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US FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. DESIGN BY FORBES.
She and her husband own two homes in California and are sitting on a fortune worth an estimated $8 million.
Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm came from a family familiar with poverty. Her grandfather, distraught that he could not provide for his wife and children, took his own life. Her father, born in a log cabin in Canada with no running water, began working in a sawmill at age 11. And Granholm, as a four year old, immigrated to the United States with her parents, who were in search of a new opportunity.
They found it. Granholm’s father started as a bank teller and rose to become the head of a bank. His daughter attended Harvard Law School and grew up to become the first woman to serve as governor of Michigan. Today, she and her husband Daniel Mulhern own two homes in California and are sitting on a fortune worth an estimated $8 million.
Much of their money came after she left the governor’s mansion. In 2011, she and her husband published a book about her experience in office. They also began teaching at University of California, Berkeley, where she went to undergrad. Granholm joined the boards of Dow Chemical and Talmer Bancorp. She became an adviser for a clean energy program with the Pew Charitable Trust. She got her own TV show, on Al Gore’s network, and signed speaking contracts with two different firms, Keppler Speakers and the Harry Walker Agency.
From January 2019 to December last year, Granholm reported earning at least $2 million, according to a financial disclosure report she filed before becoming energy secretary. The filing showed diverse income streams: $160,000 for sitting on the board of Navy shipbuilder Marinette Marine Corporation, $200,000 for being a talking head on CNN, $390,000 in salary in the political consulting and speaking business she started with her husband. Granholm also earned more than $170,000 in speaking fees, delivering talks to groups like the American Hospital Association (which paid $20,000), the Chatham University ($18,000) and AIPAC New England ($10,000).
Jennifer Granholm Vs. Rick Perry
Both former governors, Granholm of Michigan and Perry of Texas, had stints on company boards after leaving office.
Since Granholm took office as Secretary of Energy earlier this year, she has been in the process of unwinding herself from assets that could pose conflict-of-interest concerns. In March, she divested at least $190,000 of investments, including stock in companies such as Apple, Microsoft and Visa. Next, in May, she exercised her stock options in Proterra, an electric vehicle company where she served as a director. She pocketed $1.6 million, according to an energy department spokesperson. But Granholm won’t have to get rid of every stock she owns. Based on her ethics agreement, it seems that she plans to hold onto shares of real estate business Redfin, pharmaceutical firm Gilead and Uber.
In the meantime, her financial interests have already caused some headache. In April, President Joe Biden conducted a virtual tour of a Proterra factory in South Carolina, leading critics to question why, of all the electric vehicle companies in the country, Biden chose to visit one with financial ties to a cabinet secretary. Republican Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming asked the inspector general of the energy department to investigate Granholm’s “potential conflict of interest.” The White House and the DOE have said that Granholm and the department were not involved in the decision to visit the facility.
Other optics issues may arise for Granholm. Her husband plans to maintain a consulting business while she serves, according to her ethics agreement. Past clients of his have included companies such as Google, Cisco and Facebook.