If Chris Wright is confirmed as Donald Trump’s energy secretary, the Liberty Energy CEO will become the 11th Coloradan to sit on a presidential cabinet and the second from the state to head the Department of Energy.

It’s a robust yield for the relatively small state all the more distinctive since the roster boasts seven interior secretaries, including three this century.

Like Wright, six of the previous cabinet members from Colorado were appointed by Republican presidents — including one who served under Trump in the president-elect’s first administration — while four worked for Democrats, though that number includes a secretary who helmed two different departments, consecutively.

Unlike nearly all of the Coloradans who have been named to cabinet positions, Wright is neither a lawyer nor a politician, though it’s near certain he’ll be a lightning rod for controversy as he enacts his boss’s policies, like most of his predecessors were.

Currently numbering 26 — 15 department heads, 10 additional cabinet-level positions and the vice president — the cabinet meets in a stately room adjacent to the Oval Office and is the chief advisory body to the president. Its composition has expanded and contracted over the years, as executive agencies have been created, abolished and elevated to cabinet status. In addition, the other positions vary from president to president, with offices in the Biden White House including director of national intelligence, CIA director, trade representative and director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

The Coloradans who’ve served on cabinets each directed executive departments, from the Departments of Interior and Energy to Agriculture, Transportation and Veterans Affairs.

The first cabinet official from Colorado showed up soon after statehood, when Henry M. Teller — one of the state’s first two U.S. senators, elected by the General Assembly in 1876 — joined Republican Chester Arthur’s administration as interior secretary in 1882, serving until 1885. A lawyer, Teller advocated for Native American rights, opposing assimilation policies and attempts to allocate tribal lands to individuals. After his tenure, Teller returned to Colorado and was elected — again by the legislature, before the popular election of senators — to another four terms in the U.S. Senate.

The next Coloradan to join a cabinet — also as interior secretary — was physician Hubert Work, who served as Warren Harding’s postmaster general until the Republican appointed Work to his cabinet in 1923 shortly before dying in office. Harding’s successor, Calvin Coolidge, kept Work on at Interior through 1928, where he oversaw the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, which granted U.S. citizenship to Native Americans. Before he went to DC, Work chaired the Colorado Republican Party for one year.

Two Colorado New Dealers served in Democrat Harry S. Truman’s cabinet after each had spent lengthy stints in FDR’s administration.

Truman’s agriculture secretary from 1948 to 1953, lawyer Charles F. Brannan, advocated for the failed Brannan Plan, which would have provided government payments to small-scale farmers, while letting the market set commodity prices, while also encouraging rural development, soil conservation and expanding markets. After returning to Colorado, Brannan lost a U.S. Senate primary to Democratic U.S. Rep. John Carroll, who went on to win a term in the Senate.

As secretary of interior from 1948 to 1953, Oscar Chapman, a lawyer, expanded national parks, promoted Native American rights and oversaw Bureau of Reclamation water projects, including the Colorado River Storage Project. He also promoted statehood for Hawaii, which had been under Interior’s domain.

James Watt, Republican Ronald Reagan’s interior secretary from 1981 to 1983, enjoyed perhaps the most controversial of the Coloradans’ cabinet terms. President of the conservative Mountain States Legal Foundation before his appointment, the lawyer drew sustained criticism for reversing federal policy by favoring mining and fossil fuel extraction on public lands. Watt resigned under bipartisan pressure for an insensitive remark describing the diverse makeup of a coal leasing commission: ”We have every kind of mixture you can have — I have a Black, I have a woman, two Jews and a cripple. And we have talent.”

Watt died last year at age 85, but the other five Colorado cabinet alumnae from the modern era are all still active.

After serving two terms as Denver mayor, lawyer and former state lawmaker Federico Peña joined Democrat Bill Clinton’s cabinet, first as secretary of transportation from 1993 to 1997 — a nod to Peña’s role championing the construction of Denver International Airport — and then as secretary of energy, from 1997 to 1998. The first Hispanic secretary to hold both posts, Peña focused on modernizing infrastructure at the departments, from promoting high speed rail and implementing the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act at Transportation to steering nuclear security and climate change initiatives at Energy. Since leaving government, Peña has worked in private equity and serves on numerous corporate and nonprofit boards.

A veteran of Watt’s Mountain States Legal Foundation, former Colorado Attorney General Gale Norton served as Republican George W. Bush’s first interior secretary — and was the first woman to hold the position — from 2001 to 2006, where she pushed for expanding oil and gas drilling in the West. Norton worked as general counsel for a division of Royal Dutch Shell after leaving the cabinet and later founded an Aurora-based consulting firm, Norton Regulatory Strategies, which focuses on navigating environmental regulations.

The other Coloradan tapped by Bush was lawyer, real estate developer and former Republican National Committee Chairman Jim Nicholson, who ran the Department of Veterans Affairs from 2005 to 2007 after serving as Bush’s ambassador to the Vatican for four years. At the VA, Nicholson focused on bolstering medical services and expanding access to care. Back in Colorado, he works as senior counsel with Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP and is chairman of Daniels Fund, a multi-billion dollar Denver-based foundation.

Four years after his election as U.S. senator, former Colorado Attorney General Ken Salazar stepped down to become Democrat Barack Obama’s first interior secretary in 2009 and served until 2013. Salazar pioneered development of renewable energy on public lands and tightened offshore drilling regulations after Interior’s botched response to the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. After leaving his public position, Salazar opened the Denver office of international law firm Wilmer Hale but returned in 2021 as Democrat Joe Biden’s ambassador to Mexico.

Lawyer and lobbyist David Bernhardt, a Western Slope native, served as Trump’s interior secretary from 2019 to 2021, prioritizing energy development — including both fossil fuels and renewables — on public lands, while rolling back environmental regulations. Previously, Bernhardt was Norton’s chief of staff when she ran the department. He bracketed his cabinet post at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP, the powerhouse Denver-based law and lobbying firm.

Ernest Luning has covered politics for Colorado Politics and its predecessor publication, The Colorado Statesman, since 2009. He’s analyzed the exploits, foibles and history of state campaigns and politicians since 2018 in the weekly Trail Mix column.

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