Christopher Drake Heinz (born 1973) is an American businessman and investment manager. He is an heir to the billionaire fortune from the family food company Heinz.
Chris Heinz is the youngest son of United States Senator Henry John Heinz III (d. 1991) and Teresa Heinz Kerry. He is the great-great-grandson of the industrialist and founder of the H.J. Heinz Co. [1] He has two brothers, H. John Heinz IV (born 4 November 1966) and Andre Heinz. He and his brothers served on the board of The Heinz Endowments chaired by their mother. [2] His father was killed in the 1991 mid-air collision of a helicopter and plane (Merion air disaster).
Chris Heinz is a stepson of the United States Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, and stepbrother of Alexandra Kerry and Vanessa Kerry. Heinz married Alexandra Lewis in February 2007. [3] They have two children. [4]
In 2004 when his stepfather John Kerry, was the Democratic nominee for president of the United States, Heinz quit his job working as a venture capitalist to work as a fundraiser and surrogate speaker for Kerry’s campaign. Heinz worked on his stepfather's Presidential campaign, [5] [6] and spoke at the 2004 Democratic National Convention where he was considered a plausible candidate for a 2006 seat in the U.S. Congress. [2] [7] In 2005, [8] he co-founded Rosemont Capital (named for the family’s Fox Chapel property near Pittsburgh) until departing in 2014. [1] He was a partner in the Washington, D.C. firm Rosemont Seneca from its founding in 2009 until 2014, when he ended his working relationship with Hunter Biden and Devon Archer, after Biden and Archer took board positions on Burisma Holdings (a Ukrainian fracking gas company), which was owned by Ukrainian oligarch Mykola Zlochevsky, the former Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources. [9] In 2015, he relocated to Pittsburgh. [1]
He has served on the board of the Navy SEAL Foundation. [1] He is a former member of the Council on Foreign Relations. [10]
Johnny Reid Edwards is an American lawyer and former politician who served as a U.S. senator from North Carolina. He was the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2004 alongside John Kerry, losing to incumbents George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. He also was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004 and 2008.
John David Podesta Jr. is an American political consultant who has served as senior advisor to the president for clean energy innovation and implementation since September 2022. Podesta previously served as White House chief of staff to President Bill Clinton from 1998 to 2001 and counselor to President Barack Obama from 2014 to 2015. Before that, he served in the Clinton administration as White House staff secretary from 1993 to 1995 and White House deputy chief of staff for operations from 1997 to 1998.
Henry John Heinz III was an American businessman and politician who served as a United States senator from Pennsylvania from 1977 until his death in 1991. An heir to the Heinz family fortune, Heinz entered politics in 1971 when he won a special election to replace Robert Corbett to represent Pennsylvania's 18th congressional district. In 1976, Heinz ran to replace retiring Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott. Heinz narrowly won in the primary over future Senator Arlen Specter, and defeated William Green III. Heinz won re-election in 1982 and 1988 by large margins. On April 4, 1991, Heinz was killed when his plane, facing mechanical problems, collided with a helicopter inspecting the plane, killing all involved in the crash.
Marc Racicot is an American attorney, lobbyist, and former Republican politician who served as the 21st Governor of Montana from 1993 until 2001. After leaving office, Racicot worked as a lobbyist for the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani. His notable clients included Enron, Burlington Northern Santa Fe, and the Recording Industry Association of America.
Teresa Heinz, also known as Teresa Heinz Kerry, is an American businesswoman and philanthropist. Heinz is the widow of former U.S. Senator John Heinz and the current wife of United States Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, longtime U.S. Senator, and 2004 Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry. Heinz is Chair of the Heinz Endowments and the Heinz Family Philanthropies.
Alexandra Forbes Kerry is an American actress and filmmaker. She is a partner at Locomotive Films and co-founder of Fictional Pictures, a film production company based in New York and Los Angeles. She is married to contemporary art curator Julien Dobbs-Higginson and they have two daughters named Isabelle and Allegra.
This article lists those who were potential candidates for the Democratic nomination for Vice President of the United States in the 2004 election. Massachusetts Senator John Kerry won the 2004 Democratic nomination for President of the United States, and chose North Carolina Senator John Edwards as his running mate on July 6, 2004. The Kerry–Edwards ticket would go on to lose the 2004 election to the Bush–Cheney ticket.
