Board Chair

Serving as the former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture (USDA) and a former U.S. Representative from Mississippi’s 2nd Congressional District, A. Michael Espy is a nationally recognized leader in agricultural policy, trade, rural development, and international agribusiness. He currently works in the private sector as an attorney, counselor, and agricultural advisor, leading his law firm, Mike Espy, PLLC, where he advises agribusiness companies, food organizations, and government entities on a wide range of agricultural, trade, regulatory, and business matters.

Secretary Espy served seven years in the U.S. House of Representatives after his election in 1986, becoming the first African American elected to Congress from Mississippi since the Reconstruction era. During his tenure, he served on the House Agriculture and Budget Committees, and on the House’s Select Committee on Hunger, as its subcommittee chairman for Domestic Hunger. Prior to Congress, he worked as a trial lawyer, served as Assistant Attorney General for the State of Mississippi, and as Director of the Mississippi Office of Consumer Protection.

As the 25th U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Espy led the GATT and NAFTA trade negotiations, expanded global markets for American agricultural commodities, reformed USDA’s food inspection system, and strengthened the nation’s nutrition, anti-hunger, and rural development programs. Under his leadership, USDA’s bureaucratic structure was fundamentally reformed, and its commodity outreach, crop reporting, and marketing programs were modernized.

Mike Espy has served as a member of the Advisory Committee of the U.S. Export-Import Bank, is a 2024 Harvard Fellow, and served as Chairman of the Board of Hope Enterprise Corporation, a billion-dollar community development financial institution supporting economic growth across the Mid-South.