Angela Chao, a shipping CEO and sister-in-law of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), has been confirmed to have died in a Texas ranch after her car was submerged into a pond, according to an incident report.
According to the report from the local fire department EMS personnel, Ms. Chao’s body was extracted from the water on Feb. 11 at midnight, in Texas Hill Country, Blanco County.
Ms. Chao, 50, was CEO of New York-based dry bulk shipping company, Foremost Group, which was doing business mainly with communist China.
While officials from Blanco County determined that Ms. Chao had “succumbed from being under the water” and that there was no foul play, a letter from the county office to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton stated the incident was “not a typical accident.”
Ms. Chao died on land owned by her husband, Jim Breyer, and the investigation into the cause of her death is ongoing.
A family statement at the time did not disclose details about her death and authorities in Blanco County have not released additional information.
Rescue workers called for a dive team upon arriving at the scene but none were available. One emergency unit arrived at 12:28 a.m., about 24 minutes after getting a call.
Deputies requested devices to break the window of the vehicle and an emergency services worker and firefighter entered the water with rescue tools.
Ms. Chao was found unresponsive after her car, a Tesla, and was pulled from the water, Blanco County emergency services chief Ben Oakley said. She was pulled from the vehicle and attempts were made to resuscitate her.
“Although the preliminary investigation indicated that this was an unfortunate accident, the Sheriff’s Office is still investigating this accident as a criminal matter until they have sufficient evidence to rule out criminal activity,” the county’s public information officer, Kimberly Ashby, wrote in a Feb. 29 letter, which was first obtained by CNBC.
It states that the sheriff’s office is withholding key details such as the exact location of the accident and 911 logs, arguing that early release of records “could hinder their investigation.”
However, officials appear to have backtracked from the statement since it gained national attention.
Ms. Chao was the youngest of six sisters to immigrant parents who moved to the United States from China in the late 1950s. Her eldest sibling, Elaine Chao, is married to Mr. McConnell and served as transportation secretary under former President Donald Trump and labor secretary under President George W. Bush.
Suspicious Elements
Driving into a pond of water is not something easily done by a sober person, except in certain circumstances, which remains a subject of the investigation.
Officials with Blanco County fire and emergency services did not immediately return an email Monday seeking information about the accident.
Ms. Chao’s husband, Jim Breyer, had served as co-chair of IDG Capital, a Beijing-based investment management firm that the Department of Defense in January listed as a “Chinese military” company. He also presided over the advisory board of the business school of China’s state-funded Tsinghua University.
In mid-January, just weeks before Ms. Chao’s death, Mr. Breyer said he had paused investing in China for 18 months and had no plans to invest more money there “for the foreseeable future,” suggesting a souring of relations.
The county’s public information officer, Kimberly Ashby, said “that was not a typical accident,” contrary to the initial official statement.
Mitch McConnell
Mr. McConnell seemed to echo that, saying with a cryptic message on Feb. 28, as he announced his departure from the Senate Republican leadership:
“As some of you may know, this has been a particularly difficult time for my family. We tragically lost Elaine’s younger sister Angela, just a few weeks ago. When you lose a loved one, particularly at a young age, there’s a certain introspection that accompanies the grieving process.”
He continued, “Perhaps it is God’s way of reminding you of your own life’s journey to reprioritize the impact on the world that we will all inevitably leave behind.”
Investigative journalist Peter Schweizer has noted that Mr. McConnell had hardline positions on communist China before his marriage to Elaine Chao, Angela Chao’s sister.
In 1994, he was invited by China State Shipbuilding Corp. to meet then-Party leader Jiang Zemin and Vice Premier Li Lanqing as arranged by Ms. Chao’s father, James Chao.
In 2008, Mr. McConnell received a multimillion-dollar “gift” from Mr. Chao that increased Mr. McConnell’s net worth nearly tenfold.
Mr. McConnell helped to continue China’s most-favored-nation status with the United States, as he cosponsored S.2277, which removed the requirement that China had to demonstrate progress on human rights after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
Caixin Global, a mainland Chinese media outlet backed by former Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan, which reports financial news, broke the story even before U.S. media, claiming Ms. Chao’s car was hit by a truck.
Angela Chao
Ms. Chao’s family has forged deep political and business ties at China’s top levels.
Ms. Chao was CEO of the shipping business Foremost Group since 2018 and was a founding member of The Asian American Foundation.
She lived in Austin, Texas, and served on the boards of the American Bureau of Shipping Council, the Bank of China, and a holding company for China State Shipbuilding.
She was also a former vice chair of the Council of China’s Foreign Trade. China State Shipbuilding Corp builds ships for the People’s Liberation Army-Navy while the Council of China’s Foreign Trade is a promotional group created by Beijing to facilitate Chinese trade worldwide. These positions show that Ms. Chao was deeply embedded in the CCP’s infrastructure, in positions that average CCP members don’t have.
Ms. Chao was dismissed as an independent director of the Bank of China in 2022 after relations between the bank and Evergrande soured.
Her father maintained connections to Chinese communists at the highest levels.
Lastly, according to China Insights, the Chao family “is known in overseas Chinese circles as ‘The First Chinese American Family,’” with Mr. Chao known as the “Chinese Ship King.”
Elaine Chao
The Chao family’s business connection with China became a focal point while Ms. Chao’s elder sister, Elaine Chao, served as the transportation secretary in the Trump administration.
A 2021 report by the Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General concluded that Elaine Chao used her position to further her family’s interests. Two divisions of the Justice Department declined to open a criminal investigation.
The Associated Press, Eva Fu, and Stu Cvrk contributed to this report.