André Thierstein Heinz is an American environmentalist. A descendant of Henry J. Heinz, he is the son of John Heinz and Teresa Heinz.
William Mark Peduto is an American politician who was the 60th mayor of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 2014 until 2022. He was a Democratic member of the Pittsburgh City Council from 2002 to 2014.
John Forbes Kerry is an American attorney, politician and diplomat who served as the 68th United States secretary of state from 2013 to 2017 in the administration of Barack Obama. A member of the Forbes family and the Democratic Party, he previously represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1985 to 2013 and later as the first U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate from 2021 to 2024. Kerry was the Democratic nominee for president of the United States in the 2004 election, losing to then-incumbent president George W. Bush.
Robert Hunter Biden is an American attorney and businessman. Biden has also worked as a hedge fund principal and a venture capital and private equity fund investor. He formerly worked as a banker, a lobbyist, and a legal representative for lobbying firms.
Joe Biden, the 46th and current president of the United States, has family members who are prominent in law, education, activism and politics. Biden's immediate family became the first family of the United States on his inauguration on January 20, 2021. His immediate family circle was also the second family of the United States from 2009 to 2017, when Biden was vice president. Biden's family is mostly descended from the British Isles, with most of their ancestors coming from Ireland and England, and a smaller number descending from the French.
David Morehouse is an American businessman and former president and chief executive officer of Pittsburgh Penguins of the National Hockey League. During his tenure, the Penguins won three Stanley Cups, reached four Stanley Cup finals and was sold out every game for 14 seasons. He previously served in politics as a member of the Clinton administration, and on the presidential campaigns of Al Gore (2000) and John Kerry (2004).
Blair W. Effron is an American financier. Effron co-founded Centerview Partners, a leading global investment banking firm based in New York City. Centerview has offices in London, Paris, Chicago, Los Angeles, Palo Alto and San Francisco. The firm provides advice on mergers and acquisitions, financial restructurings, valuation, and capital structure to companies, institutions and governments.
Burisma Holdings Limited was a holding company based in Kyiv, Ukraine, for a group of energy exploration and production companies. It was registered in Limassol, Cyprus, until being dissolved in 2023. Burisma Holdings operated in the Ukrainian natural gas market since 2002. It was one of the largest private natural gas producers in Ukraine, circa 2019. It was owned by Ukrainian oligarch Mykola Zlochevsky through his company Brociti Investments Limited.
BHR Partners (Shanghai) Equity Investment Fund Management Co., Ltd. is a Chinese private equity firm. The company was renamed to BHR Partners (Shanghai) Equity Investment Fund Management Co., Ltd. on May 31, 2023. BHR Partners was founded in 2013 by Bohai Industrial Investment Fund Management Co., Ltd., which is controlled by Bank of China Limited whose focus is on mergers and acquisitions, investments, and reforms as part of the country's state-owned enterprises.
On April 25, 2019, former vice president Joe Biden released a video announcing his candidacy in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries. On November 3, 2020, Biden and his running mate, Kamala Harris, defeated incumbent Republican president Donald Trump and vice president Mike Pence in the general election.
The Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory is a series of false allegations that Joe Biden, while he was vice president of the United States, improperly withheld a loan guarantee and took a bribe to pressure Ukraine into firing prosecutor general Viktor Shokin to prevent a corruption investigation of Ukrainian gas company Burisma and to protect his son, Hunter Biden, who was on the Burisma board. As part of efforts by Donald Trump and his campaign in the Trump–Ukraine scandal, which led to Trump's first impeachment, these falsehoods were spread in an attempt to damage Joe Biden's reputation and chances during the 2020 presidential campaign, and later in an effort to impeach him.
Christopher Raphael Deluzio is an American attorney, politician and former U.S. Navy officer serving as the U.S. representative for Pennsylvania's 17th congressional district since 2023. The district includes most of the northwestern suburbs of Pittsburgh. He is a member of the Democratic Party.
Devon Archer is an American businessman and entrepreneur who was a venture capital and private-equity fund investor. He was a founding board member of BHR Partners, a Chinese investment company, in 2013.