muslim activist Frank Gaffney's radio show for the Center for Security Policy. As a congressman, he cosponsored legislation to add the Muslim Brotherhood to the United States State Department list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations.
In 2017, it was reported that Pompeo had expressed desire for regime change in North Korea. In July 2017, he said "It would be a great thing to denuclearize the peninsula, to get those weapons off of that, but the thing that is most dangerous about it is the character who holds the control over them today."
While being interviewed on a podcast in 2023, Pompeo claimed that Israel had a biblical claim to the Palestinian territories, and therefore the situation could not be defined as an occupation.
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Energy and environment
Speaking about climate change in 2013, Pompeo said: "There are scientists who think lots of different things about climate change. There's some who think we're warming, there's some who think we're cooling, there's some who think that the last 16 years have shown a pretty stable climate environment." He has said, "Federal policy should be about the American family, not worshipping a radical environmental agenda." In 2009 Pompeo signed the No Climate Tax pledge of Americans for Prosperity.
In 2015, Pompeo opposed the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions by the United States and supported eliminating the United States federal register of greenhouse gas emissions. As a member of the United States House Committee on Energy and Commerce, he voted for two resolutions disapproving of the Clean Power Plan implemented by the United States Environmental Protection Agency during the Obama administration.
In May 2019, Pompeo acted against environmental protection at the Arctic Council. He refused to sign on to a joint statement addressing the need for protection of the Arctic region from the threat of rapidly melting ice unless all mentions of climate change were removed from the document. He said, "Climate change is actually good for the Arctic, since melting ice caps are 'opening up new shipping routes' and thus making it more economically viable to expand oil drilling in the region."
Personal life
Pompeo married Leslie Libert in 1986. The couple later divorced. He then married Susan Justice Mostrous in 2000 and formally adopted her son, Nicholas.
Pompeo is affiliated with the Evangelical Presbyterian Church. Pompeo served as a local church deacon from 2007 to 2009 and taught Sunday school.
In 2014, Pompeo told a church group that Christians needed to "know that Jesus Christ as our savior is truly the only solution for our world". In 2015 in a talk at a church, Pompeo said that "politics is a never-ending struggle ... until the Rapture."
In an interview with Fox News in January 2022, Pompeo said he has lost over 90 lb (41 kg) in the prior six months through self-guided exercises and dietary changes. Experts were skeptical of Pompeo's claim that such changes could have produced this weight loss in a man his age, and The Guardian said that Pompeo's history of misleading statements cast further doubt on his claims.
Foreign honors
Order of Brilliant Star with Special Grand Cordon (2021)
Doctor Honoris Causa, University of Tirana (2022)
See also
In Spanish: Mike Pompeo para niños
- Foreign interference in the 2020 United States elections
- List of members of the American Legion
- List of people who have held multiple United States Cabinet-level positions
- Timeline of investigations into Trump and Russia (2019)
